IN 50 YEARS: NRDC Annual Report 2019

IN FIFTY YEARS 2019 ANNUAL REPORT

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COVER ILLUSTRATION BY EIKO OJALA

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“EVERY CHALLENGE FACING THE PLANET HAS A SINGLE SOLUTION: BRILLIANT, PASSIONATE PEOPLE. NRDC HAS BEEN BLESSED WITH THEM FOR 50 YEARS, AND THEY REMAIN THE LIFEBLOOD OF OUR MOVEMENT.” John Adams, COFOUNDER OF NRDC

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FROM OUR CHAIR Alan Horn reflects on NRDC’s 50-year history and our progress in the past year in paving the path for lasting change, from state climate change legislation to victorious court battles.

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FROM OUR PRESIDENT As NRDC’s new president and CEO, Gina McCarthy is ready to build on our pioneering agenda, expand our solid track record of success, and make history in this critical time.

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CONFRONTING THE CLIMATE CRISIS NRDC has conquered seemingly insurmountable battles before.

Now we are ready to win the fight against climate change to ensure the health and resilience of humankind.

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BUILDING HEALTHY, RESILIENT COMMUNITIES From the beginning, NRDC has recognized the importance of empowering citizens and communities. Whether it’s in the courts or on Capitol Hill, in corporate boardrooms or community meetings, we continue to put people first.

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GUARDING NATURE Propelled by science, smart policies, and the support of millions of activists speaking out on behalf of everything from bees to the boreal forest, NRDC is changing the course for nature.

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FUELING THE MOVEMENT As NRDC has grown over the past 50 years, so has our network of partners and allies. Together, we’ve increased the visibility of environmental challenges and the pressure to address them.

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EVENTS A celebration of 30 years of NRDC victories in Southern California, our biannual Night of Comedy benefit in New York City, a climate art exhibition in Chicago, and more highlights from the past year.

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FINANCIAL STATEMENT

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IN MEMORIAM NRDC honors longtime Midwest Director Henry Henderson and Honorary Trustee Kirby Walker.

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MEMBER VOICES A window into the passion and the personalities of some of the inspiring people who motivate NRDC to keep up our fight.

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SUPPORTERS

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T E ESKCAY O THTE RWE I L S O N

CONTENTS

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T E E K AY H E R E

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A humpback whale and her calf in the waters of Tonga

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H I S M O M E N T I S A R E M A R KA B L E O C CA S I O N T O

invite you to join us in looking back, not just on the past year but also on the past 50 years for both NRDC and the environmental movement.

Our fight to protect clean air, clean water, and a livable future for all has come a long way. We’ve achieved so much together—from getting lead out of gasoline in 1973 to helping save the ozone layer in 1987 to halting development in Mexico’s Laguna San Ignacio in 2000 to helping achieve justice for residents in Flint, Michigan, in 2017. As we look ahead to the next 50 years, this moment in time provides us with an opportunity to take stock of all we have achieved—and how much more we need to do. Thank you for your sustained support, which is crucial to our work as we press forward.

What’s foremost in my mind this year is the climate crisis and the devastating impacts it will have on people. It will also affect nearly everything we cherish, as the recent, consecutive United Nations reports on biodiversity, lands, and oceans warned us. To confront this central issue, we are drawing on our 50-year history of solving tough challenges.

We made much progress paving the path for lasting change in the past year—for example, helping New York State pass the country’s strongest-ever climate change legislation, working with Colorado to advance a zero-emissions vehicle program, and spurring Virginia to cap its carbon pollution, making it the first southern state to do so.

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For even more pointed ways to make meaningful impact, we will work to strengthen our litigation efforts at the federal level, galvanize the political will to seed the changes necessary to a clean energy future throughout all levels of our government, and support and defend science from systematic attacks. We have so much at stake, and failure is not—and will never be—an option.

I’m pleased that we’re continuing to forge strong partnerships and deepen collaborations to grow the rich ecosystem of the power we need for a livable future for all. I’m proud that this past September, NRDC became a signatory to the Equitable and Just National Climate Platform, a group of organizations mapping out a plan for climate policy that prioritizes equity. It’s also an exciting time to support the youth climate movement. Like many of you, I am deeply moved by the staggering numbers of children and teens who have been leading the global climate protests.

We stand with them and are inspired by all they’re doing to accelerate the changes we all want to see in the world.

M I C H A E L K O VA C / G E T T Y I M A G E S F O R N R D C

FROM OUR CHAIR

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Our might grows stronger with a rising number of new members and activists, new board members, and NRDC’s new president and CEO, Gina McCarthy, best known as the 13th administrator of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency under President Barack Obama. With her entire career dedicated to serving the public and her unmatched expertise in policy and public health, she is the right person to lead the organization so that we can dream big, aim high, and achieve impactful results. I’m deeply grateful to Mitch Bernard, our chief counsel, for filling the role of interim president. He is a strong leader with deep knowledge of NRDC’s history who advanced important conversations on critical aspects of our work with the staff during the transition period.

With this fresh energy, thoughtful strategy, an indefatigable staff, and our all-in attitude, we are moving full speed ahead in 2020—and we will sow the seeds for the next half century. We will continue to strengthen our partnerships with states, businesses, and leaders who are working to decarbonize our world through systems-wide changes: the American Cities Climate Challenge; the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative, which will soon include Pennsylvania; the Transportation and Climate Initiative, a coalition of northeastern and mid-Atlantic states and Washington, D.C., that are investing in a cleaner transportation system; and our partners abroad in India and China.

We will stay the course with our work in climate resilience so that we bolster our defenses against the oncoming effects of climate change from the ground up, including internationally, as we have in India with the continuously improving Ahmedabad Heat Action Plan. We will be unrelenting in the

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fight for clean water for all our communities, as exemplified by our recent work in Newark, New Jersey. And we will do as much as we can to steer wildlife biodiversity from irreversible loss with our best-in-class acumen in science, litigation, and advocacy, as we’ve done by making the case for protecting critically endangered animals around the planet at CITES, the world's biggest international conference on wildlife trade.

I’m especially grateful for the support of each and every one of you and for your commitment to protecting our environment, our climate, and our future. Together, we are powerful, and we will create change that’s made to last—for the coming year, for the next 50 years, and beyond.

Sincerely,

Alan Horn Chair, NRDC Board of Trustees

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A M T H R I L L E D T O B E W R I T I N G T H I S M ESSAG E AS T H E I N -

coming president and chief executive officer of NRDC. In fact, I’d even say it’s “wicked awesome.”

In the 35 years I’ve spent to protect public health and the environment for the great people of our country, I’ve had many chances to see firsthand the value of NRDC’s work and appreciate the organization’s unrelenting commitment to clean air, clean water, and a healthy environment and climate for our kids and future generations. And now I am close enough to see firsthand that NRDC has the passion, tenacity, integrity, and smarts to successfully stand up against the unprecedented attacks on our health and our natural resources we are facing today.

