Stolen Stars
Your city stole 200 stars from your sky last year. We have the satellite receipts.
Consumer-facing light pollution intelligence — city-level sky brightness scorecards, dark sky loss timelines, health impact translation, wildlife damage reports, astrotourism dark-sky guides, and weekly "brightest offender" dispatches, all auto-generated from VIIRS satellite composites, Globe at Night citizen science data, DarkSky International certifications, and peer-reviewed health research.
Niche Explored
Light pollution intelligence — city-level sky brightness scorecards, dark sky loss tracking, health/ecological impact translation, astrotourism guidance, and lighting accountability. Translating VIIRS satellite data, Globe at Night citizen science observations, DarkSky International certifications, and peer-reviewed health research into a beautiful, opinionated, data-journalism site.
Why This Niche NOW
- Kyba et al. (Science, Jan 2023): Citizen science data shows sky brightness increasing at 9.6% per year — far faster than satellite data suggested. At this rate, a child born where 250 stars are visible will see fewer than 100 by age 18.
- DarkSky “State of the Science 2025” report (June 2025): Comprehensive summary of ALAN impacts on night sky, wildlife, human health, energy waste, equity, and climate. Growing mainstream awareness.
- Light pollution linked to cancer, obesity, sleep disorders, depression — 2025 meta-analyses in BMC Environmental Science, Wellbeing Space & Society, and Photochemical & Photobiological Sciences confirm links between artificial light at night (ALAN) and metabolic/mental health disorders.
- Astrotourism market booming — $5.8M+ revenue at individual sites; Utah declared April “Dark Sky Month” for 6th consecutive year. Over 160,000 sq km of certified dark sky lands globally across 22 countries.
- 80% of world population lives under light-polluted skies (Nature Reviews Earth & Environment, 2024).
- r/darksky subreddit active and growing; CNN, Scientific American, Nature all covering light pollution as mainstream concern.
Existing Competition
- DarkSky International (darksky.org) — advocacy org, certifies dark sky places, publishes reports. Authoritative but not data-journalism. Gaps: no city scorecards, no zip-code-level tools, no weekly data dispatches.
- Light Pollution News (lightpollutionnews.com) — podcast and blog, news aggregation. Gap: no original data analysis, no visualizations, no automated data pipelines.
- Light Pollution Map (lightpollutionmap.info) — interactive VIIRS map. Great tool but no editorial content, no stories, no health context.
- Globe at Night (globeatnight.org) — citizen science data collection. Raw data, no consumer-facing analysis.
- Cities at Night (citiesatnight.org) — ISS astronaut photo analysis project. Academic, not consumer-facing.
Key gap: Nobody is doing city-level light pollution scorecards with health impact context, trend analysis, dark sky loss countdowns, and opinionated editorial voice. The data is all free and public — but nobody is translating it for consumers.
Data Sources Found
Primary — Satellite Data
- VIIRS DNB Monthly Composites — NOAA/NCEI Earth Observation Group (eogdata.mines.edu/products/vnl/). Free download, CC-BY 4.0. Monthly radiance data at ~750m resolution. Available via Google Earth Engine API (developers.google.com/earth-engine/datasets/catalog/NOAA_VIIRS_DNB_MONTHLY_V1_VCMCFG).
- VIIRS+DMSP dLIGHT — NASA SEDAC. Fused dataset showing change in nighttime lights from 1992-present. Free via NASA Earthdata.
- Global NTL dataset 1992-2022 — Nature Scientific Data (2025). Focus on low-light areas. Downloadable.
Secondary — Citizen Science
- Globe at Night — globeatnight.org/maps-data/. All observations since 2006 downloadable in CSV/GeoJSON. Naked-eye limiting magnitude by location and date.
- Sky Quality Meter (SQM) networks — GaN-MN monitoring network provides calibrated sky brightness measurements at fixed stations worldwide.
Tertiary — Infrastructure & Policy
- OpenStreetMap Overpass API — Query all tagged streetlights globally (highway=street_lamp). OSMStreetLight project (github.com/sb12/OSMStreetLight) with 44 stars.
- DarkSky International Dark Sky Places — darksky.org/what-we-do/international-dark-sky-places/all-places/. 200+ certified sites in 22 countries. GFZ Potsdam has administrative boundary GIS data.
Health/Ecology Research
- PubMed/OpenAlex — “artificial light at night” returns thousands of peer-reviewed papers. Key: melatonin suppression, circadian disruption, breast cancer risk, obesity correlation, insect decline, sea turtle disorientation, bird collision.
- DarkSky “State of the Science 2025” — DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.15492393. Comprehensive review covering six key impact areas.
SEO Analysis
- Keywords: “light pollution map” (high volume, medium competition), “dark sky near me” (high volume, low competition), “bortle scale” (medium volume, low competition), “light pollution health effects” (medium volume, low competition), “best stargazing near [city]” (long tail, very low competition), “[city] light pollution” (long tail, minimal competition), “how to reduce light pollution” (medium, moderate)
- Search volume signals: “dark sky” searches spike around meteor showers (Perseids August, Geminids December), new moon weekends, aurora events. Year-round baseline growing.
- Content gap: No site combines satellite data analysis + health impact + city scorecards + stargazing guides. Each exists in isolation.
Communities
- r/darksky — ~30K subscribers, active and passionate
- r/Astronomy — 2.3M+ subscribers, light pollution is recurring frustration topic
- r/astrophotography — 600K+ subscribers
- DarkSky Advocates — 2,000+ volunteer advocates worldwide (darksky.org)
- Astrotourism operators — growing industry, would share/link content
- Amateur astronomy clubs — thousands worldwide
Image/Graphic Feasibility
- Satellite imagery processing — VIIRS tiles can be processed into city-level radiance maps with Python (rasterio, matplotlib). Beautiful gradient maps of light intensity.
- Before/after comparisons — Historical vs current satellite composites show light sprawl dramatically.
- Star visibility simulators — Can generate “what your sky looks like at Bortle 3 vs Bortle 7” comparison graphics.
- Health impact infographics — Melatonin suppression curves, circadian rhythm diagrams, wildlife impact chains.
- Dark sky maps — Overlay certified dark sky places on light pollution maps.
- AI image generation — Stunning night sky vs light-polluted sky comparisons, city skyline visualizations.
Monetization Signals
- DarkSky International actively fundraises (donations, memberships)
- Astrotourism is a $multi-billion industry
- Dark sky advocacy attracts eco-conscious, educated, higher-income demographic
- Telescope companies, star chart apps, camping gear, photography equipment all potential affiliates
- “Dark sky friendly” lighting (Hubbell, RAB, etc.) — potential sponsors
Sources
- https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.abq7781 (Kyba et al. 2023)
- https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adf4952 (Light pollution skyrocketing)
- https://darksky.org/app/uploads/2025/06/ALAN-State-of-the-Science-2025-EN-2.pdf
- https://link.springer.com/article/10.1186/s40645-025-00739-x
- https://www.nature.com/articles/s43017-024-00555-9
- https://bmcenvsci.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s44329-025-00017-7
- https://eogdata.mines.edu/products/vnl/
- https://developers.google.com/earth-engine/datasets/catalog/NOAA_VIIRS_DNB_MONTHLY_V1_VCMCFG
- https://www.globeatnight.org/maps-data/
- https://darksky.org/what-we-do/international-dark-sky-places/all-places/
- https://github.com/sb12/OSMStreetLight