How Infrastructure Works

How Infrastructure Works

Inside the Systems That Shape Our World

Deb Chachra

access to more resources leads so universally and predictably to an increase in artificial light that researchers have even used it as a proxy for economic growth, observing how nighttime satellite images of a particular region glow more brightly over time. Developed regions are brighter than comparable regions in less developed areas. South Korea, for example, blazes from coast to coast, with a clear shoreline. But after years of sanctions and scarcity, North Korea is nearly invisible in nighttime images except for a faint cobweb of light reaching out from the capital of Pyongyang.
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