Size distortion

Africa actually has 14 times as much area as Greenland

Thematic mapping

In the wild

Web Mercator

• Mercator projection cropped to ~85°N to 85°S -> square, good for tiling
• Spherical and ellipsoidal mix of formulas

Equal Earth Greenwich

EPSG:8857

Equal Earth Americas

EPSG:8858

Equal Earth Asia-Pacific

EPSG:8859

Equal Earth Florence

Florence Meridian 11E

Dynamic center meridian

Interactive example (OpenLayers)

Use Mercator for higher zoom levels

• World view: Equal earth
• Regional view: Mercator

Challenges: Antimeridian problems

Solutions:

• Prepare data (split at potential antimeridians)
• Improve rendering algorithms

Smooth transition Equal Earth -> Mercator

Example: MapLibre globe

Projection

• PROJ -> GDAL, QGIS, R
• proj4js
• D3

OpenLayers

• Projection support for raster and vector data
• Reprojection of vector tiles
• Support for non-Mercator grids

MapLibre

• Single tile grid
• Globe view reprojected from Mercator tiles
• In development: Equal earth view reprojected from Mercator tiles!

Ways to support Equal Earth

• Use data in Equal Earth projection
  • Which tile grids?
  • PoC SotM EU 2024: Equal Earth projected data in Mercator grid
• Reproject data from WGS84 (or Mercator?)

How can you help?

• Sponsor development
• Call out bad maps and spread the word
• Use Equal Earth for world maps