OpenStreetMap-derived data: method and offer

How to read the queries

Each block is the Overpass QL text the ETL sends to the public Overpass API, copied from the source. Sections 1–3 go through etl/download_global.py::overpass_query; the other sections' downloaders each carry their own copy of the retry loop. The server list and the user agent of each are read from its source:

Every list starts with overpass-api.de; a list that names a second server moves to it only after a failed attempt. A query that runs once per region is shown once, with its {s},{w},{n},{e} placeholders (south, west, north, east, decimal degrees) and the region table it runs over. Raw answers are cached under data/raw/; each section's refresh line says how its files are renewed — a rolling refresh in the nightly (the lines, substations and GB groups: the stalest files of a group each night, a full cycle in about 30 days), a fetch only when the cached file is missing (planned upgrades, gas pipelines, data centres), or a static release that is re-fetched by hand (the EU 33 kV cells, gas facilities and projects, water, fibre, offshore cables, the WECC rasters). The rules describe the current ETL code; the served tiles are rebuilt by the nightly, so the map can lag a rule change by one build and a new extract by one refresh. Processing rules are given in plain words with the module and function that implements them; the properties listed are the ones the served tile carries.

1. Transmission lines

served layer: Transmission lines (lines.pmtiles, free) · raw files: osm_<region>_hv_lines.json, osm_<region>_all_lines.json, osm_gb_lines_cables.json, osm_<region>_hv_cables.json · modules: etl/download_global.py, etl/download_eu_33kv.py, etl/process_global.py, etl/_hifld_gapfill.py · refresh: 1a, 1b, 1d, 1e rolling: each nightly re-fetches the stalest files of the group, a full cycle in about 30 days (etl/_osm_refresh.py); 1c a static release — the downloader is not in any workflow; re-fetched by hand

Four kinds of extract feed one layer, which also carries PyPSA-Eur gridkit lines (220 kV and up in the PyPSA-Eur countries; not OpenStreetMap-derived) and, in the United States, HIFLD lines where no served line has the line (the gap-fill rule below) in the same tile.

1a. World HV lines — download_global_lines (one query per region)

[out:json][timeout:240];
(
  way["power"="line"]["voltage"~"{V_REGEX_HV}"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

{V_REGEX_HV} = ([3-9][0-9]{4}|[1-9][0-9]{5,}) (a voltage tag of 30,000 V or more, as text). {s},{w},{n},{e} is the region's bounding box from this table (south, west, north, east; regions overlap a little and the processor dedupes):

1b. Sparse-region fill — download_sparse_region_fill (no voltage filter)

[out:json][timeout:240];
(
  way["power"="line"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["power"="cable"]["location"="underground"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Run over the bounding boxes of these regions only: af_madagascar, eu_iceland, na_alaska, na_hawaii, oc_pacific.

1c. European 33 kV supplement — etl/download_eu_33kv.py::_fetch_region (the same HV query, cell by cell)

[out:json][timeout:170];
(way["power"="line"]["voltage"~"{dg.V_REGEX_HV}"]({cs},{cw},{cn},{ce}););
out geom;

{dg.V_REGEX_HV} is the regex of 1a. Each region below is cut into 2.0° × 2.0° cells ({cs},{cw},{cn},{ce}); the cells are merged and deduplicated by element id into osm_<region>_hv_lines.json, replacing the one-shot regional file of 1a for that region.

1d. Great Britain lines and cables — download_global.py::gb_lines_cables_query, the gb_full group

[out:json][timeout:300];
area["ISO3166-1"="GB"]["admin_level"="2"]->.uk;
(
  way["power"="line"](area.uk);
  way["power"="cable"](area.uk);
);
out geom;

Every power=line and every power=cable way (any location, any voltage) in the United Kingdom area (the country relation: land and the 12-nautical-mile territorial sea). Written to osm_gb_lines_cables.json; it replaces the earlier osm_gb_all_lines.json, which was fetched but never processed. It serves Great Britain's sub-220 kV supplement from the first nightly build after this change (dated 2026-10-03); until that build, and whenever the file is absent, the GB supplement comes from the GB + Ireland extract of 1c as before. From the first nightly build after the GB backbone switch of 2026-10-04 it also serves Great Britain's 220 kV-and-up backbone (the rules below).

1e. United States underground HV cables — download_us_hv_cables (the us_cables group)

[out:json][timeout:240];
(
  way["power"="cable"]["voltage"~"{V_REGEX_HV100}"]["location"!~"^(underwater|submarine|sea|offshore)"]["submarine"!="yes"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

{V_REGEX_HV100} = ([1-9][0-9]{5,}) (a voltage tag of 100,000 V or more). Run over the 1a bounding boxes of these regions (the contiguous United States; the boxes also reach southern Canada and northern Mexico, whose cables are served like their overhead lines): na_east, na_west, na_central. Written to osm_<region>_hv_cables.json and read with the HV line files under the same rules, plus the cable floor of the PyPSA-Eur countries: a cable below 100 kV is not served (collector and distribution cabling — wind-farm array cables are often tagged location=underground even on the seabed). Served as power_kind=cable. Underwater and submarine cables are not fetched here: they are the Offshore cables layer's (§10), which from 2026-11-03 draws OpenStreetMap's underwater power cables worldwide (until then only inside its US East Coast box, 24–45° N, 82–65° W — the Trans Bay Cable under San Francisco Bay, for one, was on neither layer and came from the HIFLD gap-fill below; the gap-fill's own comparison set is the copy of the 2026-04 layer named in its rule, unchanged). Alaska and Hawaii already receive cables from the sparse fill of 1b. Served from the first nightly build after this change (dated 2026-10-13).

Processing rules (etl/process_global.py::process_osm_lines_non_europe, process_lines)

