India electrification trends with VIIRS

Get a NASA Earthdata token

1. Register at https://urs.earthdata.nasa.gov/
2. Go to Profile → Generate Token
3. Sys.setenv(EARTHDATA_TOKEN = "YOUR_TOKEN"), or pass the token directly to earthdata_token("TOKEN")

Tiles are cached in ~/.lightson/cache/ after the first download.

Quick workflow

library(lightson)

token <- earthdata_token()
rasters <- ntl_download(region = "IND", years = 2015:2025, token = token)
districts <- get_india_admin(level = "district")
panel <- extract_panel(rasters, districts)
plot_ntl_trend(panel, region = "Lucknow")

Use your own shape/boundary file

extract_panel() accepts any sf object:

library(sf)
my_districts <- sf::read_sf("~/github/bharatviz/public/India_LGD_districts.geojson")
panel2 <- extract_panel(rasters, my_districts, id_col = "district_name")

See the Custom geometry vignette for a complete walkthrough using bharatviz boundaries with Bhuvan NTL rasters, which need only ISRO’s public API.