Today, Project Drawdown is launching the Global Solutions Diary, a community-generated video library where people around the world can upload, view, and share stories of climate action. There are already nearly 100 stories from people representing over 25 countries on the platform with more being added every month.

“When it comes to climate change, we often only hear traditional voices sharing doom and gloom narratives,” says Project Drawdown Director of Storytelling and Engagement Matt Scott, who will be hosting a webinar about the Global Solutions Diary on September 18 at 1 pm ET. “But each and every day there are unsung people doing their part to contribute to solutions. The Global Solutions Diary is a way to elevate those stories to inspire hope and action.”

As the founder of Drawdown’s Neighborhood, Project Drawdown’s short documentary series passing the mic to underrepresented climate heroes, Matt has long shown the power that stories have to shape our perceptions around the climate crisis and who is working to address it. The Global Solutions Diary seeks to empower anyone – no matter who they are or where they live – to share their own status-quo-shattering stories. 

“Stories are an essential part of how we make sense of the world,” says Project Drawdown Executive Director Jonathan Foley, Ph.D. “By democratizing climate storytelling, the Global Solutions Diary allows everyone, including those who are too often portrayed solely as victims of climate change, to see themselves as part of the solution.”

Stories featured in the Global Solutions Diary are searchable by location and by sector. Visitors are encouraged to share videos they find particularly inspiring, submit their own stories, or invite others in their network to participate. 

To learn more about the Global Solutions Diary, visit www.drawdown.org/diary and register here for Matt’s upcoming webinar.

Project Drawdown is thrilled to announce a generous gift of US$100,000 from the McCance Foundation. This latest donation from the long-time supporter comes at a pivotal moment for Project Drawdown as the nonprofit prepares to launch several new initiatives to help stop climate change as quickly, safely, and equitably as possible.

“More than ever before, the world needs guidance on which solutions – deployed when and where – will have the biggest impact on climate change,” says Project Drawdown Executive Director Jonathan Foley, Ph.D. “We are so grateful for the continued support of the McCance Foundation as we work to provide those insights to policymakers, philanthropists, corporate leaders, and the broader public.”

“We are working hard to build the world’s leading climate solutions resource,” says Project Drawdown Managing Director Elizabeth Bagley, Ph.D., “and those efforts are only possible through the generous support of organizations like the McCance Foundation.”

 “The McCance Foundation is honored to support Project Drawdown and is excited about the ongoing advancements in critical climate solutions,” says McCance Foundation Executive Director Katie Cutler. “We look forward to continuing our collaboration to drive impactful progress in addressing climate change.” 

For more information about Project Drawdown or to pledge your own support, please visit www.drawdown.org. 

Shortly after I left academia to take a scientist position with a nonprofit environmental organization, a colleague from the Environmental Protection Agency – a key audience for my science-based advocacy – gave me some advice. 

“You need to understand,” he said, “that the government decision-makers you talk to don’t care about what you know. They care about how what you know can help them do their jobs.”

Climate solutions have powerful new private-sector champions. After launching Drawdown Labs last October, Project Drawdown—the world’s leading resource for climate solutions—is announcing five new partners to round out its pioneering group of private sector climate leaders. 

This consortium of 14 organizations spans nearly every industry, using their resources, influence, employees, community members, and customers to help the world reach drawdown—a future point in time when levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere stop climbing and start to steadily decline. This spring, Netflix, General Mills, LinkedIn, Aspiration, and Residential & Dining Enterprises (R&DE) Stanford Dining join Drawdown Labs to challenge status-quo private sector leadership for faster, safer, and more equitable climate action at unprecedented scale. 

“Net-zero commitments by some date in the distant future just won’t cut it anymore,” says Drawdown Labs Director Jamie Alexander. “Drawdown Labs partners prove every day that any job can be a climate job, whether they’re helping people bank responsibly, find good-paying jobs, feed their families, inspire student climate leaders, or feel entertained at home. Project Drawdown chooses partners that are leading the transformation of their sectors—not simply playing at the edges of real change.”

Leveraging world-class research and analysis from Project Drawdown and cross-industry capabilities of its partners, Drawdown Labs is a testing ground for companies who already have industry-leading climate goals. Potential Labs partners are vetted on the nature of their science-based, independently verified greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets as well as their track record for lobbying, leadership goals, and commitment to climate solutions both within and outside their business operations. As the year progresses, Drawdown Labs partners will meet regularly, share insights, ask critical questions, and enjoy full access to Project Drawdown’s science-based resources and staff members.