Here’s what you should know about me. I’ve worked in all levels of government—local, state, federal, and international—and I understand that each plays a critical role in protecting our health, our environment, and our climate. I have always kept my eye on meeting the mission by focusing on outcomes and results that are measurable and real. I am a collaborator, a team player, a communicator, and a fighter. I face conflicts head-on, and I am not afraid to stand up for what I believe will make a difference not just tomorrow but for the long term as well. And I don’t give up.

As NRDC celebrates its 50th year, I could not be more excited to come on board. I could not sit on the sidelines and just hope and pray; there is no time to waste. We are facing a climate crisis that threatens our health and our

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well being. Our decisions today—and the actions we take or fail to take—will determine whether the world will be livable and sustainable for us tomorrow. It will take a concerted, coordinated, and sustained effort, both nationally and internationally, to tackle this crisis and turn it into an opportunity to build a cleaner, healthier, and more inclusive world.

NRDC is the perfect team to lead this momentous task because NRDC has a proven record of success, and we are ready to build on that success.

This year, NRDC will keep pushing for a just and equitable transition to 100 percent clean energy in our work at the state and local levels.

We will help our communities to build resilience and prepare for the climate changes that are no longer avoidable. We will double down on our defense against federal rollbacks that continue to threaten our health and our climate, and we won’t stop until we win these fights in court.

And we will strengthen our international partnerships to better protect human health and

A L E X A N D E R S PA C H E R / N R D C

FROM OUR PRESIDENT

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“NOW I AM CLOSE ENOUGH TO SEE FIRSTHAND THAT NRDC HAS THE PASSION, TENACITY, INTEGRITY, AND SMARTS TO SUCCESSFULLY STAND UP AGAINST UNPRECEDENTED ATTACKS ON OUR HEALTH AND OUR NATURAL RESOURCES WE ARE FACING TODAY.”

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preserve the wild places that are invaluable and can never be replaced.

I am honored, humbled, and more than a little amazed to be taking the reins of NRDC at the start of its next 50 years. Following in the footsteps of leaders past—John Adams, Frances Beinecke, and Rhea Suh—is daunting, but thankfully I have Mitch Bernard, our chief counsel and interim president, to guide me with his deep knowledge of, and commitment to, the organization.

And I’m grateful to our staff, our board, and all of you, our members and activists, who have embraced our shared mission and joined this fight for our future. Together, we cannot lose.

Gina McCarthy President and Chief Executive Officer, NRDC

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A solar farm near rapeseed fields in Liangyuan, Hefei, China’s Anhui Province

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CONFRONTING THE CLIMATE CRISIS As the world continues to heat up, action to reduce carbon pollution and help communities adapt to the impacts of the climate crisis is more than an environmental imperative—it is crucial for ensuring the health and resilience of humankind.

A growing chorus of international expert reports tells us that we need to aggressively cut planetwarming pollution over the coming years in order to prevent catastrophe. We have conquered seemingly insurmountable challenges before. Fifty years ago, scientists detected the depletion of the earth’s protective ozone layer. In the wake of that discovery, NRDC sounded the alarm bells, the public demanded action, and after steady advocacy for a ban on CFCs, governments responded. The resulting Montreal Protocol stands as proof that the earth’s nearly 200 countries can effectively cooperate to avert a planetary pollution crisis.

Despite the Trump administration’s turning its back on the climate crisis, we are seeing ambitious action on the local, state, and global levels. As we continue our work partnering with American cities to slash their transportation and building emissions, creating coalitions across the nation to stop dirty energy projects, and driving new policies that encourage global powers to ramp up their installation of renewable energy, we aim to win this fight, too.

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A ROAD MAP FOR FRONTLINE COMMUNITIES To address the growing climate impacts on low-income people and communities of color, NRDC signed on to a historic platform that seeks to create a future that benefits all.

RDC JOINED SISTER GROUPS LARGE AND SMALL—

including other national environmental organizations and community environmental justice groups—at a Climate Forum in Washington, D.C., this past June.

Our task? To step up collaborative action to address a rising tide of climate injustice.

The problem isn’t a new one; marginalized communities have historically shouldered a disproportionate share of our collective environmental burden, while simultaneously not always benefiting from policies to reduce pollution. And recent dire climate warnings have exacerbated the issue. People earning low incomes and communities of color are the most vulnerable to the worst of climate change’s effects. They experience higher rates of heat-related deaths and greater damage from extreme storms and flooding. To make matters worse, these groups tend to have fewer resources to both prevent and recover from climate disasters.

Forum participants gathered to address this growing burden. The outcome of the meeting—which capped a year of work among all involved to achieve consensus—was the Equitable and Just National Climate Platform, a blueprint for a new movement that fuses economic, racial, and environmental justice into a single advocacy framework. The platform allows groups both large and small to leverage their combined resources toward the twin goals of redressing inequity and creating safe, strong, resilient communities.

“This agreement is a long time coming,” notes Richard Moore of the Environmental Justice Health Alliance, a frequent collaborator with NRDC and one of the platform’s key architects. “Only when we come together will we win. The future of all our communities and workers depends on it.”

Lissa Lynch, an attorney in NRDC’s Climate & Clean Energy Program, echoes Moore’s urgency. “For too long, environmental justice communities have borne the brunt of pollution and been excluded from the process of developing policies to address that pollution,” she says. “The platform is an important step toward righting those wrongs by acknowledging the interconnectedness of injustice and environmental harm and by elevating the voices and ideas of environmental justice leaders as we work together to solve the climate crisis.”

In calling for renewed and vigorous investment in clean energy, lowemissions public transportation, and resilient infrastructure and housing,

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Barbara J. Love, who facilitated the climate forum, and Mildred McClain, executive director of the Harambee House, after the signing of the Equitable and Just National Climate Platform

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R A L P H A L S WA N G / T H E C E N T E R F O R A M E R I C A N P R O G R E S S .

P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : WA N G W E N / V I S U A L C H I N A G R O U P V I A G E T T Y I M A G E S

R A L P H A L S WA N G / T H E C E N T E R F O R A M E R I C A N P R O G R E S S ( A L L )

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the platform’s authors made sure to emphasize the links between environmental progress and economic progress. Together, NRDC and our partners vowed to support expanded job opportunities for communities that have experienced disproportionately high unemployment, responsible transit-oriented development that invigorates neighborhoods without displacing residents (see “The Quest to Restore the L.A. River for All Angelenos,” page 36), and more abundant (and centrally located) energy-efficient affordable housing.

Recognizing that this vision can never be achieved unless policymakers adequately address the legacy of systemic racism and injustice in our country, the forum participants crafted the platform as a tool to aid and inform local, regional, and national lawmakers, business leaders, and civil society advocates. Equally important, says Roland Hwang, managing director of NRDC’s Climate & Clean Energy Program, the platform is meant to provide guidance on how decision makers can go about generating new policy ideas to right environmental injustice.