• Voltage — parse_voltage_levels_kv: the voltage tag is split on ; and ,, every value is read as volts and divided by 1,000, values below 1 kV and above 2,000 kV are ignored; the way's kV is the highest level kept, and every level is remembered for the multi-voltage rule below.
• Not route — a way tagged line=busbar or line=bay (conductors inside a substation), or carrying a lifecycle state (proposed, planned, construction, disused, abandoned, dismantled, demolished, razed, removed, ruins — as <prefix>:power=* or a bare <prefix>=yes; a date in construction=* is not a state), is dropped from every OpenStreetMap line file worldwide (osm_line_exclusion).
• Floor — ways with no usable voltage or under 33 kV are dropped (except in the sparse-fill regions of 1b, where every way is kept).
• PyPSA-Eur countries (continental Europe, Great Britain and Ireland) — OpenStreetMap supplies only the 33–219 kV supplement: a way at 220 kV and above is dropped there because PyPSA-Eur gridkit owns the backbone — unless its voltage list also carries a 33–219 kV level, in which case the way is served at its highest such level (a 132 kV circuit on a 400 kV tower is a 132 kV circuit) with shared_kv = the ≥ 220 kV level it shares the route with. In the continental and Ireland files a power=cable way below 100 kV is dropped too (OSM_SUPPLEMENT_CABLE_MIN_KV: 33 / 66 kV cable is distribution and offshore inter-array cabling; 33 / 66 kV overhead lines are kept). In the GB extract (1d) a cable is kept from 33 kV, like a line (GB_SUPPLEMENT_CABLE_MIN_KV; since 2026-10-12, from the first nightly build after this change), except a cable below 100 kV that runs under water — location = underwater or submarine (in a ; list too) or submarine=yes: offshore-wind inter-array and island cabling (supplement_cable_exclusion); a cable at 100 kV and up is kept under water or not. A way tagged frequency=0 is left to PyPSA-Eur's HVDC links — outside Great Britain. So in Great Britain the supplement is lines at 33–219 kV and cables at 100–219 kV, with cables at 33–99 kV on land, and the ≥ 220 kV network is the backbone rule below.
• Great Britain ≥ 220 kV — the backbone switch of 2026-10-04 (GB_BACKBONE_MIN_KV; served from the first nightly build after it). A way of the GB extract (1d) whose highest level is 220 kV or more, operating and not a substation connector (line=busbar / bay / substation / internal, GB_BACKBONE_EXCLUDED_LINE_TAGS), is served at that level with country=GB, its length and our capacity estimate — overhead lines and cables alike, so the 220 kV offshore-wind export cables are in (they also appear on the Offshore Cables layer); a way carrying a lower level too is served as two rows (the backbone row carries voltage_levels, e.g. 275;132; the sub-220 kV circuit keeps the rule above). Northern Ireland: a way whose first, middle and last vertex lie on the island of Ireland (etl/_gb_geometry.py, the pilot's polygon) is not served from this file — gridkit's Northern Ireland lines stay. HVDC (frequency=0): the way is first looked up in the interconnector table GB_HVDC_INTERCONNECTORS (wikidata tag, else name / ref): a link PyPSA-Eur gridkit already serves as a cross-border link (BritNed, IFA, Nemo, Moyle, the East-West Interconnector, North Sea Link) is left to gridkit — its sea cable and its onshore segments — so a link is never drawn twice; a link gridkit lacks (Viking Link, IFA2, ElecLink, Greenlink) is served from OpenStreetMap, as whole ways (Viking's Danish waters included); a way in neither row is served when both its end vertices are in Great Britain or UK waters (the Western HVDC Link, Caithness–Moray, Shetland, the Dogger Bank / Sofia / East Anglia THREE / Hornsea 3 export links) and skipped, named in the build log, when an end is foreign; a named way of 1 km or more in neither table (GB_HVDC_INTERNAL_NAMES lists the Great Britain-internal links we expect) is served but flagged in the build log, because OpenStreetMap splits interconnector ways at the UK boundary. The gridkit side: every gridkit line or link with both ends in Great Britain (by the same geometry, on the end buses) leaves the served layer, except (a) the reviewed exception table GB_GRIDKIT_KEEP — eleven 275 kV circuits (North Hyde–Chessington, North Hyde–Willesden, Sheffield City / Wincobank / Norton Lees–Jordanthorpe, Lambhill / West George Street–Charlotte Street, Whitehouse–Currie, Whitelee Extension–East Kilbride and –Whitelee ×2; 92 km: London, Sheffield, Glasgow and Edinburgh city routes and three Whitelee wind-farm connections) that OpenStreetMap does not map continuously at 275 kV, kept with their PyPSA-Eur credit until the compare run finds the route, and (b) a link that continues one of gridkit's cross-border links at a shared bus (gridkit splits Nemo Link at a sea joint: its Richborough half has both ends in Great Britain and stays, or the link would end mid-sea). Cross-border links, Northern Ireland, Ireland and the continent are untouched. Fallback: when the GB extract is absent, unreadable or substantially short — fewer than GB_BACKBONE_MIN_WAYS (2,000) backbone ways or under GB_BACKBONE_MIN_HV_KM (9,500) km of 275 / 400 kV route (the 2026-10-02 extract: 2,646 ways, 10,063 km) — the backbone rows are withheld and gridkit serves Great Britain exactly as before — never a Great Britain with no backbone. The engines' network bundles are not read from this layer and keep gridkit.
• Capacity — capacity_mw is our estimate from the voltage class × circuits (or cables ÷ 3). For a multi-voltage way kept at its sub-220 kV level it is estimated for one circuit at that level, unless the circuits / cables tag is a ;-list aligned with the voltage tag, whose matching element is used; the way-total circuits / cables tags are not served for those ways (they count the ≥ 220 kV circuits too).
• Deduplication — by OpenStreetMap way id across extracts (the GB file is read first, so its copy of a way wins over the GB + Ireland bbox copy); then an OpenStreetMap way whose endpoints and voltage match a PyPSA-Eur line (endpoints within 2 km, either orientation) is dropped; then within-OSM near-duplicates are dropped when both endpoints lie within 100 m, the voltage bucket is the same and the lengths are within 10 %. For a pair in which at least one way comes from the GB lines-and-cables file (1d) a fourth test applies: the two routes must coincide (mean offset within 20 m, both directions) — parallel GB circuits mapped as separate ways, a second tower line tens of metres away, are kept. Everywhere else the three-test rule of before 2026-10-03 stands unchanged until the route test's world-wide effect on the layer has been measured (on the GB extract it kept 43 % of the endpoint-matched pairs).
• Properties kept — voltage_kv, a voltage bucket, capacity_mw, operator, name, ref, cables, circuits, source=OSM, osm_id, shared_kv (multi-voltage ways only), power_kind=cable (cable ways only).
• HIFLD gap-fill (United States) — etl/_hifld_gapfill.py, after every rule above: a line of the HIFLD Open Electric Power Transmission Lines file (its final public issue, frozen 2025-08-26, as archived by SeerAI; CC BY 4.0) is drawn only where no line the map already shows has it: the lines of this layer and the Offshore cables layer's North American ways (§10, copied to etl/seed/offshore_cables_na.geojson) — not all of OpenStreetMap. Each HIFLD line is sampled every 250 m. A sample is covered by a line within 250 m at any voltage; by one further off — within 2 km at the same voltage class (or with either voltage unknown), within 1 km one class away — only where the route holds on both sides: such a run counts when it has a sample within 250 m on at least one side and an uncovered sample on neither (so where two lines fork, or a different line runs alongside, the HIFLD line is drawn from where it leaves the line it shares); an uncovered run shorter than 1 km between covered samples (a bend, the end of one OpenStreetMap way) does not break the route, one at the HIFLD line's own end does. A line covers a sample only when it runs within 45° of the HIFLD line there, and never one that lies more than 250 m beyond its end. A line with no covered sample is drawn whole (unless it is under 50 m long); an uncovered stretch of 1 km or more is drawn on its own and runs on along the HIFLD route (at most 2 km) to the line it leaves, ending on it. A HIFLD line drawn twice in HIFLD's own file (within 5 m along 85 % of its length) is drawn once; a piece within 200 m of the map's lines along 75 % of its length (stubs at substations) is not drawn; nor is a piece that is HIFLD's own copy of a line the map shows on another route (a city cable HIFLD draws as a chord): a served line of its voltage class whose name carries both of the HIFLD line's end-station names (case, punctuation, St / Street, Rd / Road, kV figures and words such as substation aside) reaches both of its ends, and HIFLD has no row of its own along that line. Inactive and under-construction HIFLD lines are not drawn, nor six rows named in DENY_IDS: Neptune and the Cross Sound Cable, which the Offshore cables layer draws and HIFLD maps 0.2–6 km away from it; East Garden City – Sprain Brook (Y-49) and the two Gloucester – Camden circuits, which the US cables draw and HIFLD maps 1.4–3.8 km away from them; and a 0.24 km line HIFLD mislabels DC. These lines keep HIFLD's geometry and attributes (source=HIFLD, hifld_fill); a line with no recorded voltage is shown as "voltage unknown". HIFLD's file is the United States'; two of its lines run on about 4 km into Canada and are drawn there too. Which HIFLD lines and stretches are drawn is decided by comparing them with the served OpenStreetMap lines, so we supply them with the layer's OpenStreetMap-derived data on request (the offer below).
• Seeded lines — etl/_seed_lines.py, last of all (from the first nightly build after 2026-10-31): a line neither OpenStreetMap nor HIFLD has, drawn from the reviewed record etl/seed/line_additions.geojson (the operator's published description of the line: owner, voltage, declared capacity, in-service date, the stations it runs between, with the source named on every row). The record is sampled every 250 m and a seed is drawn only while no served line covers it: a served line of the same or a higher voltage class within 2 km, or any served AC line within 250 m, covers a sample, and a seed 80 % covered is not drawn, so the night OpenStreetMap gains the line the seed leaves on its own. A seed drawn station to station says so in its popup (seed_schematic): the alignment is not mapped. These rows carry source=Seed, seed_id, seed_basis and seed_date; they are not OpenStreetMap-derived and are not part of the offer below. They are served as their own small file, public/data/lines_seed.geojson, which the Transmission layer draws beside lines.pmtiles with the same styling and popup (the nightly writes it from the served lines; nothing is added to the tile). A seed a source has since gained is retired in the record (a retired sentence naming the source) and never drawn again; with no live seed the served file is empty. The first seed, Western Spirit, PNM's 345 kV, 800 MW line across Torrance County, New Mexico (energised December 2021), which the HIFLD file predates, was retired the evening it was added: OpenStreetMap maps the line (way 1104844306 and its continuation), and the served tile of 30 October 2026 already carried it.

