A new open‑source tool lets anyone turn power‑line data from OpenStreetMap into high‑resolution, stylish print‑ready posters and shareable online. Hosted on GitHub under open-energy-transition/grid2poster, the script pulls transmission and cable tags, renders them with GeoPandas, OSMnx and Matplotlib, and outputs PNG and SVG files. Users can target countries, states, continents or custom GeoJSON boundaries, choosing from built‑in themes or creating their own.

Coverage depends on how thoroughly volunteers have mapped the grid in OpenStreetMap, a gap the community‑driven MapYourGrid initiative aims to close. The repo ships region files for common power‑system groupings—Europe, MENA, Southeast Asia—and provides command‑line flags for tile size, minor lines, cables, and paper format. Large continents may trigger hundreds of Overpass queries, so users can increase tile‑size to stay within API limits.

Because the visualizations are vector‑based, they scale cleanly for wall‑size displays or detailed technical reports. Researchers can quickly illustrate transmission topology for policy briefs, while educators gain a ready‑made backdrop for classroom demos. The tool’s low barrier—just a Python virtual environment and a few pip installs—makes geographic grid mapping accessible to anyone with an interest in energy infrastructure.