“Drawdown Labs only works when you start with companies that are already all-in on climate,” says Alexander. “If a company is pouring money into anti-climate lobbying and suddenly makes a commitment to reach ‘net zero,’ we need to question the authenticity of that commitment. There’s no room for daylight between the pursuit of a just climate future and any other business priority. The superpowers of our five new companies, along with our existing partners, should demonstrate to the world the kind of climate ambition that is possible, achievable, and necessary.”

Joining Drawdown Labs (and its nine existing partners) are:

• Netflix—The streaming entertainment service showcases inclusive stories on climate solutions to hundreds of millions of viewers around the world. Sitting at the intersection of technology and entertainment, Netflix shows how sustainability can be implemented beyond operational footprints through creative, memorable storytelling.
• General Mills—This global manufacturer of branded consumer foods has the reach to create large-scale impact in the food and agriculture industry beyond its own operational footprint. As a Drawdown Labs partner, General Mills brings with it its holistic focus on regenerative agriculture that strengthens both ecosystems and communities.  
• LinkedIn—As the world’s largest professional network, LinkedIn is focused on creating economic opportunity for every member of the global workforce. This means providing its members with the tools, resources, and community needed for this transition by spotlighting green economic trends, connecting green job seekers and employers, providing sustainability skills training, and partnering with environmental innovators.
• Aspiration—Drawdown Labs’ first-ever financial services partner enables customers to keep their deposits out of fossil fuels, automatically plant trees with their card purchases, and track business and personal Planet & People impact scores as they shop. Aspiration shows that people can use their spending and saving to achieve meaningful climate impact at scale.
• R&DE Stanford Dining—This leading university partner collaborates on many aspects of complex global food systems—from equitable supply chains, climate-smart dining, and regenerative agriculture, to reducing food waste and shifting diets towards plant-forward options. Stanford Dining demonstrates that sustainable, ethical, and healthy food systems can be deployed at scale, while simultaneously inspiring the next generation to improve how Earth’s precious resources are managed.

Learn more about Drawdown Labs online, follow Project Drawdown on social media, and sign up for email newsletters for inspiring real-world Labs updates throughout the year. Looking for a deeper dive into the climate solutions driving Drawdown Labs partners to think big? Climate Solutions 101 presented by Project Drawdown—the world’s first educational effort focused solely on global solutions—is free, full of hope, and streaming now.

About Drawdown Labs
Drawdown Labs is Project Drawdown’s private sector testing ground for scaling bold climate solutions quickly, safely, and equitably. This consortium of visionary partners goes beyond “net zero” to scale global climate solutions, within and outside their own operations. Leveraging world-class research and analysis from Project Drawdown—and the cross-industry capabilities of participating organizations, businesses, and funders—Drawdown Labs experiments with collaborative ways to address climate change at unprecedented scale, and offers the world a transformative vision for private sector climate leadership. Drawdown Labs members include Allbirds, Aspiration, Copia, General Mills, Google, Grove Collaborative, IDEO, Impossible Foods, Intuit, Lime, LinkedIn, Netflix, R&DE Stanford Dining, and Trane Technologies.

Project Drawdown is pleased to announce the election of Stephan Nicoleau—Partner at FullCycle, an investment firm focused on addressing the climate crisis—to its Board of Directors.

Nicoleau is an investor, advisor, and founder with more than 15 years of experience in the social and environmental impact space. He joins eight longtime Project Drawdown Board members during a time of remarkable growth for the nonprofit organization.

“We couldn’t have found a more passionate climate advocate to join our Board,” says Project Drawdown Executive Director Jonathan Foley, PhD. “Stephan knows how to think long-term while taking action on the best investment climate solutions we have in-hand today. Project Drawdown is proud to have his support—and an opportunity to learn from him—as we significantly level up our efforts to help the world reach drawdown quickly, safely, and equitably.”

Visionary social, environmental, and financial leadership

At FullCycle, Nicoleau heads capital solutions for the firm, managing institutional relationships and the firm’s capital formation for its fund vehicles. He began his career as a management consultant, as a founding member of Coalition Ltd., a boutique strategy consultancy, which advised the executive management teams of the top global investment banks such as JP Morgan, Credit Suisse and Barclays Capital. 