2. Substations

served layer: Substations (substations.pmtiles, free) · raw files: osm_subs_<cc>.json, osm_subs_us_chunk_NN.json, osm_fr_subs_tile_NN.json, osm_gb_substations.json · modules: etl/download_global.py, etl/download_us_substations.py, etl/process_global.py · refresh: rolling: each nightly re-fetches the stalest files of the group, a full cycle in about 30 days (etl/_osm_refresh.py)

2a. One area query per country — download_global_substations

[out:json][timeout:120];
area["ISO3166-1"="{cc}"]->.a;
(
  node["power"="substation"](area.a);
  way["power"="substation"](area.a);
  relation["power"="substation"](area.a);
);
out center;

{cc} runs over 137 ISO 3166-1 codes: GB, FR, DE, ES, IT, NL, BE, AT, CH, PL, CZ, SE, NO, DK, FI, IE, PT, GR, RO, HU, SK, HR, BG, SI, LT, LV, EE, LU, RS, BA, ME, MK, AL, UA, MD, BY, IS, MT, CY, US, CA, MX, GT, HN, SV, NI, CR, PA, CU, DO, JM, TT, PR, BR, AR, CL, CO, PE, VE, EC, BO, PY, UY, GY, SR, JP, KR, CN, TW, IN, PK, BD, LK, NP, TH, VN, MY, SG, ID, PH, MM, KH, LA, TR, SA, AE, IL, JO, IQ, IR, KW, QA, BH, OM, YE, LB, SY, KZ, UZ, TM, KG, TJ, GE, AM, AZ, MN, ZA, EG, MA, DZ, TN, LY, NG, GH, KE, TZ, ET, CI, SN, CM, CD, AO, MZ, ZM, ZW, BW, NA, UG, RW, MG, MU, SD, AU, NZ, FJ, PG, RU. (The US entry times out; the US file comes from 2b. France's file is the merge of 2e's tiles.)

2b. United States in strips — etl/download_us_substations.py::build_query

[out:json][timeout:170];
(
  node["power"="substation"]({south},{west},{north},{east});
  way["power"="substation"]({south},{west},{north},{east});
  relation["power"="substation"]({south},{west},{north},{east});
);
out center;

2c. Great Britain, every substation — download_global.py::gb_substations_query, the gb_full group

[out:json][timeout:120];
area["ISO3166-1"="GB"]["admin_level"="2"]->.uk;
(
  node["power"="substation"](area.uk);
  way["power"="substation"](area.uk);
  relation["power"="substation"](area.uk);
);
out center;

Processing rules (etl/process_global.py::process_osm_substations_global)

• A node's own coordinates, else the element's Overpass center; coordinates rounded to 5 decimals.
• Voltage by the same rule as the lines (maximum of the list, volts ÷ 1,000); no voltage floor — every node, way and relation is kept, with or without a voltage, unless a rule below leaves it out.
• A node or way with a state that takes it out of service (disused=yes, abandoned=yes, construction=yes, disused:power=* and the like, the lines' rule) is left out (since 2026-11-07).
• A relation with a state that takes it out of service (disused=yes, abandoned=yes, disused:power=* and the like, the lines' rule) is left out, and so is a relation that is not an outline of a station (only type=multipolygon or type=site is read). Nodes and ways are not judged by these rules.
• A relation can repeat a station a node or way already holds, or another relation. They count as one station when the relation lists it as a member, other than an inner one and under no other name; or it has the relation's name within 1 km; or, with a name missing on either side, the same top voltage within 300 m. A place no project can connect to, such as a cable transition or a converter, and a place one can are never one station.
• A relation gives way only to one neighbour that has both its voltage and its name. Otherwise the relation stays, and a neighbour at or below its voltage goes; a neighbour at a higher voltage stays beside it. A relation of type=site with member substations is their site: the members stay and the relation does not.
• Deduplicated by OpenStreetMap (element type, id) across the files — node, way and relation ids are separate sequences. The two GB files (2a's osm_subs_gb.json and 2c's osm_gb_substations.json) overlap almost entirely and are merged; the served GB set is their union, deduplicated by (element type, id); the GB area file is read first.
• Properties kept: name, voltage_kv, a voltage bucket, operator, substation_type (the substation tag), country, frequency, source=OSM, osm_id. PyPSA-Eur buses are drawn in the same tile with source=PyPSA-Eur.
• Zoom (SUBS_MINZOOM_BY_BUCKET): the tile carries a substation from the zoom of its voltage bucket — 735 kV and up from zoom 4; 500–734 kV from zoom 5; 345–499 kV from zoom 6; 220–344 kV from zoom 7; 100–219 kV from zoom 7; 31–99 kV from zoom 9; below 31 kV from zoom 12; no voltage tag from zoom 9. Since 2026-10-12 (from the first nightly build after this change) 100–219 kV from zoom 7 (was 9) and 31–99 kV from zoom 9 (was 11), the zooms the map's style draws them from.

2d. Great Britain HV substation polygons — gb_substations_hv_geom_query: fetched, not served

[out:json][timeout:300];
area["ISO3166-1"="GB"]["admin_level"="2"]->.uk;
(
  nwr["power"="substation"]["voltage"~"([1-9][0-9]{5,})"](area.uk);
  nwr["power"="substation"]["substation"~"^(transmission|generation|converter)$"](area.uk);
);
out geom;

Written to osm_gb_substations_hv_geom.json (the gb_full group). An input of the GB network topology work; no served layer reads it today. It is listed so the inventory is complete; it is included in the offer below.

2e. France in tiles — download_global.py::fr_substations_tile_query, the fr_subs_tiles group

[out:json][timeout:180];
area["ISO3166-1"="FR"]->.a;
(
  node["power"="substation"](area.a)(41.0,-5.8,44.5,0.5);
  way["power"="substation"](area.a)(41.0,-5.8,44.5,0.5);
  relation["power"="substation"](area.a)(41.0,-5.8,44.5,0.5);
);
out center;

France's area query (2a with {cc} = FR) outgrew Overpass's time limit, so France is fetched as 13 tiles: 2a's selection cut by bounding box. The query above is tile 01; every other tile is the same query with its own box, and tile 13 is one query with all of its boxes. The tiles' boxes cover the whole globe and the area filter keeps only France, so together they return what 2a returns for France. Each tile is cached as osm_fr_subs_tile_NN.json; once all 13 hold data they are merged, deduplicated by (element type, id), into osm_subs_fr.json, the file the processing rules above read.

