The average temperature of the Earth’s surface has increased by about 1.2 to 1.4ºF since 1900, and with that has come a host of changes in other aspects of climate such as precipitation and storminess (EPA). Climate change affects people, plants, and animals in a variety of ways, and scientists have observed that some changes are already occurring (EPA).
In 2009, Philanthropedia took a close look at nonprofits working to alleviate climate change at the national level. One hundred thirty nine experts participated in this research, and collectively recommended a list of 15 organizations doing great work in the climate change arena.
We refresh our research every three years, so we are turning again to climate change to re-run our survey. We’re asking experts who work in the field of climate change to contribute to our research to let us know which nonprofits they think are doing the best work in climate change today.
Scope of the Research
For this research we are asking experts to recommend up to four nonprofits doing high-impact work at the national level in climate change, and up to two start-up nonprofits that have the potential to scale and have an impact at that level in the future.
Climate change is a multi-faceted issue with a variety of contributing factors and even more ways to address its causes and current effects. Nonprofits addressing climate change can take on many forms. They may address issues such as:
- Conservation
- Sustainability
- Alternative energy
- Pollution
- Environmental justice
- Energy efficiency
We’d like to encourage experts to consider a diverse array of organizations. Types of organizations addressing climate change could include:
- Research organizations
- Policy and advocacy organizations
- Conservation groups
- Public outreach/education organizations
Participation in the Research
If you are a professional (foundation staff, researcher, nonprofit staff member, etc.) working in climate change and have insight on nonprofit organizations working in this field, we’d love to hear from you. You may have received an email from us with a link to our survey. The survey will be open until late June 2012. We hope you will share your perspective and insights! If for some reason we have missed you and you think you have a valuable perspective to offer, please contact Jasmine Marrow at jasmine.marrow@guidestar.org, and we would be happy to send the survey to you to include your recommendations.
Additionally, we invite your feedback and thoughts about how you might frame this type of work. For those readers less familiar with this topic, we hope you learned something new and will check in again when we have the results of this research. Thank you all for your participation!