Epic storms and extreme cold snaps. Record heat and vanishing snowpack. Everywhere you turn this winter, there’s another reminder of the topsy-turvy state of our climate.
It’s enough to make you want to curl up at home in an armchair with a strong beverage. Fortunately for those so moved, four recently released reports on trending currents in climate philanthropy offer a perfectly defensible — even admirable — reason to do so.
And while plenty of climate reports leave you reaching for the liquor cabinet, I find this new batch inspiring, not disheartening. These new releases include a fresh edition of a major report on funding grassroots climate movements, a closer look at a rising power in the environmental movement, and two publications on how foundations can use every bit of their power, investments and all.
Smell a theme? By chance, this round of recent reports all come from the progressive side of the traditional climate philanthropy landscape. But regardless of ideological orientation, the collection offers guidance to funders considering backing such work, as well as potential insights for nonprofits into where such dollars may flow in the months and years ahead.
So put on your reading glasses and pour yourself a hot cup of tea. That whisky won’t be necessary. Here’s a rundown of strategies funders are taking and nonprofits are urging in response to the world’s increasingly extreme weather.
A classic, updated
Three years ago, the funding collaborative CLIMA published what became one of the most frequently cited texts on why climate philanthropy should back grassroots climate movements. Last month, it published a new edition of that landmark resource.
“Soil to Sky: Climate Solutions That Transform” moves, as its title suggests, from a bird’s-eye analysis of the systems at play to ground-level case studies in how the approach can play out. Its framework focuses on four overarching forces that are increasingly named in philanthropy and beyond — colonialism, white supremacy, extractivism, heteropatriarchy — and connects the dots to their climate impact on food and energy. Individual stories then take you into the field.
Nor is it just theory and storytelling. If you’re looking for statistics to cite to your board or to bolster your grant application, this report is rich with them. There’s even gigaton counts for the potential carbon savings of suggested solutions. The report also includes an extended argument against measures that the movement considers “false solutions.” And in practice of its inclusive vision, the report is also available in Spanish, French and Portuguese.
A grassroots network’s decade of growing power
I wouldn’t normally include an annual report in a roundup like this one. But Climate Justice Alliance’s latest, “Celebrating a Decade of Our Power: 2022 Annual Report,” arrives as the grassroots environmental justice network is receiving long-overdue mainstream support, and may be poised to become much more powerful and influential.
Over the last few years, the alliance has seen new funding from celebrities like Rihanna, green stalwarts such as the William and Flora Hewlett Foundation, and new climate giants like Sequoia Climate Foundation, already the nation’s 11th-largest green funder. It’s also forged partnerships with some of the nation’s biggest green groups, such as the Fund for Frontline Power, whose funding partners include NRDC and RMI, hopefully signaling a new era of collaboration as equals. It’s also moving money, whether by regranting ($3.8 million last fiscal year), starting a $10 million fellowship program, or helping to move more than $106 million to grassroots organizing.
Published on the eve of its 10-year anniversary, CJA’s latest annual report is a helpful overview of the journey it has taken up to this point. With most of climate philanthropy talking big about equity lately, this document is a guide to the thinking of a climate organization that has practiced and lived equity since way before wider philanthropy started paying attention. Read through it for a course in the vocabulary, convictions, priorities, and perhaps most importantly, the impact of front-line climate activism. Case in point: The CJA network’s role in thus far blocking Sen. Joe Manchin’s attempted climate bill side deal to legislate, among other things, increased fossil fuel development.
The report is in part a tale of CJA’s own growth. The network has expanded from seven founding communities to 48 today. Membership has more than doubled to 89 total members, spanning alliances, networks and movement support groups. Yet in funding terms, CJA is still far from parity with top green groups. Foundations gave CJA just under $8 million in 2022. Compare that, for example, to the Environmental Defense Fund, which received $40.8 million from institutional philanthropy that same year. We’ll see if that disparity persists.
A guide to going beyond divesting
Call it the “five percent paradox.” Conversations about how foundations make change typically begin and end with grantmaking (typically 5% of assets annually), without ever considering investments (the other 95%), even though the latter is nearly 20 times the former. This is starting to change, and Justice Funders’ new “Just Transition Investment Framework” offers a roadmap for philanthropies concerned that conventional investments work at odds with the goals that they and the sector seek to achieve.
The 25-page report, “Shifting Capital and Power to Build the Regenerative Economy,” lays out a series of principles on both the “what” and “how” of shifting capital and power as climate threats multiply. The framework is a call to philanthropy to ensure all its resources — not just funding — center long-marginalized groups who are most vulnerable to the financial shocks and catastrophes that climate chaos is making more common. As the report notes, “grants alone will not resource our movements to the level they need to win large-scale economic transformation.”
A frontrunner shows the work does not stop
Way back in 2014, the Rockefeller Brothers Fund became one of the first foundations to publicly divest from fossil fuels. It was a potent symbol from a family synonymous with oil riches. And the fund has been a leader on that front ever since, representing philanthropy on groups like the U.N.-convened Net-Zero Asset Owner Alliance. Despite the early start, the fund recently shared that its portfolio — though 99% fossil-fuel-free — is still on track to contribute to catastrophic climate damage.
In a brief released this month, “Beyond Divestment: Decarbonizing Our Investment Portfolio,” the foundation sums up the situation and its plans to respond. The result is a useful case study for those contemplating a similar path or curious as to how foundations are approaching these questions. How far off is RBF? Its consultants found that emissions resulting from its investments, even if they were not directly bankrolling the fossil fuel industry, were consistent with 2.1 degrees Celsius of warming. Scientific consensus says we can afford no more than a 1.5 degree increase.
RBF is now working to lower its impact and hopes to pave the way for others. After all, it’s a challenge facing all foundations, not to mention anyone else with money in the bank or funds in the stock market, even nonprofits. Activists like Bill McKibben call financial decarbonization the next great climate struggle. One hopes more foundations follow these steps, with equal candor and urgency. RBF, incidentally, remains active on the grantmaking side of the shop. Last November, the fund formalized a plan to spend an additional $100 million over 10 years to address the climate crisis.
Did I miss an important climate philanthropy report? Email me at michaelk [at] insidephilanthropy [dot] com.