3. GB wind turbines and farms (new layer)

served layer: GB wind turbines (OpenStreetMap) — a separate, all-OpenStreetMap layer (gb_wind_turbines.pmtiles), UK regional cut; served since 2026-10-03 — the first tile, built that day from a fetch with the widened sea boxes, went out with the deploy; the nightly refreshes it · raw files: osm_gb_wind_generators.json, osm_gb_wind_plants.json · group: gb_wind (etl/download_global.py) · builder: etl/build_gb_wind_turbines.py · refresh: rolling: each nightly re-fetches the stalest files of the group, a full cycle in about 30 days (etl/_osm_refresh.py; the layer's data window shows the extract date)

3a. Turbines — every wind generator in the UK area plus the offshore boxes (gb_wind_generators_query)

[out:json][timeout:300];
area["ISO3166-1"="GB"]["admin_level"="2"]->.uk;
(
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](area.uk);
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](51.25,0.7,51.95,2.4);
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](50.4,-1.5,51.25,0.7);
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](51.8,-0.5,56.6,2.95);
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](55.8,-3.6,61.0,0.5);
  nwr["power"="generator"]["generator:source"="wind"](53.0,-5.6,54.95,-2.9);
);
out center tags;

3b. Wind farms — every wind plant, with member geometry (gb_wind_plants_query)

[out:json][timeout:300];
area["ISO3166-1"="GB"]["admin_level"="2"]->.uk;
(
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](area.uk);
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](51.25,0.7,51.95,2.4);
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](50.4,-1.5,51.25,0.7);
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](51.8,-0.5,56.6,2.95);
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](55.8,-3.6,61.0,0.5);
  nwr["power"="plant"]["plant:source"~"wind"](53.0,-5.6,54.95,-2.9);
);
out geom;

The United Kingdom area is land plus the 12-nautical-mile territorial sea; offshore farms beyond it are reached through these boxes, chosen to reach the UK offshore wind areas; where a box overlaps a neighbour's waters, the screen below refuses those points:

Processing rules (the UK regional cut — method version 1.0, read from the builder's PROCESSING_RULES)

• The layer is OpenStreetMap only: turbine points are power=generator + generator:source=wind elements (a way's centre stands for the turbine), farms are power=plant wind relations / ways and, for turbines in no plant, a spatial clustering of the turbines themselves. No value from any other source is mixed into the layer.
• Regional cut: points inside the Isle of Man box (54.04, -4.85, 54.42, -4.3) (south, west, north, east) are dropped; points in the neighbours' waters — coarse median-line polygons for FR, BE, NL, DE, DK, NO, IE — are refused and logged by name; a point outside the UK envelope (49.8, -8.7, 61.1, 2.95) is dropped and logged. The served set is checked again.
• Lifecycle: operating unless a lifecycle prefix sits on a feature-defining key (construction:power, proposed:power, disused:power, demolished:power, planned:generator:source …) or operational_status / disused / abandoned / construction / proposed says otherwise; removed, demolished, razed or dismantled turbines are dropped; the rest are drawn as operating / under construction / proposed / disused. A prefixed non-defining key (was:name, was:operator) carries no lifecycle.
• Duplicates: generator elements within 3 m of each other with identical tags are one turbine; the lower id is kept and the count is reported.
• Rating: generator:output:electricity is read as MW (W / kW / MW / GW; a ';'-list is summed; '2,500 kW' is thousands, '2,5 MW' a decimal comma); a value above 20 MW on one turbine is treated as a farm total and not used; 'yes', 'yes/kW' and 'small_installation' keep the text and no figure.
• Offshore: offshore=yes, floating=yes or location=offshore on the turbine; a lit seamark (seamark:light* / seamark:fog_signal*); a seamark windmotor landmark with another within 3 km (a lone one is an onshore landmark); or membership of an offshore plant (offshore=yes, a seamark production area, 'Offshore' in its name). location=roof / rooftop is onshore.
• Farms: a turbine belongs to the first power=plant relation in the extract that lists it as a member (role generator or blank), else to the closed plant way or multipolygon outer ring that contains it; a nested or overlapping relation whose turbines another relation already holds is served with n=0, n_shared and the name of the farm that draws them. The farm point is the centroid of its member turbines (else of the shared ones, else of its polygon, else the element's centre). Heights are metres (0 < h < 1000).
• Groups: turbines in no plant are grouped by single linkage at 1 km onshore and 2.5 km offshore and served as unnamed groups (kind 'group') for the country-zoom view.
• repd:id is the OpenStreetMap tag as mapped (a turbine's own, else its plant's) — a reference key, never a REPD value. Legend classes: lt1, 1to2, 2to3, 3to4, ge4, offshore, unknown (rated-size bands in MW, offshore, unknown).
• Zoom: farm and group points at z3–7, individual turbines from z8; the tile is z3–12. Every property in the tile is OpenStreetMap-derived; the tile metadata names the licence (https://opendatacommons.org/licenses/odbl/1-0/), the copyright page (https://www.openstreetmap.org/copyright) and the method-and-offer page (https://atlas.compoundingenergy.com/osm-data.html).
• Tags carried (CARRIED_TAGS): name; operator; generator:output:electricity; manufacturer / generator:manufacturer; model / generator:model; height; height:hub; rotor:diameter; start_date; ref; wikidata; repd:id; generator:type (vertical_axis); offshore / floating / location; seamark:* (offshore flag only); plant:output:electricity; turbines; the lifecycle prefixes and operational_status / disused / abandoned / construction / proposed; and the OpenStreetMap element id.
• The other direction is closed: no OpenStreetMap coordinate or attribute enters the REPD plant register, the GB fleet census, the BM-unit location table, the GB wind validation sites, any API answer or any download of those products. OpenStreetMap is an internal cross-check for them ("compare, never take"), and every correction they receive comes from a non-OpenStreetMap source.

4. Proposed lines (OpenStreetMap)

served layer: Proposed lines (OpenStreetMap) (osm_proposed_lines.pmtiles; a FREE layer since 2026-11-03 — until then the planned_lines source-layer of the paid Planned upgrades tile, which now carries no OpenStreetMap data) · raw files: osm_planned_lines.json, osm_planned_subs.json · modules: etl/download_planned.py, etl/process_planned.py · refresh: fetched by the nightly when the cached raw file is missing or older than 28 days (ATLAS_PLANNED_MAX_AGE_DAYS; a re-pull replaces the cache only above the OSM rolling-refresh retention floor), otherwise kept as is

4a. Proposed / under-construction lines (worldwide, no bounding box)

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["proposed:power"="line"];
  way["construction:power"="line"];
  way["power"="line"]["construction"="yes"];
  way["power"="line"]["planned"="yes"];
);
out geom;

4b. Proposed / under-construction substations (worldwide)

[out:json][timeout:120];
(
  node["proposed:power"="substation"];
  way["proposed:power"="substation"];
  relation["proposed:power"="substation"];
  node["construction:power"="substation"];
  way["construction:power"="substation"];
  relation["construction:power"="substation"];
);
out center;

Processing rules (etl/process_planned.py::process_planned_lines)

• Ways with fewer than two points are skipped; elements are deduplicated by OpenStreetMap id.
• Voltage: the voltage tag, else proposed:voltage; an integer above 1,000 is volts (÷ 1,000), otherwise it is read as kV already; unparseable → 0.
• Status from the lifecycle tag that matched (proposed / construction / planned). Properties: name, operator, voltage_kv, status, source=OSM, osm_id.
• Since 2026-11-03 the OpenStreetMap features are cut into their own tile (osm_proposed_lines.pmtiles, source-layer osm_proposed_lines); the paid planned.pmtiles keeps only the EIA-860M planned generators (source=EIA-860M), which are not OpenStreetMap-derived.

