NVE HydAPI
The main source used by vannkart.no is NVE HydAPI. It provides measurements of water level, river discharge and, in some cases, water temperature. Water level indicates how high the water is at a particular monitoring station. Discharge indicates how much water passes the station per second, usually expressed in cubic metres per second.
NVE data is also used for historical records and normal ranges where available. vannkart.no uses this to show whether a measurement is low, normal, high or very high compared with historical values for the same time of year.
To learn more about why these measurements are made, read Why measure rivers? (Norwegian).
Weather data from Meteorologisk institutt and Yr
Where enabled, vannkart.no displays weather data from the Norwegian Meteorological Institute through Yr-related APIs. Weather data provides useful context, such as rainfall, temperature changes or wind. It supplements NVE measurements and does not replace local assessment.
Vann-Nett, the Norwegian Environment Agency and the Norwegian Biodiversity Information Centre
Environmental status for individual water bodies is obtained from Vann-Nett, managed by the Norwegian Environment Agency. The data shows ecological and chemical status classified under the EU Water Framework Directive. The classification is updated every six years.
Information about confirmed salmon-bearing stretches comes from the Norwegian Environment Agency’s map service for anadromous salmonids and is matched to station coordinates. For inland waters, species records from the Norwegian Biodiversity Information Centre’s Artskart are used to show freshwater fish recorded near the station. Sources: kart.miljodirektoratet.no and artskart.artsdatabanken.no.
Kartverket
Place names near monitoring stations come from the Norwegian Mapping Authority’s place-name API. They provide geographical and cultural context on station pages, such as waterfalls, mountains, churches and cultural heritage sites. Source: ws.geonorge.no.
Kartverket water levels and tides
The tide pages use the Norwegian Mapping Authority’s open API for water-level and tide data. It provides predicted high and low tides for positions along the coast. The data is licensed under Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 (CC BY 4.0), with the Norwegian Mapping Authority credited as the source.
Statnett: power flows
The page Kraftflyt inn og ut av Norge (Norwegian) shows physical power flows between Norwegian bidding zones and neighbouring countries. The figures come from Statnett’s operational data, the system operator’s own real-time reporting from the power system. Requests are made by vannkart.no’s own server, not your browser.
Physical flow is not the same as traded exchange. Physical flow is the electricity actually flowing through cables at a given moment. Traded or scheduled exchange is power bought and sold in the market in advance. The two differ; this page shows physical flow.
The map also shows bidding zones in Sweden and Denmark, giving flows between them a visible boundary. Denmark is derived exactly: DK1 and DK2 are separated by the Great Belt, so the zone follows the island group. Sweden is approximate: Svenska kraftnät publishes only interactive maps, and the actual boundaries follow municipal boundaries. SE1–SE4 are therefore divided along lines of latitude based on Svenska kraftnät’s own description of the areas. The difference is small at national scale, but these are our approximations, not official boundaries like the Norwegian ones.
The background map on the same page shows Norway’s five bidding zones NO1–NO5 and neighbouring countries. The bidding-zone boundaries come from NVE. The map background itself, including coastlines and national borders, is Natural Earth at low resolution and is in the public domain. It is background rather than data: countries are drawn to make their shapes recognisable and carry no figures.
All geometry was downloaded once and simplified, rather than fetched on every visit. Bidding-zone boundaries changed ten times between 2004 and 2022 and national borders less often, so in practice they remain stable.
Statnett publishes no terms of use or licence information for this API. vannkart.no therefore credits Statnett as the source but is not an official Statnett service. The site was neither developed in cooperation with nor approved by Statnett. Check the original data at Statnett’s operational data when needed.
Electricity spot prices
The reservoir filling page shows the daily average electricity spot price for each bidding zone alongside the filling level because the two are related: abundant reservoir water normally means cheaper electricity. Prices are currently obtained from hvakosterstrommen.no, which distributes price data from ENTSO-E and converts it to Norwegian kroner.
The displayed price is the spot price alone. Grid charges, taxes, markups and any fixed-price scheme are additional and vary by grid company and agreement, so this is not the amount you pay.
OpenStreetMap and Wikipedia
The base map comes from OpenStreetMap. Basic place information may be obtained from Wikipedia to provide context about rivers, lakes and places where available.
Important limitations
Data may be delayed, temporarily unavailable or contain errors. Local conditions at a station may also mean that figures need to be interpreted with caution. For critical decisions, check the original source at NVE, the Norwegian Meteorological Institute or other relevant authorities.