What’s the difference between the Drawdown Explorer and the old Drawdown Solutions from the book and online library?
In a word, the new Drawdown Explorer platform is better. It's more detailed, more transparent, and based on the most up-to-date research.
We learned a lot from our previous work and the work of others and decided it was time to take a bold new approach – one that is a quantum leap forward in analyzing climate solutions.
The Drawdown Explorer goes further in several important ways:
- The Drawdown Explorer will examine well over 100 solutions, and we will keep them updated on a regular basis, making this the most complete, up-to-date, and scientifically accurate database of climate solutions.
- provides far more detail about each potential solution, including specific information about the current effectiveness, current and potential adoption, current and potential climate impact, cost, speed, and additional benefits.
- The Drawdown Explorer highlights a wider array of potential solutions. The world needs to understand not only what works, but also what doesn’t. That’s why we now categorize climate solutions as “Highly Recommended” (for truly effective solutions), “Worthwhile” (for smaller, niche applications), “Worth Watching” (for solutions that hold promise, but aren’t ready yet), or “Not Recommended” (for proposed solutions that don’t measure up according to our analysis).
- The Drawdown Explorer focuses attention on the world as it is today, rather than scenarios of the distant future. This presents a more accurate “here and now” assessment of climate solutions, making it far more actionable for policymakers, community leaders, businesses, investors, philanthropists, and more.
- The Drawdown Explorer provides regional geographic guidance for most solutions. This major breakthrough means we show how they behave in different parts of the world. Global average numbers obscure those details; now, thanks to big data, we can do better.
- The Drawdown Explorer goes beyond describing the “what” of climate solutions to the “how,” “where,” “when,” and “who” of meaningful climate action. Beyond describing potential solutions, this new information helps drive these solutions to scale and meet the challenge of climate change.
- The Drawdown Explorer provides detailed recommendations for key actors, including policymakers, investors, community leaders, and individuals, to scale each solution.
- The Drawdown Explorer is far more transparent than any other climate solutions resource. In an era where trusted sources of scientific information are hard to come by, we go the extra mile to show our work and document every step of our assessments. And we freely provide all of the data, maps, code, references, graphics, and more to the world in easy-to-use formats.
Why did you create the Drawdown Explorer?
The Drawdown Explorer represents a fundamental shift in Project Drawdown’s philosophy.
Our early work asked whether the world had enough effective climate solutions to stop climate change by mid-century. So, we did what scientists call an “existence proof” – a lot of math and scenario modeling – to figure out the hypothetical size of possible climate solutions, based on different assumptions about the future between now and 2050, to see if they were sufficient to stop climate change. The good news is that they were!
But now we want to actually build them in the real world. So we rebooted our approach to showcase how climate solutions work in the here and now, using the latest intelligence, the best regional data, and the clearest and most actionable assessments possible.
Thanks to our earlier work, we know meaningful climate action is possible. Now we want to make it happen – today – in the most effective way possible. And that’s what the Drawdown Explorer is all about.
Do you still have the original Drawdown Solutions Library online?
No, we sunset the original Drawdown Solutions Library – just as we did with previous iterations of the Drawdown Solutions – and are focusing 100% of our attention on the new assessments, the Drawdown Explorer, and related materials.
Can I compare the new Drawdown Explorer climate solutions assessments with the older solutions?
No, not directly. They are apples and oranges.
The older solutions presented a global average estimate for the world between now and 2050, based on a wide range of assumptions. The Drawdown Explorer assessments focus on the performance of solutions today, in far greater depth, and provide regional details for many solutions. Therefore, a meaningful comparison of these different approaches doesn’t make sense.
Why don’t you rank the Drawdown Explorer solutions, as you did with the Drawdown Solutions Library?
While rankings are popular, we don’t encourage people to rank climate solutions, since we will have to do almost all of them, together, to meaningfully address climate change.
Even if we did rank them, there is no clear, individual metric by which they should be ranked.
In the Drawdown Explorer, you can sort solutions in a number of ways. We don’t decide what’s most important to you. That’s in your control.
How does Project Drawdown define a climate solution? Why isn’t ______ considered a solution to climate change?
At Project Drawdown, we define a climate solution as a physical practice or technology that materially lowers the long-term concentration of greenhouse gases and other warming pollution in the atmosphere, either by cutting greenhouse gas emissions or removing greenhouse gases from the atmosphere.