5. Gas pipelines

served layer: Gas pipelines (gas_pipelines.pmtiles, free) · raw files: osm_gas_<region>.json, gas_pbf_manifest.json · modules: etl/download_gas.py, etl/process_gas.py · refresh: the served tile is the WORLD build (below), re-made by hand from fresh Geofabrik extracts; the Overpass boxes roll through the staggered refresh (the stalest region re-pulled each night, a partial answer never replacing a cached one) but do not tile while the world build stands

The world build (served from the first deploy after 2026-11-03)

Not an Overpass query: etl/download_gas.py --from-pbf reads the Geofabrik continent extracts (.osm.pbf; Europe and the United States of 2026-11-02, the other continents of 2026-10-16) through osmium tags-filter w/man_made=pipeline and osmium export (GeoJSON sequence, linestrings, way ids), keeps every way whose substance is in the gas family — the same list the Overpass query below takes — and writes each extract in the Overpass answer shape, so etl/process_gas.py classifies it exactly as a box answer; a closed way tagged area=yes (a facility outline, never a pipeline) is not taken. A manifest (gas_pbf_manifest.json) names the files the processor reads; the committed stamp etl/seed/gas_pipelines_world.json records the build (extracts, sizes, md5, 108,566 ways) and keeps a box-only nightly from tiling over it. Nothing from any other source enters the OpenStreetMap part of the tile.

The Overpass boxes (the layer until 2026-11-03; still fetched for the suitability scorer)

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"~"^(gas|natural_gas|cng|lpg|ngl|hydrocarbons)$"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Processing rules (etl/process_gas.py)

• Every man_made=pipeline way whose substance is in the gas family (gas, natural_gas, cng, lpg, ngl, hydrocarbons); untagged pipelines are not taken. A way with fewer than two points is skipped.
• Deduplicated by OpenStreetMap way id across the regions / extracts (an extract that overlaps another — Moldova inside Europe — adds only the ways not yet seen); length in km computed from the geometry.
• Properties: name, operator, substance, diameter, pressure, country, length_km, osm_id, region (the box key, or gas_<extract> in the world build). The US EIA interstate / intrastate network is drawn in the same layer from EIA's own tile (gas_eia.pmtiles, not OpenStreetMap).

6. Gas facilities, LNG sites and pipeline projects

served layers: Gas facilities (gas_facilities.pmtiles: compressor stations; LNG site locations) and Gas pipeline projects (gas_pipeline_projects.pmtiles), both free · modules: etl/build_gas_facilities.py, etl/build_gas_pipeline_projects.py, etl/_gas_facilities.py · refresh: a static release — the downloader is not in any workflow; re-fetched by hand (release 2026-09-29; the builders query Overpass when they run)

6a. Compressor stations — build_gas_facilities.py::osm_compressors

[out:json][timeout:300];(nwr["substation"="compression"]({s},{w},{n},{e});nwr["pipeline"="substation"]["substance"~"gas",i]({s},{w},{n},{e}););out center tags;

Rules: every OpenStreetMap compressor station in North America is matched to the EPA Greenhouse Gas Reporting Program facility on the same site — within 1.5 km always; within 3 km when the names share a place word or station number; within 5 km when the operator or the full name also agrees — and the matched row carries both (src=OSM + GHGRP); an unmatched station stays an OpenStreetMap-only row (src=OSM); EPA-only stations sit at their reported coordinates. Tiles overlap at their edges only; the (type, id) key dedupes.

6b. LNG terminals

No Overpass query: each site's location comes from one documented public source named per row in etl/seed/lng_terminals.csv (EIA, EPA GHGRP, EPA Facility Registry Service, Wikidata or OpenStreetMap). The rows whose source is OpenStreetMap carry that credit; a machine-readable list of them is part of the offer.

6c. Gas pipeline projects — build_gas_pipeline_projects.py::osm_named_ways then osm_way_geometry

[out:json][timeout:300];(way["man_made"="pipeline"]["name"]["substance"~"gas",i]({s},{w},{n},{e});way["construction:man_made"="pipeline"]["name"]({s},{w},{n},{e});way["proposed:man_made"="pipeline"]["name"]({s},{w},{n},{e});way["man_made"="pipeline"]["construction"="yes"]["name"]({s},{w},{n},{e}););out tags center;

[out:json][timeout:300];way(id:{','.join(map(str, chunk))});out geom;

Rules: the US EIA Natural Gas Pipeline Projects tracker supplies the project list and attributes; a project is drawn only where OpenStreetMap maps a pipeline way of the same name in one of the project's states (names normalised; a name match against the wrong operator is rejected and logged); the geometry of the matched ways is then fetched by way id and the popup says how many miles are drawn. Every drawn geometry is OpenStreetMap-derived.

7. Water infrastructure

served layer: Water infrastructure (water_infrastructure.pmtiles, free; the map calls the layer Waterways) · raw files: <stem>-latest.osm.pbf (Geofabrik), osm_water_dams_<key>.json, osm_water_treatment_<key>.json, osm_water_towers_<key>.json, osm_water_pipes_<key>.json · modules: etl/process_water_fiber.py, etl/download_water_fiber.py, etl/fetch_water_pipelines.py · refresh: a static release — the downloader is not in any workflow; re-fetched by hand

7·0. Worldwide from the Geofabrik extracts (the served tile since 2026-11-03) — process_water_fiber.py --pbf

The served tile is built from the Geofabrik continent extracts (<stem>-latest.osm.pbf of 2026-11-02: africa, asia, australia-oceania, central-america, south-america, russia, europe, the four eastern-Europe country extracts, north-america canada / mexico and us — every continent but Antarctica; Greenland's own extract was not fetched), not from Overpass: osmium tags-filter with the expressions below (referenced nodes kept, so ways have geometry), then osmium export and the processing rules of this section. The expressions are the union of the tags the Overpass queries of 7a–7d ask for, plus man_made=reservoir_covered (the legend's Reservoirs, which no Overpass query fetched); man_made=water_well is left out. The Overpass queries remain the documented fallback and define the tag set.

nwr/man_made=dam,reservoir_covered,water_works,desalination_plant,wastewater_plant,pumping_station,water_tower
nwr/waterway=dam,pipeline
w/man_made=pipeline
w/communication=line
w/telecom=cable
w/utility=telecom

7a. Dams

[out:json][timeout:120];
(
  node["waterway"="dam"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["waterway"="dam"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out center;

7b. Water treatment, desalination, wastewater

[out:json][timeout:120];
(
  node["man_made"="water_works"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="water_works"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  node["man_made"="desalination_plant"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="desalination_plant"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  node["man_made"="wastewater_plant"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="wastewater_plant"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out center;

7c. Water towers and pumping stations (the first seven regions below — Europe only)

[out:json][timeout:120];
(
  node["man_made"="pumping_station"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  node["man_made"="water_tower"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out;

7d. Water and sewage pipelines — fetch_water_pipelines.py::download_all

[out:json][timeout:180];
(
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"="water"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"="drinking_water"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"="rainwater"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"="sewage"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["man_made"="pipeline"]["substance"="wastewater"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["waterway"="pipeline"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Processing rules (etl/process_water_fiber.py::process_water_infrastructure)

• Every osm_water_*.json file is read; elements deduplicated by OpenStreetMap id; a way with geometry becomes a line, a node or a centre a point.
• The infrastructure type is taken from the file (dam, treatment, tower / pump, pipe); properties: name, type, operator, feature type, osm_id.
• From the extracts (classify_water, the same rules): waterway=dam → Dam; man_made=pipeline with substance sewage / wastewater → Sewage Pipeline, water / drinking_water / rainwater → Water Pipeline (any other substance dropped); waterway=pipeline → Water Pipeline; the other man_made values by the type table. A node is a point; a way or multipolygon area becomes the centre of its bounding box (Overpass out center); pipelines keep the way geometry. Features are deduplicated by typed OpenStreetMap id across the extracts (they overlap along their borders).
• The tile has one source layer, water_infra, and every feature in it is OpenStreetMap-derived. Rivers and lakes are a separate Natural Earth tile.