“The signatories believe communities that bear the greatest burdens from pollution, climate change, and economic inequality should be full partners and co-lead the efforts to develop and adopt the necessary solutions to tackle the climate crisis and environmental racism,” Hwang says. Only then can we truly realize a just climate future.

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R A L P H A L S WA N G / T H E C E N T E R F O R A M E R I C A N P R O G R E S S ( A L L )

Scenes from the signing of the Equitable and Just National Climate Platform at the 2019 Climate Forum in Washington, D.C. Participants included Michelle Martinez (far left), executive director of the Michigan Environmental Justice Coalition; NRDC Chief Counsel Mitch Bernard (above); and numerous other environmental justice elders and advocates (below).

“THE PLATFORM IS AN IMPORTANT STEP TOWARD ACKNOWLEDGING THE INTERCONNECTEDNESS OF INJUSTICE AND ENVIRONMENTAL HARM AND ELEVATING THE VOICES OF ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE LEADERS AS WE WORK TOGETHER TO SOLVE THE CLIMATE CRISIS.” —LISSA LYNCH, NRDC

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BLOCKING PIPELINES FROM COAST TO COAST NRDC’s resistance efforts against major tar sands projects continue, and our state-level strategy halts a new frackedgas pipeline in the Northeast.

RBLOOD VIA FLICKR

T’S BEEN THREE YEARS SINCE PRESIDENT TRUMP STARTED

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An oil pipeline under construction in Alberta, Canada

trying to revive the Keystone XL tar sands pipeline—and three years since NRDC began fighting his efforts. But our history of battling KXL extends much farther back—we’ve been part of a coalition that has blocked the project since it was first proposed 11 years ago. And as the climate crisis deepens, so has our resistance to this and other dirty, misguided projects.

Among them are the two other major tar sands pipeline projects currently in play: Enbridge’s Line 3, which would cross all of northern Minnesota’s lake country, and Kinder Morgan’s Trans Mountain pipeline, which would extend from Alberta to the coast of British Columbia across millions of acres that are as environmentally fragile as they are culturally sacred to Canada’s First Nations. This past year, NRDC saw some progress in blocking both as we continued to support the many stakeholders engaged in fighting these projects on the ground. Enbridge’s pipeline got caught up in Minnesota’s courts following the denial of a key state permit. Meanwhile, a Canadian federal court has allowed First Nations to again challenge permits for the Trans Mountain pipeline expansion project, putting the project in legal limbo. (Adding to the hurdles that Kinder Morgan faces, in 2018 NRDC threatened legal action against the company if it continued construction, citing a violation of the U.S. Endangered Species Act for potentially risking the lives of Southern Resident orcas.)

Josh Axelrod, a senior advocate in the Nature Program, notes that the tar sands industry also continues to see investors pull out, further undermining its ability to expand. Opposition to new pipelines and investor uncertainty have kept billions of barrels of planned tar sands production from moving forward.

At the same time, lawmakers are facing increasingly urgent calls to slow the production of fossil fuels. “The hope is that climate policy around the world is going to continue to constrain demand for oil—and especially oil that hasn’t yet gone into production,” Axelrod says. He also points out the importance of strengthening state-level capacity to respond to potential oil spills, particularly on the West Coast, long a center for refining heavy oils. On that front, NRDC pushed for legislation, passed into law in California in October 2019, that will

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New Yorkers marching across the Brooklyn Bridge demanding that Governor Cuomo block the Williams Pipeline

help prepare the state for the dangers of such an event (including a spill of tar sands oil).

NRDC’s pipeline resistance efforts have also included a successful battle against the Williams fracked-gas pipeline (officially the Northeast Supply Enhancement Project) in New York and New Jersey. In the spring, both states denied a key permit for the project, citing its dangerous potential impacts on local waterways. (The Clean Water Act gives states the authority to block pipeline construction if companies fail to show that their projects comply with state water quality standards, and New York has used this requirement to hold up two other pipelines in recent years.) The pipeline

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developer has already reapplied for both permits, and NRDC continues to fight the project by submitting additional comments to the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation and rallying public support for denial of the water quality certification once and for all. This work is especially critical as the Trump administration has tried to short-circuit states’ ability to weigh the risks of these projects for themselves.

Since the beginning of the battle against tar sands, NRDC and our activists have rallied lawmakers to work toward a clean energy future as we push back against the exploitation of this and other dangerous, dirty fuels. “It really has been a proxy to have an important discussion about what kind of energy sources we want to lock ourselves into,” says Anthony Swift, director of NRDC’s Canada Project. Through this discussion, he says, “we raise the point that long-term infrastructure decisions will play a significant role in determining the success of our efforts to fight climate change.”

ERIK MCGREGOR

“THE HOPE IS THAT CLIMATE POLICY AROUND THE WORLD IS GOING TO CONTINUE TO CONSTRAIN DEMAND FOR OIL—ESPECIALLY OIL THAT HASN’T GONE INTO PRODUCTION.” —JOSH AXELROD, NRDC

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CLEAN CARS

BY THE NUMBERS

These 10 stats are proof that a wave of electric vehicle initiatives is sweeping the nation, helping to put a dent in one of the biggest sources of carbon pollution and spur economic growth.

AST SUMMER, A TEAM OF FOUR NRDC STAFFERS SET OUT

on a fuel-free road trip through the Midwest in an electric Chevy Bolt, stopping in nine cities in five states, from Michigan to Missouri.

Along the way, the crew—Samuel Garcia, Ada Statler, Patricia Valderrama, and Madhur Boloor, all Schneider Fellows in the Climate & Clean Energy Program—visited manufacturing and research and development facilities, spoke to a wide variety of electric vehicle (EV) stakeholders, and got a firsthand look at the ways in which electric cars are a part of the Midwest’s economy, culture, and history. (In fact, the country’s first electric car, unveiled in 1890, was built by an Iowan.) The group blogged about their adventures, writing, “After 10 days in our EV, we were not only impressed by the driving experience and all the EV champions we met along the way but also by the curiosity and interest that folks had about our car and our road trip. Strangers would come up to us while we were charging and ask us questions about what we were driving, how far it could go, or how long it would take to charge.” The trip also served as a reminder that electrification is revving up nationwide as NRDC helps push forward state- and city-level programs for EV adoption.

NRDC’s Madhur Boloor (driver), Patricia Valderrama (front), and Samuel Garcia (back) driving through Navy Pier, Chicago

83,650 JOBS across the Midwest are supported by the EV economy.

13 STATES, representing 105 million Americans, are now committed to reducing the tailpipe pollution of vehicles through zero-emissions vehicle (ZEV) programs, ensuring that automakers offer more EV products.

24 GOVERNORS have formally opposed the Trump administration’s clean car rollbacks, which will cost consumers $460 billion extra at the gas pump.

361,307 EVS were sold in the United States in 2018, up 81 percent from the previous year.

80 NEW MODELS of battery electric, plug-in hybrid, or fuel cell vehicles will be introduced by automakers by 2021, on top of the 44 currently offered in some states.