In other words, solutions are the physical things – practices or technologies that actually change the air – we need to stop climate change. Levers, including policies, investments, or campaigns, are not climate solutions, but rather actions that help bring these solutions into being and scale. And key actors are the people just like you pushing on various levers to effect change, such as policymakers, business leaders, community leaders, investors, philanthropists, everyday practitioners, cultural changemakers, activists, and more.
We further refine our definition of an effective climate solution as an identifiable technology or practice that:
- is readily available today and has a proven ability to mitigate greenhouse gases; and
- meaningfully affects greenhouse gases on a global scale, at levels necessary to impact climate change.
What are these “Additional Benefits”?
One of the great things about climate solutions is that they often do more good things than just lower the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
Some climate solutions can help us with climate adaptation, too. Many also provide tremendous benefits to other aspects of the environment, such as biodiversity, fresh water, and air quality. And many solutions also improve human well-being, through jobs, income, improved health, security, and more.
We don’t call these “co-benefits” of climate action, as they are sometimes called, since it makes them sound subordinate and secondary. They are important. So we elevate them by showcasing 18 additional benefits beyond reducing greenhouse gas emissions for each climate solution.
Some other sources seem to provide more cost estimates for climate solutions than you do. Why?
Yes, some other sources are far more comfortable estimating the economics underpinning climate solutions than we are.
When we carefully look at the best available data, we often find that cost estimates of climate solutions – for the construction, operation, depreciation, etc. – vary enormously around the world, and no single number makes sense. Therefore, we worry that many numbers being presented elsewhere are not meaningful for real-world climate action.
In some cases, we present a range of cost estimates. But when we believe that the data do not support it, we do not present a global average cost estimate that is ultimately nonsensical.
Who is involved in the assessments and review?
While many people and organizations are offering proposed “solutions” to climate change, it’s hard to know, without a great deal of in-depth research, which ideas are truly effective, which are still in the works, and which are just a distraction. Moreover, now that significant funding and attention are going to climate action, it’s critical to find trusted, independent advisors who know their stuff, want to achieve real climate impact, and are not looking to exploit momentum to stop climate change for their own personal gain.
That’s why Project Drawdown does the work that we do.
We have a dedicated team of scientists, research fellows, and outside reviewers working on the solution assessments. Each solution is carefully reviewed by several internal experts and then highly recommended solutions are reviewed again by at least two external experts. Moreover, we have made this an open platform, where our methods and data are freely available for everyone to find and evaluate. If you have a question or a concern about this work, please feel free to let us know at the following link.
When will this all be done?
We released a beta version of the Drawdown Explorer in June 2025 and currently have around 30 solutions published. We will be adding more solutions as quickly as we can.
We aim to launch the Drawdown Explorer to the broader public in September 2025 and finish publishing all of the remaining solutions by spring 2026. We will also make revisions and updates along the way.
That being said, we will never be “done.” The data are constantly changing and improving. We aim to keep the Drawdown Explorer as up-to-date as possible and add powerful new features as we can, time and funding permitting.
To stay updated on the latest Drawdown Explorer news, solutions, and features, sign up for the Project Drawdown newsletter.
Where can I find the underlying data?
All of the data, spreadsheets, GIS map layers, and other resources powering the Drawdown Explorer solutions assessments are freely available by visiting the “Methods and Supporting Data” link at the bottom of each solution page.
Can I use this material in my work, my presentations, my reports, etc.? How do I cite it?
Yes! Please use our materials – the numbers, the graphics, the maps, the analysis – in your work. That’s why we created them!
We have intentionally made all of this material freely available so it can be used to accelerate meaningful climate action around the world. Everyone has access to it equally.
We only ask that you give credit to Project Drawdown, link to the appropriate page(s), and cite our work as ….
Project Drawdown. (Year, Month Day). The Drawdown Explorer. http://TKTKTK.
How can I help?
Thank you for asking! You can help us in many different ways. First, you can share our work with people in your network – whether on social media, email, Slack, or wherever else you connect. Second, you can send us feedback or corrections at the email link here. Finally, as a 501(c)3 nonprofit, we also welcome financial contributions to help us continue this important work. You can make your tax-deductible donation here.