resources
climate + environmental action
- New York Times: Q&A on how to reduce your and your family's carbon footprint
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The Gold Standard: Go Climate+ and reduce your individual carbon footprint
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Take action online, by phone, or on social media with the David Suzuki Foundation
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The Environmental Voter Project: pledge to vote for climate action in the next election
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Global Climate Strike: find local climate strikes and grassroots advocacy groups near you, online actions, and skill-building for advocacy and engagement
- 350.org: provide resources and tools for organizing and building local campaigns
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EarthJustice: uses the law to protect the environment and has an Action Center for individuals
climate solutions + resources for educators
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Project Drawdown: offers top solutions by sector and the book describes the top 100 solutions to move the needle on global warming based on science and research
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Project Drawdown 2020 Review: free downloadable update on climate solutions with the latest data, analysis, and research findings
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Climate Interactive En-ROADS: climate change solutions simulator developed by Climate Interactive, MIT Sloan, and Ventana Systems
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Center for Energy and Climate Solutions: offers solutions across business, technology, resilience, and individual carbon footprints
- Climate Mama: climate education and activism for parents
blogs + websites
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Grist: all climate and environmental news and articles
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Yale Environment 360: part of Yale’s School of Forestry & Environmental Sciences presenting a variety of environment-related news and discussion
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Collaborative on Health and Environment (CHE): website and blog
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BBC Earth Blog: short stories about the planet
- The New Yorker Climate Crisis Newsletter
- Climatebase: the platform for climate action with curated jobs, events, and organizations shaping a climate-positive future
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LiveKindly.co: vegan news and opinion site that includes environment-related content
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Green Biz: where sustainability, business, and technology meet
- Yale Climate Connections: part of the Yale Center for Environmental Communication, it is a nonpartisan, multimedia platform with daily broadcast radio programming and original web-based reporting and analysis on climate change
- Climate Crisis Policy: compendium of climate policy ideas
shows + movies:
- Down to Earth with Zac Efron: documentary series hosted by Zac Efron and Darin Olien who travel to different countries to experience and explore the best sustainable practices (available on Netflix)
- The Story of Stuff: 20-minute short film that reveals the extraction, creation, sale, use and disposal of all the stuff in our lives (watch for free on website)
- The Story of Plastic: film that looks at the man-made crisis of plastic pollution and the global impacts on the health of people and the planet (available on DiscoveryGo and for rent on Amazon, Apple TV, and Xfinity video-on-demand)
- Our Planet: documentary series hosted by David Attenborough showcasing the planet's breathtaking diversity across landscapes (available on Netflix)
- Chasing Coral: documentary narrating the coral reefs that are existentially threatened by the climate crisis (available on Netflix)
- Broken (available on Netflix)
- The Condor & The Eagle: documentary that tells the story of indigenous environmental leaders working to fight against oil and gas companies and protect their communities (rent on website for $6 or attend a move hosted event)
- Cowspiracy: political documentary about the meat industry and our massive global consumption of meat and the implications on our land and climate (available on Netflix)
- There's Something in the Water: documentary spotlighting the struggle of minority communities in Nova Scotia as they fight officials over the deadly consequences of industrial waste (available on Netflix)
podcasts:
- The Energy Gang: a weekly digest on energy, cleantech and the environment with Stephen Lacey, Katherine Hamilton, and Jigar Shah
- Climate One: weekly podcast of Climate One At the Commonwealth Club, a leadership dialogue on energy, the economy, and the environment that brings together thinks and doers advancing the discussion about a clean energy future
- America Adapts - The Climate Change Podcast: Host Doug Parsons talks with scientists, activists, policymakers, and journalists to discuss the tough questions facing the world as we confront humanity's greatest challenge.
- Reversing Climate Change: a podcast about the different people, technologies, and organizations coming together to remove CO2 from the atmosphere and reverse climate change
- Costing the Earth: Fresh ideas from the sharpest mind working toward a cleaner, greener planet
- Climate Cast: Hosted by the Minnesota Public Radio News meteorologist Paul Huttner shares the latest research on the changing climate (most episodes are 4-12 minutes long)
- Sustainability Defined: Hosted by Jay Siegel and Scott Breen, each episode focuses on a topic that pushes sustainability forward
- Climate Scientists: Informal conversation with climate-relevant researchers [Episode "SHORTS: Climate change is simple, serious, and solvable" is a 15-minute listen to on climate change]
books:
**We encourage you to rent from your local library, buy from your local bookstore, or support black-owned online bookstores.
- The Story of Stuff by Annie Leonard
- The Unsettling of America by Wendell Berry
- Building Suburbia: Green Fields and Urban Growth, 1820-2000 by Dolores Hayden
- This Changes Everything: Capitalism vs. the Climate by Naomi Klein (documentary info here)
- The Upcycle: Beyond Sustainability—Designing for Abundance by William McDonough and Michael Braungart
- Falter: Has the Human Game Begun to Play Itself Out? by Bill McKibben
- A Finer Future: Creating an Economy in Service to Life by L. Hunter Lovins
- The Big Pivot: Radically Practical Strategies for a Hotter, Scarcer, and More Open World by Andrew Winston
- Prosperity without Growth: Foundations for the Economy of Tomorrow by Tim Jackson
- Regenerative Capitalism: How Universal Principal and Patterns Will Shape Our New Economy by John Fullerton (available here for free)
volunteer opportunities:
**Note, due to COVID-19, many volunteer programs have been suspended. Check with organizers about the latest status
Here are some national and international opportunities. Check with your community for projects most relevant to local needs.