2.2 MILLION METRIC TONS less carbon pollution will be emitted in Colorado from 2023 to 2030 thanks to its new ZEV program.

$76 MILLION will be spent by Duke Energy to double the number of EV charging stations in North Carolina by 2022.

A D A S TA D L E R F O R N R D C

ERIK MCGREGOR

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$20,000 REBATES are paid by DTE Energy Inc. to businesses in Detroit, Michigan, for each charger installed, part of an incentive package to help boost EV sales.

5 MILLION ELECTRIC CARS will be on the roads in California by 2030, a goal established by a 2018 executive order.

9 PERCENT of new vehicles being sold in New Mexico will be zero-emission EVs by 2025.

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in conversation

CLEAN AIR WARRIOR DAVID DONIGER , senior strategic director of the Climate &

Clean Energy Program, has helped shape federal and global climate-related policies since he joined NRDC in 1978.

You’ve compared the current climate crisis to the fight to save the ozone layer that began in the 1970s. Did you face resistance from government and industry back then?

The chemicals industry responded to this threat just like the coal industry is responding to the climate crisis today. While NRDC’s scientists in public health and chemistry were working to get ozone-destroying CFCs [chlorofluorocarbons] banned from aerosols and other products, the industry was pushing back. They denied the science and attacked the scientists. They hired people to investigate Sherry Rowland and Mario Molina, the chemists

David Doniger at a rally in Chicago, where the public testified about the Trump administration’s new rule to replace the landmark Clean Power Plan

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How did NRDC break through?

When my colleague David Hawkins was away from NRDC working at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency during the Carter administration [which banned nearly all CFC aerosols in 1978], he reviewed the new science on CFCs’ effects on stratospheric ozone and public health. This included the EPA’s 1980 endangerment finding that triggered a legal obligation to take action on CFCs’ other uses, in refrigeration and air-conditioning.

When the Reagan administration arrived, that endangerment finding was sitting on their desks.

Under the Clean Air Act, the EPA was obligated to act. When it didn’t, NRDC sued. We eventually reached a settlement with the EPA to make a decision on domestic CFC production by 1986, and that provided important leverage both here and abroad.

The Reagan administration knew that without an international treaty, U.S. companies would be at a competitive disadvantage because they would be the only ones barred from using CFCs. That taught us an important lesson—domestic action can support the call for global action.

Then the pieces all fell into place for a global CFC ban?

Not exactly. The EPA and the State Department favored an international phaseout. But the chemicals industry was still fighting us at that time, and it looked for a supporter inside the administration.

It identified Energy Secretary Donald Hodel, who, as it turned out, wasn’t a particularly effective spokesperson. Hodel pushed for a “personal protection plan” instead of a treaty. NRDC found out and told reporters that this meant, instead of phasing out CFCs, people could just wear hats and sunglasses. The dam kind of broke when the story came out—public opinion moved firmly against CFCs, and industry resistance subsided.

We eventually were able to start the CFC phaseout in 1987 through the Montreal Protocol, and then accelerate it. The Montreal Protocol now includes every country in the world.

What has the Montreal Protocol—which you’ve described as the world’s most successful treaty to protect our atmosphere—meant for climate change?

By some estimates, without it, climate change would be 10 years ahead of where it is now. That’s

C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); J A S P E R C H A M B E R /A L A M Y; A LY S S A S C H U K A R F O R N R D C

who first identified the ozone layer as a problem in 1974. They formed a trade association called the Alliance for Responsible CFC Policy, which tried to scare everyone whose job depended on air-conditioning or aerosols.

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Protesters in Ontario, Canada, on the very first Earth Day, April 22, 1970, which brought together people from all over the world

because CFCs aren’t just ozone-depleting agents.

They’re also unbelievably powerful greenhouse gases, with 5,000 to 10,000 times the warming potential of carbon dioxide.

The process also revealed a pattern. When CFCs were first identified as an environmental threat, the industry resisted and obfuscated. But once companies figured out how to make alternatives, they got on board with an agreement to phase the chemicals out. The air-conditioning industry, for example, had been making the same product for years without ever changing or improving its approach. The phaseout of CFCs aerosols in the late 1970s turned that industry into a dynamic force that is always improving its products. Something

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similar is happening today. The power industry, for example, is moving sharply away from coal because they see how to prosper without it.

What lessons are there for NRDC’s work with industries today?

We can replicate the coalition that we forged with the chemicals industry in the greenhouse gas sphere. We are more aligned with many industries than the Trump administration is, from car manufacturers to power companies to appliance makers. As an example, President Trump seems dead set on blowing up the historic clean car peace treaty forged 10 years ago between the automobile industry, the federal government, and leading states. But industry doesn’t want the uncertainty that comes with unraveling the progress we’re making on greenhouse gases, and many auto suppliers oppose Trump’s rollbacks on federal fuel efficiency standards. Those standards have supported technological innovation—and nearly 300,000 U.S. manufacturing jobs.

These companies see environmental progress as economic progress, too.

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CAN CITIES SAVE US FROM THE CLIMATE CRISIS? Across the country, the Bloomberg Philanthropies American Cities Climate Challenge is developing the momentum— and implementing the solutions—we need to tackle some of the biggest sources of greenhouse gas emissions.

ORE THAN TWO YEARS SINCE PRESIDENT TRUMP

announced his intention to withdraw the United States from the historic Paris Agreement and in the face of continued federal inaction on the climate crisis, cities in the United States are accelerating their own climate action plans. The American Cities Climate Challenge, a $70 million initiative launched by Bloomberg Philanthropies in partnership with NRDC and other organizations, is helping 25 cities get those plans off the ground. From helping to make transportation more sustainable in Austin to improving energy efficiency in apartments across Los Angeles, the program is ensuring cities can meet ambitious carbon reduction goals.

“Our communities are depending on us for action, and we’re going to deliver,” says Christina Angelides, director of the American Cities Climate Challenge at NRDC. “The mayors are very passionate about this because they’re on the frontline of engaging with communities that have been hit really hard by the impacts of climate change. They intimately understand what’s at stake—and because of that, there’s a strong willingness to take action.”

To rein in greenhouse gas emissions from urban buildings and transportation sectors, NRDC built a staff of 30 climate advisors working directly with the 25 challenge cities, plus a team of city strategists (each of whom oversees a regional grouping of cities) and technical strategists (specializing in transportation, buildings, and energy) who assist the challenge participants in meeting their goals. “NRDC’s role is really to provide best-in-class policy expertise and sharp environmental advocacy,” Angelides says of the team, which is overseen by NRDC staffers Kimi Narita, Amanda Eaken, and Chris Wheat. The advisors have experience in a wide range of sectors, from corporations to foundations to government, but all have a vested interest in seeing their respective cities meet their goals. Additionally, Wheat notes, the climate advisors all share a strong commitment to equity and approach the work through that lens.

