Wednesday, July 25, 2007

A Very Nice Email From Environmental Defense, Inc.

In response to my post
"Business Roundtable Climate Change Statement"

About your Tuesday post...

Kira Marchenese
to me


I can understand why it looks like Environmental Defense is working with businesses to rake in the money. But if you dig a little deeper, you'll see that's not actually the case.

From our page about where the money goes (and comes from):

    Environmental Defense receives less than 1% of its financial support from corporate donors. We accept no payments from our corporate partners (such as McDonald's and FedEx). Generous individuals and foundations fund our corporate partnership work to ensure its independence and public credibility.

    Full page: http://www.environmentaldefense.org/page.cfm?tagID=369

And a bit more specific to funding for our corporate partnership work: http://www.environmentaldefense.org/partnerships.cfm?subnav=partnerships_advice

This policy is pretty buried on our Web site -- but we know how important it is to our credibility and are working on highlighting it more clearly.

Thanks,
Kira Marchenese
Director, Internet Communications
Environmental Defense

I responded:
"Thanks for the clarification. It is buried, I looked and did not find. Look for a post next week"

and she emailed back:
"Thanks -- like I said, our bad for not having things organized better. We're working on it!"

They are however continuing to accept tobacco money.

Just kidding Kira.
ED got a grant from the Doris Duke Foundation:


New York, NY – In the first round of grants from its $100 million Climate Change Initiative, the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation (DDCF) today announced support for six organizations that will evaluate and develop policies that put a price on greenhouse gas emissions and address other aspects of the regulatory frameworks needed to reduce the threat of global warming.

The foundation awarded grants totaling $3.6 million to researchers from Harvard University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, as well as four nonprofit organizations: Environmental Defense, the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, Resources for the Future (RFF), and the World Resources Institute (WRI). Press Release

I am posting this clarification because it is important to know when these big NGO's make an effort to avoid even the appearance of greenwashing.
ED's approach is in marked contrast to the WWF (How much is that Panda in the window....I do hope that Panda's for sale), and should be acknowledged.

Now if I could only convince ED to throw their weight behind Sky Trust or Cap-and-Share...