Later—in founding Critical Value Advisors (“CVA”)—Nicoleau built an advisory practice which served private investors managing several billion in assets, working to source emerging managers and impact investment opportunities globally. CVA structured and advised investments in venture, real estate, and infrastructure, playing an integral role in identifying investment opportunities that would achieve environmental, social, and financial returns for private and institutional investors. In 2016, he founded LaGuardia Development Partners (“LDP”), a minority-owned infrastructure financing vehicle focused on the redevelopment of LaGuardia Airport—a project that was integral in reshaping the public private partnership (“P3”) to be more inclusive of minority and women-owned funders and operators. 

In addition to serving on the board of Project Drawdown, Nicoleau serves on the boards of Monument Lab, a public arts studio leading national conversations about public space and history; and Future of Cities, a regenerative placemaking coalition focused on sustainable urban development. Nicoleau is an active mentor to entrepreneurs in his community, lives in New York City, and is a graduate of the University of Pennsylvania.

In his own words

Project Drawdown: When did you first become passionate about climate change and solutions?
Nicoleau: I have been an impact investor for over 15 years, so climate has always been part of my work. However, as the science became clearer for us all, I understood my role in having impact would be to work on this existential issue. My passion to have an impact is met by my desire to be as effective as possible in my work—and I’m grateful to do it every day. Because I have experience as an investor, operator, and finance professional, I feel especially lucky that I can meaningfully apply my lived and professional experience to addressing the greatest challenge of our times.

PD: What are you doing to help the world reach drawdown—the future point in time when levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere stop climbing and start to steadily decline?
Nicoleau: I’d say this is most prominent in my work at FullCycle, where we are actively scaling climate-critical infrastructure that has the capacity for significant abatement and drawdown of CO₂ and its equivalents. My advocacy for an “all-hands-on-deck” approach has been a hallmark of my efforts to help us meaningfully drawdown GHGs, and has spurred dialogue and action well beyond the fund with policy makers, philanthropists, and community stakeholders.

PD: What’s your favorite part of your work with Fullcycle?
Nicoleau: There is a lot to love about FullCycle’s mission—we’re invested with incredible capital partners and operators, and we’re a team that deeply cares about making a difference. This  compelling, activated community and ecosystem that we have built inspires me every day. The innovations we see —and indeed, those that we select to commercialize—are transformative, which gives me hope that we can mitigate the impact of climate change while investing and building the future that we and future generations deserve.

PD: Which climate solution(s) do you wish the finance and investment community would adopt today to make an impact?
Nicoleau: We’re going to need to accelerate investment in all of the available emissions-abating technologies, practices, and solutions that are available now. But because the climate crisis is so urgent, the order in which we invest matters significantly. Solutions that have the highest carbon abatement potential (per dollar invested) must be prioritized alongside those solutions that are ready for market and implementable at scale. For investors, that means investing with managers that are designed to accelerate solutions and deliver measurable climate and financial returns—galvanizing the global markets to invest trillions into climate restoration. Focusing on infrastructure is the most effective way for asset managers to have a meaningful impact, as climate change is mostly driven by the operations of our global systems.

PD: How should nonprofits like Project Drawdown commit more deeply to equity and justice in their climate work? How would you like to see this organization grow?
Nicoleau: Project Drawdown can play a substantial and important role in identifying the critical link between climate solutions and a more just transition to a low-carbon future. As we identify the best innovations, practices, and nature-based solutions that actively drawdown greenhouse gases, we must consider the reparative power of implementation at every frontline and in communities that have been underserved. This intersection between the work to overhaul our aging infrastructure and the work to build a more equitable world is an important one for us to explore and activate through the solutions work at Project Drawdown. This includes working to include the voices of traditionally underrepresented communities and stakeholders in our conversations about a just transition to a low-carbon, more equitable, and increasingly resilient global economy.

About Project Drawdown
Founded in 2014, Project Drawdown® is a nonprofit organization that seeks to help the world reach “drawdown”—the future point in time when levels of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere stop climbing and start to steadily decline. Since the 2017 publication of the New York Times bestseller Drawdown, the organization has emerged as a leading resource for information and insight about climate solutions. We continue to develop that resource by conducting rigorous review and assessment of climate solutions, creating compelling and human communication across media, and partnering with efforts to accelerate climate solutions globally. Cities, universities, corporations, philanthropies, policymakers, communities, educators, activists, and more turn to Project Drawdown as they look to advance effective climate action. We aim to support the growing constellation of efforts to move climate solutions forward and move the world toward drawdown—as quickly, safely, and equitably as possible. A 501(c)(3) nonprofit organization, Project Drawdown is funded by individual and institutional donations.