Recently, I was contracted by the Ministry of the Environment to develop an animated graph and some graphics to do with climate change and greenhouse gas emissions. I was thrilled to be able to work on the project, as the Ministry has been doing an excellent job putting together engaging, interesting, and useful online materials such as www.obviously.ca in their current campaign to educate and bring awareness to these environmental issues.

The animated graph demonstrates the different trends (historic and anticipated) in greenhouse gas emissions in the province from 1990 to 2020, with Kyoto Targets and specific milestones illustrated. It will not be available online until after the Minister’s announcement for the new climate change plan, so I will not post it here. However, here is a screenshot.

The graph uses XML data to load in the various trends, targets, and milestones. All information regarding the statistics and presentation of the graph is included in the XML document to allow the client to easily add, remove, or edit the data as new information becomes available. This is then loaded into the Flash Player at run time, where the interface is populated with the trends, and the user is able to selectively play, show, and hide each trend on the graph.

In addition to this work, I was asked to develop some ideas for how to visualize our carbon footprint. Each Ontarian is responsible for about 5.7 tonnes of carbon each year (excluding the impact of industry, which bumps each individual’s footprint to 20+ tonnes). Nobody likes the sound of this, but educators in the field recognize that such a number is not the easiest statistic for people to relate to. To that end, the following were some brief ideas or sketches which came to my mind to try to visualize these concepts. The materials are intended for an upcoming Ministry website intended for a younger audience (10-20 years).

It has been interesting and fun to work on this project, and I hope to continue to combine my work in design and multimedia with environmental education and awareness.