That’s clear in recent developments they have helped advance for residents of six low-income communities in Columbus, Ohio. Members of these communities pay between 6 and 10 percent of their annual incomes on residential heating and electricity, as opposed to the average of 3.5 percent in the United States. With NRDC support, city officials have taken the first step in tackling this disparity and lowering energy bills for these residents by assessing the energy efficiency of their homes, with

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a goal to conduct 30,000 home energy audits

by December 2020. After inspectors identify opportunities for improvement—such as replacing drafty windows or doors or outmoded appliances—residents will get help making the needed efficiency upgrades.

“Part of our goal in the challenge is to help cities engage a broader range of stakeholders and devise more ambitious policy measures than what’s in their comfort zone,” Wheat says. “And we’re particularly prioritizing equity to ensure they’re bringing all voices to the table.”

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U L A DZ I K K R Y H I N / 1 2 3 R F

San Jose, California, which recently introduced an innovative network of protected bike lanes

With that mission in mind, NRDC advisors recently worked with transportation officials on a bicycling initiative in San Jose, California, as they reached out to community organizations in neighborhoods where biking can feel dangerous. Already, to reduce the number of cars on its streets, the city has added 10 miles of protected bike lanes in just the past year and is planning for more. As this work expands, San Jose officials want to consider the needs of a wide spectrum of current and potential bikers. To that end, the city is partnering with Latinos United for a New America

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and the Vietnamese Voluntary Foundation to collect local input on barriers to biking and how the city can help. Through these partnerships, says NRDC city strategist Elizabeth Stampe, “the city is trying to hear from people who may be too busy to come to city hall on a weekday evening to speak up.” In turn, she says, “the diverse communities in San Jose are making themselves heard and making their government accountable to them.”

While the Climate Challenge is already making huge strides by setting some of the country’s most ambitious projects in motion, the effort is really just beginning. The Bloomberg Philanthropies grant runs through December 2020, but Angelides notes that delivering on each city’s individual climate action goals will take sustained investment and support. “NRDC is in this work with cities for the long haul,” she says.

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STATE LAWMAKERS FORGE A CLEAN ENERGY FUTURE A look at half a dozen local plans that will fuel America’s renewable revolution.

duty to address the climate crisis, but the same cannot be said of state leaders. With the help of NRDC advocacy, lawmakers across the country have set ambitious plans to reduce emissions and overhaul polluting industries, improving public health and boosting economies along the way.

NEW YORK

The Empire State enacted the nation’s strongest plan to limit greenhouse gas emissions last July. The Climate Leadership and Community Protection Act requires the state’s power sector to provide an entirely emissions-free electricity supply by 2040, and mandates that the state reach net-zero emissions overall by 2050. (Specifically, the plan sets out to reduce sources of emissions by 85 percent from 1990 levels and to make up the remaining 15 percent through projects such as reforestation, restoration of wetlands, and carbon-capture technologies.) To meet these ambitious goals, lawmakers included explicit mandates for building out renewables—such as solar infrastructure, battery storage, and offshore wind—in the coming years. In collaboration with nearly 200 environmental, labor, and grassroots organizations that had been leading this campaign for years, NRDC experts advocated for lawmakers to set bold targets and ensure that the benefits of the plan would reach historically disadvantaged communities.

ILLINOIS

The proposed Clean Energy Jobs Act would commit Illinois to 100 percent renewable energy by 2050. The bill’s introduction capped years of work by NRDC and our partners, which together hosted more than 60 community meetings across the state to talk through the goals and address any concerns about transitioning to clean energy. The initiative deals with one of the

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biggest obstacles to scaling up renewables—the lack of funding—by amending the way the state supports new developments (like wind and solar farms) while encouraging utilities to invest in them with incentives such as renewable energy credits. That’s good news for Illinoisans: Already, clean energy employs twice as many residents as does the fossil fuel industry.

NEW MEXICO

Last spring, New Mexico passed a plan to shutter its aging coal plants and rev up its vast solar and wind resources. The Energy Transition Act commits the state to 40 percent renewable energy by 2025, 50 percent by 2030, 80 percent by 2040, and 100 percent clean energy by 2045.

NRDC experts helped broker the legislation, which facilitates an early retirement of coal for the state’s largest utility through an innovative financing technique called securitization. (That technique lowers the utility’s interest rates and reduces closure costs by as much as 40 percent.)

The law not only protects the climate and residents’ health but also boosts local economies hit hardest by the loss of fossil fuel jobs and lowers customers’ energy bills.

WASHINGTON

With the help of NRDC’s scientific expertise, Washington State legislators passed a slew

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HE FEDERAL GOVERNMENT CONTINUES TO SHIRK ITS

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of climate-friendly bills this year. The state is now on track to phase out coal by 2025 and to achieve 100 percent clean electricity by 2045— a commitment that was paired with tax incentives to create clean energy jobs. The state also passed two emissions-slashing bills—one to overhaul energy-wasting buildings and another to set energy efficiency standards for appliances not currently regulated at the federal level.

In addition, legislators banned major uses of hydrofluorocarbons—a class of climate pollutants found in some refrigerators and air conditioners that, pound for pound, have hundreds or thousands of times the heat-trapping power of carbon dioxide.

NEVADA

In a remarkable display of bipartisanship, the Nevada state legislature unanimously passed a law upping the amount of electricity that must come from renewable sources to 50 percent by 2030. NRDC experts, who helped secure the bill’s passing, have found that the new law will spur $1.5 billion in economic activity and support at least 11,000 more jobs by 2030. Research commissioned by NRDC also shows that Nevada already has the capacity to meet its 50 percent renewable target and still provide reliable power, without needing additional technology. The Silver State also passed legislation requiring the governor to develop a plan to reduce carbon emissions in the state.

CALIFORNIA

With its efforts to reach 100 percent clean energy by 2045, California continues to lead the nation’s fight against climate change. Plus, a new law backed by NRDC experts recognizes the elevated risks from heavy oils—like diluted bitumen from Canada’s tar sands—traveling through the state and along its coast by rail and tanker and ensures that the state can respond effectively in the event of a spill.

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in conversation

INTERNATIONAL ANALYST HAN CHEN , energy policy manager in NRDC’s International

Program, keeps the big picture in view as she works to advance a global energy transition and monitor climate commitments by key powers, including China, India, and the United States.

The 2019 United Nations Climate Summit had an urgent mission in the wake of the latest IPCC report that showed what we’re up against if we don’t drastically reduce pollution from coal-fired power plants worldwide.

What was the outcome of that meeting?

Unfortunately, most of the national leaders who attended the summit missed the opportunity to demonstrate that they are on the right side of science and history. Meanwhile, multinational oil and gas companies hosted their own meeting in New York, seeking positive press for making relatively small commitments to reduce emissions without actually shifting the majority of their fossil fuel investments. But outside the summit, we’re seeing some true positive momentum on the global stage. Several developed countries—Germany, France, and Norway, to name just a few—have actually doubled their pledges to the Green Climate Fund, the world’s largest multilateral fund for climate action.

