Iraqi construction sites, seen from orbit

Six satellite images of the Budoor site in west Baghdad, each September from 2020 to 2026, with the site outline in white. In 2020 the plot is bare ground with a road grid. Rows of houses spread across the north-west in 2022 and 2023, roofs turn grey by 2024, and new rows fill the south-centre in 2025 and 2026.

01Budoor Residential Complex, west Baghdad · 33.3019 N 44.2055 E

Budoor every September from 2020 to 2026, with the site outline in white. It goes from bare ground with a road grid in 2020 to rows of houses across the north-west by 2022, with the south-centre still being roofed in 2026.

Map of the Budoor site with new buildings coloured: orange for 2020 to early 2025, filling the north-west of the site; magenta for early 2025 to 2026, mostly in the south-centre block and a block north-east of the diagonal road.

02Budoor · new buildings, 2020 to 2026

Budoor coloured by when the buildings went up. Orange is 2020 to early 2025 (about 67 ha), magenta is everything since - mostly the south-centre block.

Al-Jawahiri residential city, north sector: summer satellite images for 2023 to 2026 on the top row and year-on-year change maps below. The red box is empty desert in 2023 and 2024; a compound of house rows appears in 2025 and fills out in 2026.

03Al-Jawahiri Residential City, Abu Ghraib · 33.3295 N 43.9660 E

Al-Jawahiri each summer from 2023 to 2026, with what changed year on year underneath. The red box is empty desert in 2023 and 2024, and the first compound of houses appears in 2025.

Chart of Grand Faw Port container-yard reclamation from 2020 to 2026. The share of the 126 ha footprint that is land rises from near zero in 2021 to about 90% by early 2025 and about 98% by mid-2025, against a dotted line at the official 86% in February 2025.

04Grand Faw Port, Basra · 29.8828 N 48.4451 E

How much of Grand Faw's 126 ha container yard has been turned from sea into land, 2020 to 2026. It climbs from almost nothing in 2021 to about 90% by early 2025 and levels off near 98% - the dotted line is the official 86% from Feb 2025.