Mapping Humanity From Space: NASA’s Black Marble with Dr. Miguel Román

How can a weather satellite see Ramadan, Christmas and a blackout? Dr. Miguel Román joins Krishna Choudhary to explain NASA's Black Marble: nightly maps of the lights on Earth, from a single band on the VIIRS instrument, processed to account for moonlight, airglow, clouds and atmospheric effects.

It began as a calibration job on a brand-new satellite and an "anomaly" that followed the lunar calendar. Román traces how a small NASA team turned it into open data now used for energy access, disaster response and urban growth: Puerto Rico before and after Hurricane Maria, why LEDs can make satellite maps look darker, the 30-meter Black Marble HD, and a John Deere tractor seen from space.

Recorded in Washington, D.C., on September 28, 2026, before the Golden Goose Awards ceremony. Román is Deputy Director for Atmospheres and Data Systems at NASA Goddard Space Flight Center and a member of the Black Marble team, recognized with a 2026 Golden Goose Award. Part of our Golden Goose series.

CHAPTERS
00:00 Cold open: three moments from the interview
00:49 A NASA intern's question and a new weather satellite
02:38 Calibrating the night band: the Moon and the desert
04:09 The anomaly: Ramadan seen from space
05:39 Christmas lights, and home in Puerto Rico
06:48 A new pair of glasses: all of humanity at night
08:32 From calibration to a Black Marble team
11:51 Opening the data to the world
12:58 Keeping the data honest: moonlight and airglow
14:36 One band, and why LEDs look like dimming
15:57 Why the satellite can't see blue: one instrument, many jobs
18:20 Light from every angle, and building heights
22:14 Puerto Rico: the 2016 blackout and Hurricane Maria
27:29 A Golden Goose story: Adjuntas, La Perla and resilience
30:21 From 500 m to 30 m: Black Marble HD
34:55 Ground truth, and a tractor seen from space
36:50 Electrifying Africa: the darkest places on Earth
40:58 What the Golden Goose Award means
44:49 Thank you, and why showing the method matters
47:46 Outro

RESEARCH & FURTHER READING
Holidays in lights: Ramadan and Christmas (2015):
https://doi.org/10.1002/2014EF000285
NASA's Black Marble product suite (2018):
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2018.03.017
Puerto Rico after Hurricane Maria (2019):
https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0218883
Uncertainty and viewing angle in night lights (2021):
https://doi.org/10.1016/j.rse.2021.112557
Multiangle night-light composites (2022):
https://doi.org/10.1109/LGRS.2022.3176616
Volatility in human night-time activity, Nature (2026):
https://doi.org/10.1038/s41586-026-10260-w
NASA Black Marble data:
https://www.earthdata.nasa.gov/data/projects/black-marble
Tracking SDG7: The Energy Progress Report 2025:
https://www.worldbank.org/en/topic/energy/publication/tracking-sdg-7-the-energy-progress-report-2025

EDITORIAL NOTES
15:12: White LED streetlights often use blue emitters near 450 nm, outside the VIIRS day-night band's roughly 500-900 nm sensitivity. A change in lighting technology can change what the satellite detects.
22:50: NASA dates the island-wide outage to late on September 21, 2016, following a power-plant fire; nearly 1.5 million customers lost power.
30:21: The 30-meter Black Marble HD maps are downscaled using additional land-surface information, not native 30-meter night-light measurements. Miguel explains this distinction later in the section.
36:50: About 666 million people lacked electricity in 2023, including 565 million in sub-Saharan Africa (Tracking SDG7 2025).
Statements reflect the September 2026 recording.

WATCH & LISTEN
Episode notes and research: https://ffppod.com/episodes/ep67
Golden Goose science rundown (EP59): https://ffppod.com/episodes/ep59
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