- Environmental Voter Project: environmental get out the vote phone banking, text banking, and canvassing; training and everything you need to get started is provided
- WWOOF: Work on an organic farm with the Worldwide Opportunities on Organic Farms
- Arbor Day Foundation: plant trees
- Join a community garden in your neighborhood
- Volunteers-in-Parks at the National Park Service
- American Rivers or Ocean Conservancy: clean a waterway
- GRID: Install solar panels
nonprofit suggested give list:
**If you are looking to donate to a nonprofit or charitable organization, Charity Navigator, GuideStar, and Grapevine are some good resources to get started. We've vetted the list of organizations below.
- Eden Reforestation Projects: addresses deforestation by restoring healthy forests and simultaneously alleviating extreme poverty by employing local villages to plant millions of trees each year. Eden has a vision to plant 500 million+ trees every year by 2025.
- Impact: According to Impact Matters, a $7 donation offsets one year of personal carbon emissions.
- The Solutions Project: supports grassroots climate change-makers and innovators by providing grants to amplify their media capacity and connect them to influential people in an effort to convert the U.S. to 100% renewable energy by 2050.
- Impact: The Solutions Project awarded $673K across 46 grants in Capacity Building, Rapid Response, and Fighter League leadership grants in 2019. These organizations are 95% POC and 80% women led organizations across 20 U.S. states and territories.
- National Resources Defense Council (NRDC): works to safeguard the earth - its people, its plants and animals, and the natural systems on which all life depends. Key focus areas include: climate change, communities, energy, food, health, oceans, water, the wild.
- Impact: NRDC has protected the environment and secured legislative and judicial wins starting with the passage of the Clean Water Act in 1972 and banning of lead gasoline in 1973. Other impact include protecting 38K square miles of the Mid-Atlantic ocean; $97 million legal settlement to examine and replace water lines in Flint, Michigan 3 million tons of water conserve through NRDC's Clean by Design program, and so many more.
- Environmental Defense Fund (EDF): uses science and economics to address the world's most urgent environmental challenges, including focuses on the climate, oceans, ecosystems, and health.
- Impact: helped secure the biggest environmental law in a generation targeting chemical safety; introduced catch shares enabling 84% of U.S. fish stocks to return to health levels; provided scientific guidance to Walmart on how to develop a leadership policy to set a safe chemical standard, which was followed by other retailers; drove science and advocacy that led to federal action and blocked efforts in the U.S. Senate to repeal methane emission rules and more. More examples of impact here.
- Climate Justice Alliance (CJA): is building a Just Transition away from extractive systems of production, consumption, and political oppression and towards resilient, regenerative, and equitable economies. Using grassroots organizing and capacity building, CJA's work focuses on energy democracy, food sovereignty, reinvesting in local power, and more.
- 350: is an international, grassroots movement standing up to the fossil fuel industry to stop all new coal, oil, and gas projects and build a clean energy future for all.
- Impact: In 2018, 350 led key campaigns to fight fossil fuel infrastructure, including the Keystone XL Pipeline, Kinder Morgan Trans Mountain Pipeline, Afrika Vuka, fracking in Brazil, Adani Megamine in Australia. 350 also worked on divestment campaigns, pushed for local and state legislation, and organized at COP24. See their 2018 annual report for full impact here.
- Environmental Voter Project (EVP): is a nonpartisan organizations aims to increase voter demand for environmental leadership by identifying inactive environmentalists and then turning them into consistent activists and voters. EVP uses big data analytics to identify inactive environmentalists and applies cutting-edge behavioral science and Get Out The Vote techniques to increase voter turnout.
- Impact: In 2018, EVP added a 58,961 new environmental voters to the midterm election who would have otherwise stayed home. Check out annual impact reports here.
virtual + in-person communities:
- Meetup: Sustainability Groups, Environment, Community Gardening, Green Living
- Facebook: Journey to Low Waste Group, New Urbanist Memes for Transit-Oriented Teens, Environment and Earth, Climate Change Science and Environment News, Veganism, Environmentalism and Animal Rights
- Reddit Eco-Friendly
- Flickr Nature Conservancy Photo Group
- Climate Reality Project find a local chapter
- This is Zero Hour: youth climate activism
- If you are a college graduate, check with your alma mater for an alumni groups for a sustainability, climate, or the environment
green jobs:
- Green Jobs & Career Network group on LinkedIn
- Climatebase jobs board
- Environmental Career
- Green Biz jobs board
- Idealist (also has volunteer opportunities)
archived articles and news worth reading:
- NY Times article, "Emissions Are Surging Back as Countries and States Reopen" (June 2020)
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Vox article, “A Just and Sustainable Economic Response to Coronavirus, Explained” (May 2020)
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NY Times piece entitled “Climate Change Has Lessons for Fighting Coronavirus” (March 2020)
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BlackRock’s letter from CEO Larry Fink to CEOs and Investors (January 2020)
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Vox article showcasing the global ice loss over the past decade (December 2019)
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LA Times Op-Ed by Jagdeep Singher Bach on UC pensions divesting from fossil fuels (September 2019)