diff --git a/README.md b/README.md
index 3c5f923e4ae06fcd036e7afc6738d27a96cbc0f1..ccb4194f471728d602ffab89fc2125763380a4d7 100644
--- a/README.md
+++ b/README.md
@@ -16,7 +16,7 @@ This project:
 
 ## Running the targets pipeline in R
 
-Clone the repo. In RStudio, run `library(targets)` and `tar_make()`. This will require `tidycensus` and `sciencebase` credentialing to run, see instructions below.
+Clone the repo. In RStudio, run `library(targets)` and `tar_make()`. This will require `tidycensus`, `sciencebase`, and `NASA Earthdata` credentialing to run, see instructions below.
 
 
 ## `tidycensus` set up
@@ -47,6 +47,16 @@ To access controlled ScienceBase items, an additional step must be completed to
 
 Once the above steps are complete, `initialize_and_cache_sb()` will cache your username and token into the .Renviron file. From here, the pipeline should be able to use those cached credentials to re-initialize and refresh ScienceBase sessions in different R sessions for up to 10 hours.
 
+## NASA Earthdata
+Population density data must be manually downloaded from <https://sedac.ciesin.columbia.edu/data/set/gpw-v4-population-count-rev11/data-download>. You will be prompted to login to a NASA Earthdata account. If you do not have one, you will need to create one. Once logged in, use these selections:
+
+- Temporal: Single Year
+- FileFormat: GeoTiff
+- Resolution: 30 second
+- File Select: Year 2020
+
+Download the zip in the `1_process/in/` folder.
+
 
 ## Building the website locally