Climate experts talk about the 56Bn tonnes of GHG emissions we must remove to reach our climate goals, but we don't know where it is coming from. We have relied on out-of-date info, often from the polluters themselves.

A new collaborative called Climate Trace is changing all that by bringing real-time data in one comprehensive visualization solution. They harvest sensor data from sensors on land, in the sky, and in the sea to report on which companies and sectors are producing emissions. This is the first comprehensive climate accounting source to support decision-making on climate themes.

We harness satellite imagery and other forms of remote sensing, artificial intelligence, and collective data science expertise to track human-caused GHG emissions with unprecedented detail and speed.

This is critical work as we need to understand the emissions before we are able to remove it from a system. Management guru, Peter Drucker famously said, "you can't manage what you can't measure." We must understand our emissions sources and use this data inspect how our interventions are working by tracing reductions over time. 

Shining a light on emissions data through a collective helps:

• remove our reliance on polluter self-reporting;

• provides more timely feedback cycles, no more waiting years to see if emission reductions is happening;

• stops the hiding of emissions in the fog uncertainty and poor data reporting;

• connect the dots to responsible sectors and companies and removes their ability to point the finger of blame at individual consumers.

I've always believed the best climate work is based on collaborative projects. True to form, Climate Trace is a non-profit collective with Rocky Mountain Institute, Al Gore, Blue Sky Analytics, Carbon Yield, Transition Zero, Google.org, and more contributing their effort to the project.

They continue to look for teams with data, data analytics capabilities, data sources such as sensor networks, and more. Connect with them by following my link in the comments.