While India and China are still planning to build new coal plants domestically, both countries also continue to install renewable energy at a record pace. And many countries plan to announce that they’re setting even more ambitious climate targets in 2020 as part of the Paris Agreement’s next phase.

encouraging about China’s energy policy is that it has already figured out how to decouple economic growth from carbon intensity; its policies recognize the economic advantages inherent in developing renewables, batteries, and other technologies.

Although China is currently the world’s largest emitter of carbon dioxide, it’s also the world’s biggest investor in renewable energy. What are the most encouraging signs in China’s energy policies?

For one thing, the climate discourse in China isn’t as rooted in partisan ideology as it is here, and there’s not the same concerted disinformation campaign.

The discussion about energy policy there tends to focus on economic and environmental gains as opposed to politics. That’s why China is already seriously discussing—at both the national and local levels—things like a ban on sales of internal combustion engine vehicles, or converting public bus fleets to 100 percent electric vehicles. China has more than twice as much installed wind and solar power capacity as the United States, and its emissions per capita are only half what they are in our country. So what’s most hopeful and

Despite the Trump administration’s disastrous actions to thwart climate action, we often hear about how the renewable energy sector is booming here in the United States. How does our renewables sector compare with those of other developed countries?

Other countries are illustrating how implementing policies early on in order to drive renewable energy is absolutely key to decarbonizing. Germany currently gets almost 23 percent of its power generation from wind and solar; that’s three times higher than the percentage here in the United

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Han Chen in Beijing

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“NRDC ISN’T IN THE BUSINESS OF SIMPLY COMMENTING ON EXISTING POLICY. IT ACTIVELY DRIVES NEW POLICY, GLOBALLY, TO HELP US ALL DEAL WITH THIS UNBELIEVABLY COMPLEX AND DIFFICULT THREAT.”

F R O M L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); SE AN G ALL AGHER FOR NRDC

—HAN CHEN, NRDC

States. Denmark gets 51 percent of its power generation from wind and solar. Both countries supported the wind and solar industries in their early stages of development, and both countries have shown that they’re serious about updating their national climate legislation to be in line with commitments made as part of the Paris Agreement.

America needs to follow their lead by passing serious, ambitious legislation on the local, state, and federal levels.

What is the role of NRDC in pushing for that action in times like these?

NRDC isn’t in the business of simply commenting on existing policy; it actively drives new policy, globally, to help us all deal with this unbelievably complex and difficult threat. NRDC is willing to challenge government policy, campaign publicly,

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and advocate fiercely for the climate action we need. It’s this strategy that made me want to be a part of the organization when I walked in for my first job interview in 2015 and saw the office logo: “The Earth’s Best Defense.”

NRDC is celebrating its 50th anniversary this year. What is your vision for the environmental movement, and the planet, 50 years from now?

I think our concept of growth will need to focus on the quality of economic development, not just on raw numbers by themselves, like GDP or net profit.

The power of collective action taken by millions—such as the recent series of youth-led global climate strikes—will have helped us to understand the hidden costs of focusing only on high-level statistics and ignoring the impacts on individuals and the environment. In 50 years, the earth and its natural systems will hopefully have had some time to recover from centuries of human-driven greenhouse gas emissions. Of course, this assumes that within the next few decades we’ll have shifted from creating more greenhouse gas emissions to reducing them. If we can do that, though, we will have shifted from causing disastrous ecological damage to beginning a new era of better planetary stewardship by individuals, communities, and nations.

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historic wins

YEARS

PROTECTING OUR CLIMATE PAGE

26

LIFT HERE

NRDC is backing California’s efforts to reach 100 percent clean energy by 2045, including by increasing its investments in renewables like the Golden Hills Wind Farm.

1997

historic wins

CONTRIBUTES TO THE KYOTO PROTOCOL, THE FIRST INTERNATIONAL PACT TO ADDRESS CLIMATE

1978

KEEPS HARMFUL CHEMICALS OUT OF THE OZONE After years of publicizing the dangers of chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs), NRDC wins a fight to ban the ozone-depleting chemicals from aerosol cans.

1977

HELPS STRENGTHEN THE CLEAN AIR ACT

1990

ADVANCES A BAN ON OFFSHORE DRILLING NRDC helps win a moratorium, adopted by President George H. W. Bush, on oil leasing off the entire West Coast, New England, and the Florida Keys. (See “Ocean Steward,” page 60.)

IMPACT

NRDC contributes to drafting a set of amendments that requires states to establish programs to reduce air pollution from power plants.

Millions of pounds of CFCs were being released into the air each year—so NRDC kept up the pressure for a complete phaseout.

1987

HELPS SAVE THE OZONE LAYER

2000

YEARS

PUSHES FEDERAL DIESEL POLLUTION RULE

1992

HELPS IMPROVE ENERGY AND WATER EFFICIENCY STANDARDS

1985

INTRODUCES ENERGY EFFICIENCY STANDARDS FOR APPLIANCES

PROTECTING OUR CLIMATE PAGE

26

NRDC pushes Congress to pass the Energy Policy Act, which sets a series of new standards for commercial heating and air-conditioning equipment, electric motors, and lamps.

After pressure from an NRDC-led coalition, the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) adopts a new rule cutting diesel truck and bus pollution by as much as 95 percent.

IMPACT

The pollution reduction was comparable to removing 13 million trucks from our roads.

NRDC is backing California’s efforts to reach 100 percent clean energy by 2045, including by increasing its investments in renewables like the Golden Hills Wind Farm.

P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : E I KO O J A L A ( I L L U S T R AT I O N ); S A M K W E S K I N ( P H O T O)

LIFT HERE

In response to the first worldwide atmospheric pollution crisis, NRDC leads an initiative resulting in the Montreal Protocol, an international treaty to save the ozone layer by banning CFCs from all industrial uses.

(See “Clean Air Warrior,” page 18.)

2016

HELPS ESTABLISH AMERICA’S FIRST OFFSHORE WIND PLANT

2006

DECREASES AIR POLLUTION FROM OLD INDUSTRIAL FACILITIES

2009

PUSHES FOR CLEANER CARS IN THE UNITED STATES After a multiyear battle waged by NRDC and others in the courts and legislative halls, President Obama announces national fuel efficiency standards modeled on California’s groundbreaking emissions law.

2019

2014

HELPS BLOCK WILLIAMS PIPELINE

F R O M FA R L E F T: A L A M Y; G O D D A R D S PA C E F L I G H T C E N T E R / N A S A ; JAMIE RECTOR/BLOOMBERG VIA GETT Y IMAGES; DENNIS SCHROEDER/NREL; ISTOCK

HELPS CREATE THE CLEAN POWER PLAN

NRDC advocated for more than three years alongside other environmental and social justice groups against this dangerous fracked-gas pipeline expansion project. We helped deliver a significant blow to its development when New York’s Department of Environmental Conservation and New Jersey’s Department of Environmental Protection denied several key permits for the project. (See “Blocking Pipelines From Coast to Coast, page 14.)