8. Data centres and the DC pipeline

served layers: Data centres (datacenters.pmtiles) and the DC pipeline (dc_pipeline.pmtiles), both free · raw file: osm_datacenters.json · modules: etl/download_telecom.py, etl/process_telecom.py, etl/process_dc_pipeline.py · refresh: fetched by the nightly only when the cached raw file is missing, otherwise kept as is (no age check; a layer can be months behind OpenStreetMap)

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  node["telecom"="data_center"];
  way["telecom"="data_center"];
  node["building"="data_centre"];
  way["building"="data_centre"];
  node["man_made"="data_center"];
  way["man_made"="data_center"];
);
out center;

Processing rules

• process_telecom.py::process_data_centers: a node's coordinates or the element's centre; properties name, operator, country, power_mw, cooling, building_levels, type=datacenter (no element id is kept; the CSV export credits these rows by layer and type). Internet exchanges in the same tile come from PeeringDB, not OpenStreetMap.
• process_dc_pipeline.py::process_osm_datacenters: the same elements become source=OpenStreetMap rows of the DC pipeline, conflated with Epoch AI, PNNL IM3 (itself ODbL), Wikidata and hyperscaler disclosures — a site reported by a richer source keeps that source's record and the OpenStreetMap point fills where no other source has it.

9. Telecom and fibre

served layers: Terrestrial fibre (terrestrial_fiber.pmtiles), Fibre routes (fiber_routes.pmtiles), US fibre (us_fiber.pmtiles), all free · modules: etl/download_water_fiber.py, etl/download_fiber_routes.py, etl/download_us_fiber.py, etl/process_water_fiber.py, etl/process_fiber_routes.py, etl/process_us_fiber.py · refresh: a static release — the downloader is not in any workflow; re-fetched by hand

9a. Terrestrial fibre — download_water_fiber.py::download_terrestrial_fiber (the tag set) and process_water_fiber.py --pbf (the served tile since 2026-11-03, worldwide)

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["communication"="line"]["telecom:medium"="fibre"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["telecom"="cable"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["utility"="telecom"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Since 2026-11-03 the served tile comes from the Geofabrik continent extracts of 2026-11-02 (the same files and osmium steps as section 7·0), not from these seven Overpass boxes: a way matches when it carries one of the three clauses above (communication=line with telecom:medium=fibre, telecom=cable, or utility=telecom — classify_fiber); the filter expressions are the w/communication=line, w/telecom=cable and w/utility=telecom lines of:

nwr/man_made=dam,reservoir_covered,water_works,desalination_plant,wastewater_plant,pumping_station,water_tower
nwr/waterway=dam,pipeline
w/man_made=pipeline
w/communication=line
w/telecom=cable
w/utility=telecom

Rules (process_water_fiber.py::process_terrestrial_fiber / process_from_pbf): every matching way kept, deduplicated by OpenStreetMap id; properties name, operator, medium (telecom:medium, fibre when absent), location, osm_id.

9b. US confirmed fibre — download_fiber_routes.py::download_osm_fiber

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["communication"="line"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["telecom:medium"="fibre"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["telecom"="cable"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["utility"="telecom"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

9c. European mainline rail (a fibre-corridor proxy) — download_fiber_routes.py::download_eu_rail

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["railway"="rail"]["usage"~"main|branch"]["service"!~"siding|spur|yard"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Rules (process_fiber_routes.py): OpenStreetMap fibre ways are route_type=confirmed_fiber, source=OpenStreetMap; rail corridors are proxies (route_type=rail_proxy) with an estimated bandwidth class by rail class — the EU rail proxies are OpenStreetMap-derived, the US ones come from BTS / FRA. Elements deduplicated by OpenStreetMap id.

9d. US telecom exchanges — download_us_fiber.py::download_osm_telecom_exchanges

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  node["telecom"="exchange"](24,-130,50,-60);
  way["telecom"="exchange"](24,-130,50,-60);
  node["telecom"="central_office"](24,-130,50,-60);
  way["telecom"="central_office"](24,-130,50,-60);
);
out center;

Rules (process_us_fiber.py::process_osm_exchanges): points (node or centre), deduplicated by id, type=exchange (no element id is kept; the CSV export credits these rows by layer and type); the colocation facilities (PeeringDB) and FCC BDC tract points in the same tile are not OpenStreetMap-derived.

10. Offshore cables

served layer: Submarine Power Cables (OSM) (offshore_cables.pmtiles, free) · raw files: osm_ow_pbf/<extract>.geojsonseq (+ .prov.json), osm_ow_<key>.json · modules: etl/download_offshore_cables.py, etl/process_offshore_cables.py · refresh: a static release — rebuilt by hand; worldwide from 2026-11-03 (Geofabrik extracts: Europe and the United States as of 2026-11-01, the other continents as of 2026-10-15), the eight Overpass boxes below until then

10a. Worldwide — the OpenStreetMap extracts through osmium (from 2026-11-03)

Geofabrik's continent extracts (africa, asia, australia-oceania, central-america, south-america, russia, north-america's canada / mexico / us, europe with its belarus / georgia / moldova / ukraine files; nothing for Antarctica — OpenStreetMap as of 2026-11-01 for europe and us, 2026-10-15 for the rest), each first reduced to the tags this site's OpenStreetMap layers read, then osmium tags-filter with the union of the four selections of the query below and osmium export (-f geojsonseq --geometry-types=linestring -a id: every kept way as a line with all its tags and its id):

osmium tags-filter -o <stem>.filtered.osm.pbf <extract>.osm.pbf w/power=cable w/location=underwater,submarine w/submarine=yes w/seamark:type

The processor then applies the query's AND conditions to every exported way (process_offshore_cables.is_offshore_cable: power=cable with location=underwater or submarine, or with submarine=yes; power=line with location=overhead and a seamark:type), so the extracts admit exactly the ways the Overpass query admits. 2026-11-03 build: 218,188 ways exported, 2,621 served (2,359 from the europe extract, 136 asia, 44 australia-oceania, 40 us, 21 canada, 11 south-america, 9 africa, 1 central-america; mexico, russia, belarus, georgia, moldova and ukraine 0 — OpenStreetMap maps no submarine power cable there under these tags). A cable tagged location=underground on the seabed, or with no location tag, is not served (215 such ways carry seamark:type=cable_submarine; the selection is the 2026-04 build's, unchanged).

10b. The eight Overpass boxes (the 2026-04 build; still read, adding only ways the extracts lack)

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  way["power"="cable"]["location"="underwater"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["power"="cable"]["location"="submarine"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["power"="line"]["location"="overhead"]["seamark:type"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
  way["power"="cable"]["submarine"="yes"]({s},{w},{n},{e});
);
out geom;

Rules: every way kept, deduplicated by OpenStreetMap id (the extracts first, then the boxes); properties name, operator, voltage (parsed as for the lines), cables, frequency, location, osm_id; the tile carries the credit "© OpenStreetMap contributors, ODbL 1.0" in its metadata. The 2026-04 layer's North American ways (west of 50° W) were copied to etl/seed/offshore_cables_na.geojson, which the HIFLD gap-fill of §1 compares HIFLD lines with (2026-10-13); that copy is pinned by checksum and did not change with the worldwide build.

