Posted by Matt on Tuesday, November 01, 2011.

HootRoot a winner in EPA Green Apps Challenge

HootRoot, our travel footprint mapping app, has been declared a winner in the EPA’s Apps for the Environment Challenge! Of the five awards announced in this nationwide contest for the best apps powered by EPA data, HootRoot was named the number two Best Overall App. Light Bulb Finder, a great mobile app that guides your transition away from incandescents, took first place.

Hootroot helps you navigate efficiently from point A to point B. It’s powered by Brighter Planet CM1, Google Maps, and HopStop. The app provides directions, travel times, and carbon footprints for driving, public transit, flying, and human-powered transportation options on any route. Check out video and screenshots of the app on our contest submission page.

The contest required participants to use EPA data. HootRoot relies on multiple EPA data sets to power its transportation carbon calculations: Fuel Economy Guide for car trips, eGRID for train and bus electricity emissions, and US Greenhouse Gas Inventory for fuel emissions factors across all transport modes. It’s also powered by data from Energy Information Agency, Bureau of Transportation Statistics, and other sources.

The EPA has emerged as a leader in recent years in the push for opening government data and engaging the developer community in creating apps useful to the public, and this contest is an innovative part of that strategy.

We’ll be at the EPA’s Green Apps Forum in Arlington, VA on November 8 to accept the award and participate in discussions about the future of the growing environmental apps movement. It promises to be a very engaging event, and will be streamed online if you can’t make it in person.

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Safety in Numbers is Brighter Planet's blog about climate science, Ruby, Rails, data, transparency, and, well, us.

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