President Obama’s EPA proposes a commonsense policy, inspired by an NRDC strategy, to cut carbon pollution from power plants. Under the Clean Power Plan, enforceable carbon pollution limits would kick in starting in 2022.

IMPACT

Fossil-fueled power plants are responsible for nearly 40 percent of America’s carbon footprint.

2007

BREAKS POLITICAL LOGJAM ON LIMITING CLIMATE CHANGE POLLUTION NRDC and partners win a historic Supreme Court ruling that classifies carbon dioxide and other global warming emissions as “pollutants” under the Clean Air Act, thus giving the EPA the authority to curb them.

2015

HELPS BLOCK KEYSTONE XL PIPELINE

2011

HELPS REDUCE MERCURY, LEAD, AND OTHER TOXIC AIR POLLUTION FROM POWER PLANTS

After seven years of advocacy by NRDC and others, President Obama rejects the pipeline, which would have carried volatile tar sands oil through environmentally sensitive and agriculturally important areas on its way to Gulf Coast refineries.

2019

UPHOLDS OFFSHORE DRILLING BAN IN ARCTIC AND ATLANTIC In response to an NRDC lawsuit, a federal court rules that President Trump’s 2017 executive order to overturn bans on oil and gas leasing in the Arctic and Atlantic oceans— which would keep the country shackled to climate-destroying fossil fuels—was unlawful.

(See “Ocean Steward,” page 60.)

BUILDING HEALTHY, RESILIENT COMMUNITIES

Too often, low-income communities of color are left behind in the quest for clean air and water, the expansion of access to nature, and the transition from dirty fossil fuels to clean energy. Standing alongside these communities—by amplifying their voices and offering legal, science, and policy support—NRDC is committed to fighting environmental injustice. These battles are often long and hard fought, whether in Flint, Michigan, where we are still working on the ground to make sure the 2017 settlement to replace lead service lines is upheld, or in India, where we are in our eighth year helping to guide the heat action plans that protect the lives of the most vulnerable.

From the beginning, NRDC has recognized the importance of the citizen lawsuit provisions in our environmental laws, which empower individuals and groups to bring claims against polluters, as crucial tools to protect public health and wellbeing. And in the courts and on Capitol Hill, in corporate boardrooms and at community meetings, we continue to put people first.

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Children enjoying Domino Park in Brooklyn, New York

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FIGHTING THE TIDE OF WATEREDDOWN JUSTICE Three years after winning a $97 million legal settlement that requires the city of Flint, Michigan, to replace its lead water service lines, NRDC is still on the ground holding officials accountable and using similar tactics as we fight alongside the residents of Newark, New Jersey.

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in Flint, Michigan, dwindled not long after the March 2017 settlement of the federal lawsuit brought by NRDC, Concerned Pastors for Social Action, Flint resident Melissa Mays, and the ACLU of Michigan. But it has remained top-of-mind for the NRDC lawyers who are working to make sure the city of Flint and Michigan state officials uphold their legal obligation to find and fund the replacement of Flint’s lead and galvanized steel pipes.

“People think once you win a case, it’s over,” says Margie Kelly, a strategic communications manager based in NRDC’s Chicago office. “But that’s not the situation in Flint, where we have been fighting to make sure the lead lines really do come out of the ground in a way that’s accountable to the people there. It really goes to show the tenacity of our lawyers.”

Senior attorney Dimple Chaudhary, who was lead counsel on the case, knew from the start that the $97 million replacement program would require steady oversight, especially given Flint’s lack of resources. “We’ve worked to make sure we could track what the city is doing, what the state is doing—and what they aren’t doing,” she says.

Dissatisfied with the progress on the ground, NRDC went back to court in 2018 to press the city to improve its techniques for finding lead service lines.

By February 2019, its officials agreed to begin using a data-driven approach to the work and to produce monthly reports on their results. Meanwhile, in the subsequent months, Chaudhary and her colleagues, along with local community groups, launched a public outreach campaign to try to make sure that all residents knew their rights to have their pipes replaced before the end of the city’s replacement program.

The shift worked: By last fall, the city of Flint reported that it had investigated more than 24,000 of its 28,000 water lines and replaced about 9,000 of them.

The ultimate success of the pipe replacement program is exciting, Chaudhary notes, but adds, “There’s so much more that needs to be done in Flint to make the city whole.” Among other things, this means addressing the medical conditions and property damage that resulted from the water crisis. “There’s a concern that Flint will be forgotten—and then, who will do that work?” she asks. While some issues may be outside of NRDC’s areas of expertise,

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B R I T TA N Y G R E E S O N F O R N R D C . P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : J A C O B P R I T C H A R D F O R N R D C

ATIONAL NEWS COVERAGE OF THE WATER CRISIS

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Claire McClinton, a leader of the Flint Democracy Defense League

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DEMETRIUS FREEMAN FOR NRDC

A child filling a cup with water from the faucet-mounted water filter in his kitchen in Newark

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Chaudhary says, maintaining relationships in the community will ensure that NRDC can stay engaged as the recovery continues.

H E O N G O I N G WO R K I N F L I N T H A S

“IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT FIXING THE WATER. IT’S ALSO ABOUT RESTORING PEOPLE’S FAITH THAT THE GOVERNMENT IS LOOKING OUT FOR THEM.” —DIMPLE CHAUDHARY, NRDC

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been an important model for NRDC’s involvement in other cities grappling with lead in their drinking water. In Newark, New Jersey, where lead contamination also remains a serious problem and where NRDC and the Newark Education Workers Caucus filed a joint lawsuit in 2018, we’ve played a similar role in demanding accountability from officials.

While Newark has shifted its stance from denial to grudging acknowledgment of the issue, it is still not providing filters—or critical instruction on the proper installation, use, and maintenance of filters—to all affected residents.

“When my family and I first heard about the recent lead problems in our drinking water, we were terrified,” Felicia Alston-Singleton, a resident of public housing in Newark’s West Ward and an NRDC member, said in a court declaration. “I’ve had a really hard time getting any information about my own home’s water. I worry that the city will only tell my landlord if there is a problem and that no one will tell me. I’m terrified that we’re all being exposed and don’t know it.”

Advocates have heard stories like AlstonSingleton’s all too often. A September 2019 report titled Watered Down Justice, which NRDC coauthored with the Environmental Justice Health Alliance for Chemical Policy Reform and Coming Clean, found that ongoing water contamination in majority-Black cities like Flint and Newark could be related to a history of community disinvestment, residential segregation, and discrimination. The research team analyzed U.S. Environmental Protection Agency data from 2016 to 2019. They noted that drinking water systems in violation of the law for the entire study period were 40 percent more likely to be in places with higher percentages of populations that were people of color. And even when actions were taken to compel repairs, it took longer for water systems in communities of color to come back into compliance.