11. Aerodromes: exclusion zones, suitability, WECC CEM screening

served: Exclusion zones (exclusions.pmtiles, the airports source-layer, free); Site suitability (suitability.pmtiles); WECC CEM screening rasters (excl_airports.cog.tif, combined_exclusion, bitmask bit 3) and the downloads bundle; the global route finder's grids on US land (cats.tif's airport bit, from 2026-11-04) and in Great Britain and Europe (from 2026-11-05); the 1 km and 100 m route grids (cats.tif, fine.tif: these aerodrome points from 2026-10-15, the aerodromes of the seeds below from 2026-11-05); Site Development Cost, Grid Connection by Size and Site Value through those bits · modules: etl/download_suitability.py, etl/process_exclusions.py, etl/score_suitability.py, etl/build_wecc_exclusions.py, etl/publish_wecc_cem_inputs.py, etl/build_route_global.py, etl/build_route_finder.py, etl/build_route_fine.py, etl/build_site_cost_ext.py, etl/_airport_outlines.py, etl/build_airport_outlines.py, etl/seed/us_airport_outlines.geojson, etl/seed/airport_outlines.geojson, etl/build_airport_point_names.py, etl/seed/airport_point_names.json · refresh: the weekly suitability workflow (Mondays 03:00 UTC) runs the downloader, which fetches the aerodrome file only when its cached copy is missing; the exclusions tile was built 2026-04 and rebuilt 2026-11-05 from the same points and the seeds below; the WECC CEM rasters are a static release (2026-09-11)

11a. Aerodromes worldwide — download_suitability.py::download_airports

[out:json][timeout:300];
(
  node["aeroway"="aerodrome"];
  way["aeroway"="aerodrome"];
  relation["aeroway"="aerodrome"];
);
out center;

• process_exclusions.py::process_airports: one point per aerodrome (node or centre), properties name, type = airport, the IATA code where tagged → the exclusions tile, with a marker at the centre of each aerodrome of the seeds below that has no point yet.
• build_route_global.py::file_airports: on the global route grids that hold the US or Europe designations (§12), these points on that land set the airport bit: the cells a 1.5 km disc touches round a point with an iata tag, and the cell a point falls in for any other. A point on a sea cell of the grid stands on the nearest land cell within two cells, and takes that cell; with none it sets nothing. On the 5 km world grid only a point whose iata tag holds three capital letters, alone or among several codes, sets the bit, as the tag also holds other identifiers, and it does so on that land and on Europe's small territories it leaves out (Kosovo, the Isle of Man, Jersey, Guernsey, Åland, the Faroes, northern Cyprus and the British bases), and in Melilla's cell. No name or code is kept on the grids; the names seed below holds names apart from them. The query has asked for relations too since 2026-11-05; the file in use was fetched in April 2026 with nodes and ways only, so an aerodrome mapped only as a relation is not among these points, and the seeds below hold it; a closed way is one point here, at the middle of its bounds, and the seed below holds the outline of one larger than that point's square.
• etl/seed/us_airport_outlines.geojson: the aerodrome relations in Alaska east of 180° and in Hawaii, Honolulu, Juneau and Sitka among them, 21 outlines, 12 of which also have a point above, with name and iata tag and no element id, cut from Geofabrik's US extract (2026-11-01) with osmium tags-filter on r/aeroway=aerodrome and osmium export --geometry-types=polygon. file_airports counts each as a point at its representative point, by the rule above, and it also sets the cells its outline touches on US land; on the 5 km world grid only those whose iata tag is three capital letters count.
• etl/seed/airport_outlines.geojson: the aerodrome relations of the contiguous US, Puerto Rico and the US Virgin Islands, Great Britain, Northern Ireland and Europe, O'Hare, Heathrow, Frankfurt and San Juan among them, and the closed ways of those places and of Alaska east of 180° and Hawaii, Denver, Orlando, Madrid and Paris Charles de Gaulle among them, when the square a point above gets on the 100 m grid (2.1 km across with an iata tag, 0.7 km without) does not hold the way's whole outline, as with one larger than that or with no point there: 7205 outlines, 785 relations and 6420 ways, with element id (osm_id), name, iata and icao tags, country and centre, by etl/build_airport_outlines.py from Geofabrik's US and Europe extracts (2026-11-01) and Central America extract (2026-10-15): osmium tags-filter on w/aeroway=aerodrome and r/aeroway=aerodrome, osmium export --geometry-types=polygon; a relation whose rings do not close, or a closed way that crosses itself, takes the convex hull of its nodes, up to 200 km², else a point at their centre; simplified to 0.0003°. Heliports, gliding sites and microlight strips stay when they are tagged aeroway=aerodrome, as the points above keep them; those tagged or named closed, abandoned, disused or historic are left out, and the file lists them, apart from three working airfields kept by element id (College Park, Stanton, Southern California Logistics), and most closed fields keep their point above, as those points do not test the tags; so are the 117 outlines with no name under 0.05 km², which it counts, and a named one stays however small. Each counts as a point at its centre by the reader's own rule for a point, and also sets the cells its outline touches on land, on the route grids, on the same land of the 5 km grid for an iata code (build_route_finder.py::_airports, build_route_fine.py::_airport_mask, file_airports) and on the Site Development Cost grids of Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico (build_site_cost_ext.py::_airports); both seeds add markers to the exclusions tile. The Site Development Cost, Grid Connection by Size and Site Value rasters take the route grids' bits, so they are Produced Works of these aerodromes too.
• etl/seed/airport_point_names.json: the names of the aerodromes above, 43453 rows, by etl/build_airport_point_names.py: each named point above, coded or not, and each named aeroway=aerodrome of the regional Geofabrik extracts the 2 km and 5 km grids read (§12) that no point of that name stands near, as the points leave out relations. A row holds the name, its longitude and latitude to four decimal places, whether its iata tag holds three capital letters (no code is kept), and for an area the distance from the middle of its bounds, where the row stands, to their corner. No element id and no outline. Only the route finder reads it, and only for its words: to name the airport a line on the 2 km or 5 km grids may cross where that is the only way through, and the airport a click stands on. No grid, tile or raster reads it.
• score_suitability.py: the Site Suitability Score is computed from distances to the nearest features of our processed layers — substations, transmission lines, gas pipelines, data centres, water infrastructure, European terrestrial fibre and US fibre points (all of which carry OpenStreetMap-derived features, sections 1, 2, 5, 7, 8 and 9) — and from the aerodrome points above (a 5 % weight, with a 2–5 km exclusion distance by technology). A score or verdict quoted in a site report is a Produced Work of these derived databases, and the site report prints the OpenStreetMap credit when it quotes one. The suitability tile (suitability.pmtiles, a vector tile of grid cells) also carries each cell's distance fields — sub_dist_km, line_dist_km, water_dist_km, gas_dist_km, fiber_dist_km, airport_dist_km — which are derived from the layers above: under the ODbL for their OpenStreetMap-derived part and covered by the offer below (the CSV export credits every row of this layer), as are the aerodrome points and the other layers' OpenStreetMap-derived parts.
• The Suitability score and the WECC screening rasters (§11b) still read nodes and ways only: the score reads the cached file of nodes and ways until it is refreshed, and the rasters were built from their own cache. An aerodrome mapped only as a relation carries no airport distance in the score and no mask in the rasters, and one mapped as a closed way counts as one point there.

11b. WECC aerodromes — build_wecc_exclusions.py::layer_airports

[out:json][timeout:300];(node["aeroway"="aerodrome"]({s},{w},{n},{e});way["aeroway"="aerodrome"]({s},{w},{n},{e});relation["aeroway"="aerodrome"]({s},{w},{n},{e}););out center;

{s},{w},{n},{e} is the bounding box of the eleven WECC states. Rules: the aerodrome points inside the WECC footprint are buffered by airport_buffer_km (3.0 km by default; the value is recorded in each raster's .prov sidecar) and burned into a 250 m uint8 mask (excl_airports.cog.tif; bit 3 of bitmask.cog.tif; part of combined_exclusion.cog.tif and of the per-state airport km² in screening_summary.csv). The published COGs are Produced Works of this derived database; the buffered aerodrome polygons and the source points are included in the offer, and the downloads bundle's README carries the credit and this page's address. The query has asked for relations too since 2026-11-05; the published rasters were built from a cache of nodes and ways, fetched before that.

