The bivariate empirical mode decomposition (BEMD) algorithm employs uniform sampling on a circle to perform projections in multiple directions, in order to calculate the local mean of a bivariate signal. However, this approach is adequate only for equal powers in both the data channels within a bivariate signal, and results in suboptimal performance for data channels exhibiting power imbalance, a typical case in practice. To that end, we exploit second-order bivariate statistical properties to introduce a nonuniform sampling scheme for data adaptive selection of the projection directions. In this way, the resulting nonuniformly sampled BEMD (NS-BEMD) algorithm provides a more accurate time-frequency representation of bivariate data than standard BEMD, for the same number of projections. The advantages of the proposed approach are demonstrated in case studies on BEMD for correlated data channels, selection of optimal noise power in noise-assisted BEMD, and for speed estimation using Doppler radar.