speak-for-the-trees-mcp

Speak for the Trees

If it is inevitable that we will all have agents acting on our behalf, should other living systems also have agents that represent their interests?

This project explores the potential for agentic representation of ecosystems and their diverse populations. If equipped with data about the ecosystem and capital, what actions might an agent take to protect that ecosystem?

• A wetland might choose to take legal action against an upstream polluter.
• A forest might request human intervention following a rise in invasive species sightings.
• A river might submit comments on a local proposal to build on a neighboring parcel.

There are examples around the world of ecosystems being granted legal personhood, aiming to give them equal footing in modern society. Could AI better equip environmental advocates and lawyers in their pursuit of this idea?

This MCP server is a starting point: a set of tools for investigating ecosystem health using public environmental data. Point it at any coordinates and query water quality, species observations, EPA compliance, tidal conditions, and impaired waters listings.

Most tools require no API keys — data comes from free public APIs (USGS, EPA, NOAA, iNaturalist, GBIF). The airnow_air_quality tool requires a free AirNow API key (register here).

Demo

speakforthetrees.com — interactive map showing the data these tools return. Click anywhere on the map to run a live investigation.

Install

claude mcp add speak-for-the-trees -- npx @offtrailstudio/speak-for-the-trees

Or from source:

git clone https://github.com/offtrailstudio/speak-for-the-trees-mcp.git
cd speak-for-the-trees-mcp
npm install
claude mcp add speak-for-the-trees -- npx tsx $(pwd)/src/server.ts

The data clients are also available as an npm library if you want to build your own tools on top of the same data sources:

npm install @offtrailstudio/speak-for-the-trees

import { fetchWaterData, fetchObservations, fetchImpairedWaters } from "@offtrailstudio/speak-for-the-trees";

Tools

Read

These tools retrieve data about an ecosystem. All accept latitude and longitude — the server automatically discovers nearby USGS monitoring stations and NOAA tidal gauges using the USGS Network-Linked Data Index.

Tool	Data source	What it returns
usgs_water_conditions	USGS NWIS	Temperature, dissolved oxygen, pH, streamflow with EPA thresholds
noaa_tidal_conditions	NOAA CO-OPS	Water levels, predictions, tidal range, deviation from predicted
inaturalist_species_observations	iNaturalist	Species presence records with taxonomy, threat status, native/introduced flags
gbif_species_occurrences	GBIF	Species occurrence records aggregated from museum collections, research, iNaturalist, eBird
airnow_air_quality	AirNow	Current AQI readings by pollutant (PM2.5, PM10, ozone) with health category ratings
epa_facilities	EPA ECHO	Permitted dischargers, compliance status, violation counts
epa_violations	EPA ECHO	Facilities in Significant Non-Compliance
epa_violation_details	EPA ECHO	Specific effluent violations (parameter, exceedance %, dates)
epa_impaired_waters	EPA ATTAINS	303(d) listed waters, impairment causes, TMDL status
tri_toxic_releases	EPA TRI	TRI-reporting facilities and their annual chemical release obligations
tri_release_details	EPA TRI	Per-chemical release amounts by medium (air, water, land) for specific facilities

Act

No action tools exist yet — this is where the project gets interesting. Once an investigation surfaces a concern, an agent needs tools to do something about it. Planned additions include drafting regulatory comments, filing public records requests, and flagging violations for environmental advocacy orgs.

In the meantime, you can pair this MCP with others to take action.

Example

Check the water quality and EPA compliance status near the Hudson River
at Tivoli Bays (42.04, -73.91). Compare the last week against the last 3 months.

How It Works

When you provide coordinates, the server:

1. Finds the nearest stream reach via the USGS NLDI hydrolocation service
2. Discovers USGS monitoring stations on the upstream hydrologic network
3. Filters to stations with active real-time sensors
4. Finds the nearest NOAA tidal gauge
5. Queries the relevant APIs and formats results for the LLM

Investigation Guide

See AGENT.md for the full investigation methodology, including epistemic guardrails about what claims the data can and cannot support.

Data Sources

Source	API	What it provides
USGS NWIS	waterservices.usgs.gov	Real-time water quality monitoring
NOAA CO-OPS	tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov	Tidal water levels
iNaturalist	api.inaturalist.org	Community science species observations
GBIF	gbif.org	Aggregated species occurrence records
AirNow	docs.airnowapi.org	Real-time air quality index
EPA ECHO	echo.epa.gov	Discharge permits and compliance
EPA ATTAINS	epa.gov/waterdata/attains	Impaired waters assessments
EPA TRI	epa.gov/toxics-release-inventory-tri-program	Toxic chemical release reporting
USGS NLDI	api.water.usgs.gov/nldi	Hydrologic network navigation

License

MIT