12. The global route finder's constraints: protected areas, military land, aerodromes

served: Exclusion zones (route_constraints_global.pmtiles, the constraints source-layer, free; from 2026-11-03) and the global route finder's 2 km grids (the cats.tif no-go / sensitive bands and the route card's designation names) · modules: etl/build_route_global.py, etl/build_route_constraints_global.py · refresh: a static release — the extracts were downloaded 2026-10-16; re-fetched by hand with the global route grids

12a. Geofabrik extracts — build_route_global.osm_extract

Not Overpass: the continent extracts central-america-latest.osm.pbf, europe_moldova-latest.osm.pbf, europe_georgia-latest.osm.pbf, europe_belarus-latest.osm.pbf, europe_ukraine-latest.osm.pbf, north-america_mexico-latest.osm.pbf, australia-oceania-latest.osm.pbf, russia-latest.osm.pbf, south-america-latest.osm.pbf, north-america_canada-latest.osm.pbf, africa-latest.osm.pbf, asia-latest.osm.pbf from download.geofabrik.de, each filtered with osmium tags-filter and exported with osmium export --geometry-types=polygon,point (multipolygons assembled by osmium):

nwr/boundary=protected_area,national_park nwr/leisure=nature_reserve nwr/landuse=military nwr/military=airfield,base,danger_area,naval_base,range,training_area nwr/aeroway=aerodrome

12b. Classification — build_route_global.osm_class

Rules, the same for the route grids and the map: no-go (type=nogo) = boundary=national_park, or protect_class in 1, 1a, 1b, 2 on a boundary=protected_area / leisure=nature_reserve; sensitive = the other protected areas and nature reserves, except protect_class 7–29 (cultural, resource and social protection are not nature designations); military = landuse=military or military=airfield / base / danger_area / naval_base / range / training_area; airport = aeroway=aerodrome areas, and a 1.5 km disc round an aerodrome mapped as a point with an iata or icao code (an uncoded aerodrome point is left out). Properties kept: type, name (name:en, else name), kind (protection_title or designation, else "National park" / "Nature reserve" / "Protected area" / "Military land" / "Airport"). No element id is kept.

Where: only outside the countries whose designations the route grids take from the US / Europe route builds (PAD-US; Natura 2000, the nationally designated areas and the UK agencies — build_route_global.DESIG_COUNTRIES: the United States and its territories; the EU27, the UK, Norway, Iceland, Switzerland, Liechtenstein, the Balkans and Turkey), judged per feature by its representative point (the route grids judge each 2 km cell, so an area straddling such a border may differ at the line) (a feature is kept when any continental grid holding it reads OpenStreetMap there, else by the 5 km world grid's rule) with the feature's country from Natural Earth; one geometry exported twice (a way and its relation, or a border park in two extracts) is kept once. The route grids rasterise the same features at 2 km (a cell by its centre; airports by any touch). Aerodromes are the exception on the route grids: every one these rules keep from an extract is rasterised there, inside those countries too (Puerto Rico's, for one), while route_constraints_global.pmtiles leaves them out. The extracts barely reach US land and hold little of Europe, so the grids that hold the US or Europe designations also rasterise the aerodrome points of §11a there, and the outlines beside them (§11a says how); the map draws those points and a marker for each outline in the exclusions tile, not in route_constraints_global.pmtiles, and does not draw the outlines. US land on a grid holding no US designations reads the extracts alone: the far Aleutians, west of 180°, on the grid of Russia and Mongolia, and Guam and the Northern Marianas on their Asian grids.

13. Wind turbines — Mexico (the wind turbines layer's OpenStreetMap part)

served: the Wind turbines layer's Mexican turbines and projects (wind_turbines.pmtiles, source layers wind_turbines and wind_projects, free; from 2026-11-03) — the United States (USWTDB) and Canada (CWTD) in the same tile come from their own public sources, not from OpenStreetMap · modules: etl/build_wind_turbines.py --mexico-osm, etl/_gen_pipeline.py · refresh: a static release — rebuilt by hand with the layer; the extract was downloaded 2026-11-02

13a. The extract through osmium (not Overpass)

Geofabrik's north-america/mexico extract (as of 2026-11-02), through osmium tags-filter with the expression below, then osmium cat -f opl, parsed by the builder (nodes, ways and relations):

nwr/power=generator nwr/power=plant nwr/generator:source=wind nwr/plant:source=*wind

13b. Processing rules (the builder's mexico_features)

• A turbine is a power=generator + generator:source=wind node; a way or relation generator is not taken (none existed in the extract).
• A farm is a power=plant + plant:source~wind site relation or way; a turbine takes the name of the plant it is a member of, else its own name, else "unknown <state>".
• The rating, the hub height, the rotor diameter, the tip height, the manufacturer, the model, the operator and the lifecycle are read from the element's own tags with the GB layer's rules (§3): a turbine whose lifecycle is not operating is dropped; two generator nodes within 3 m with identical tags are one turbine mapped twice.
• Clipped to Mexico with Natural Earth's 1:10m states: a node in no Mexican state and more than 3.0 km from every state outline is dropped and counted (the extract bleeds across the United States border, where the USWTDB already holds the turbines; a border check keeps the two sources apart).
• Properties kept: country=MX, src=OSM, id = the OpenStreetMap node id, name, state, the rating in kW, the size class, manu, model, hub, rotor, tip, operator, plant. The project points (wind_projects) are the layer's own clustering of the turbines by plant name, as for the United States and Canada; a Mexican project point carries country=MX.
• The other direction is closed: no OpenStreetMap coordinate or attribute enters the USWTDB or CWTD rows, the plant registers or any API answer.

The offer (ODbL s.4.6)

For every dataset above, and for anything this page has missed, CEAtlas will supply on request, free of charge and without restriction beyond the ODbL itself:

• a machine-readable copy of the layer's OpenStreetMap-derived data as served (GeoJSON), or
• the raw Overpass answer the release was built from (the files named above), together with this page's version, which is the method.

Write to hello@compoundingenergy.com. The layers that mix OpenStreetMap with other sources (transmission lines, substations, planned upgrades, gas pipelines, gas facilities, the DC pipeline, fibre routes, US fibre, site suitability, wind turbines (Mexico)) are supplied as their OpenStreetMap-derived part; the analysis rasters built over the served lines, substations and aerodromes — Site Development Cost, Grid Connection by Size, the civil works adders, Site Value — in the United States (Alaska, Hawaii and Puerto Rico included), Great Britain and Europe are Produced Works of those datasets (§1, §2, §11), and the OpenStreetMap-derived data they were built from is the same served data, supplied on the same request; the other sources are credited under their own licences, listed on the licences page. Whether such a layer is one database or a collection of databases under the ODbL is not settled.

Licence and attribution

OpenStreetMap data is © OpenStreetMap contributors, available under the Open Database Licence (ODbL) 1.0; www.openstreetmap.org/copyright. The map shows “© OpenStreetMap contributors” in its credit, the CSV export writes it on every OpenStreetMap-derived row (by element id, source field, or layer and type where a layer keeps no id), the site report prints it in its footer when it quotes these layers, and the licences page lists them. Map images, rasters, charts and reports made from these layers are Produced Works and may be used under CEAtlas's terms with that credit (the paid analysis rasters — Site Development Cost, Grid Connection by Size, civil works, Site Value — are such Produced Works on every grid they cover, the United States included, and say so in their layer information); the OpenStreetMap-derived data in the vector map tiles, in the CSV rows and in the copies offered here is under the ODbL.

What is not OpenStreetMap-derived, so that the boundary is clear: the plant registers (EIA, REPD, powerplantmatching, the national registries), the GB fleet census and BM-unit tables, PyPSA-Eur gridkit lines and buses, the HIFLD Open territory and grid-region polygons, the Natural Earth features, the weather and capacity-factor products, and every Compounding Energy forecast. The GridFinder predicted grid is a published model output (CC BY 4.0) whose inputs included OpenStreetMap topology; the lines it marks source=osm are excluded from what we serve. OpenStreetMap is used as an internal cross-check for the GB plant and unit locations, and nothing is copied from it into them.

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