“One of the hardest takeaways from this work is that people can have brand-new pipes and still never trust that the water is safe,” Chaudhary says.

“That’s the damage and the lasting lesson of Flint.

In Newark, we have to get this right—and quickly.

It’s not just about fixing the water. It’s also about restoring people’s faith that the government is looking out for them.”

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L ANE BARDEN

An aerial view of the Los Angeles River

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THE QUEST TO RESTORE THE L.A. RIVER FOR ALL ANGELENOS NRDC advocates who have fought for years to bring back this beleaguered urban waterway are joining local communities of color to ensure that new development doesn’t equal displacement.

A

S IT WINDS ITS WAY THROUGH THE URBAN LAND-

scape, the Los Angeles River performs a vital service for Angelenos as an important means of flood control. During periods of heavy rain, this mostly channelized, 51-mile-long waterway is capable of depositing more than 10.8 million gallons of runoff into the Pacific Ocean every minute. Now, after many decades of neglect, portions of the river are undergoing a long-awaited and much-needed restoration designed to improve riparian health, preserve and strengthen wildlife habitat, and naturally treat the stormwater runoff that flows through the channel during extreme rain events. If the effort is successful, residents will get not only a healthier and more resilient L.A. River but also a more beautiful and welcoming one, flanked by new green spaces for communities to enjoy.

NRDC has for decades been intimately involved with the plan to clean up the river, improve its water quality, and transform it into a genuine community asset. But as excitement over the waterway’s resuscitation has risen, so too have housing costs and land speculation. And so advocates with NRDC’s Southern California Ecosystems Project are standing alongside the local communities facing pressures from gentrification as they demand equitable development.

“For many years, when restoring the L.A. River was more of a far-off vision, advocates’ main goal was to convince our civic leaders that returning the river to a more natural state, restoring its ecological functions, and giving the public access to the river were all both possible and desirable,” says NRDC senior attorney Damon Nagami. “Through years of perseverance, we finally achieved that goal. But now that there’s momentum behind and public resources aimed at river restoration, profiteering developers are horning in

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A rendering of developments along a revitalized L.A. River

“WE’RE TRYING TO ENSURE THAT ANY DEVELOPMENT ALONG A RESTORED L.A. RIVER IS BOTH SUSTAINABLE AND EQUITABLE.” —DAMON NAGAMI, NRDC

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AGAMI ALSO EMPHASIZES THAT ANY NEW DEVELOPMENT

must include public, open green space along the riverfront and must protect critical river and watershed functions. “The first two large development projects proposed along the river, north of downtown L.A., don’t do any of these things,” Nagami says, so NRDC is mounting a campaign to oppose them. One of these proposed projects, a 419-unit residential complex with only 35 units set aside as affordable housing, would dramatically increase traffic and tailpipe emissions in the surrounding Glassell Park and Atwater Village neighborhoods, disrupt habitat restoration efforts, and place commercial development atop seven acres of riverside land that the city had previously envisioned as part of a contiguous public park. The other proposed project, a mixed-use complex in L.A.’s Chinatown that would contain 920 upscale residential units, has already led to reports of landlords harassing and even evicting long-term neighborhood residents as development causes land values—and market rates for rental apartments—to increase.

As a member of the Los Angeles Regional Open Space and Affordable Housing collaborative, NRDC partners with other groups to bring more green space to urban and low-income neighborhoods while working to counter the displacement that too often comes with gentrification. “We’re trying to ensure that any development along a restored L.A. River is both sustainable and equitable,” Nagami says. That means inviting residents to take part in the planning and realization of projects, so that any new development proceeds with local support. And it means prioritizing—as NRDC does—the health and well-being of all communities, so that the rewards of environmental and economic progress are made available to everyone.

COURTESY OF LOS ANGELES CIT Y PL ANNING

with megaprojects that are threatening to displace folks in low-income communities of color.”

Residents of river-adjacent communities— many of them historically Asian- and Latino-American—are justifiably concerned that the neighborhoods they’ve called home for generations are now under threat from developers whose projects are primarily geared toward the wealthy. The issue is playing out amid the worst homelessness crisis the city has seen in decades, with nearly 60,000 people living on the streets and some 600,000 Los Angeles County residents spending 90 percent or more of their income on housing costs.

As they go about restoring the river, “both the City and County of Los Angeles need to prioritize safety, safeguard everyday quality of life, lessen collateral displacement of long-term residents— principally renters—and prioritize preservation of area residential characteristics,” says David de la Torre of the Elysian Valley Neighborhood Watch. NRDC and other community advocates echo this message, believing that any development must establish structures and policies to protect existing low-income communities from displacement and gentrification.

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A CHAMPION FOR FRESH, LOCAL FOOD AT DOLLAR GENERAL NRDC partner Helga Garza and the Campaign for Healthier Solutions are helping make local produce more accessible to low-income communities in Albuquerque and beyond.

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N E O F T H E F I R ST T H I N GS H E L GA GA RZA SAYS A B O U T

herself is that she is the daughter of an activist. She recalls how in the 1960s, with only a third-grade education, her mother organized their entire San Antonio neighborhood—made up of people of color, including Native Americans, Chicanos, and African-Americans—to successfully advocate for much-needed infrastructure and public services, including a local clinic, a Head Start program, and a recreation center. “I grew up in her activism, seeing victories and seeing small, scalable projects,” Garza says, adding with pride that her mother “made the quality of life better for my generation and for all of those after.”

Today Garza honors this legacy as the executive director of the Agri-Cultura Network (ACN). The New Mexico–based farm cooperative provides community access to local and sustainably grown produce through La Cosecha, an innovative, community-supported agriculture program whose members include many low-income families of color in the South Valley.

Seeing an opportunity to expand the network’s reach, Garza teamed up with NRDC and the Campaign for Healthier Solutions, a project of the Environmental Justice Health Alliance and Coming Clean. The goal: getting more fresh fruits and vegetables into the hands of people who live in food-insecure

J A E LY N D E M A R I A

Helga Garza at the Oceti Sakowan camp during a Standing Rock Sioux protest

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neighborhoods, like the Albuquerque-area communities La Cosecha serves. Specifically, Garza has centered her advocacy on Dollar General, the country’s largest discount retail chain. Many of its 15,000 outlets operate in areas that lack full-service grocery stores and stock their food aisles almost exclusively with items that are canned, boxed, highly processed, and low in nutritional value.

The push for healthy foods at Dollar General builds on years of effort Garza and the Campaign for Healthier Solutions have spent lobbying the company to be a better community partner. In particular, they’ve pressed Dollar General and other dollar-store chains to stop selling products— mostly children’s toys—made with toxic chemicals.

Now, as an integral part of the campaign’s Local Food Solutions project, Garza is working to persuade the chain to sign four Albuquerque-area stores onto the list of New Mexican institutions (which include hospitals, schools, and restaurants) that buy produce from ACN. “We’ve put in a lot of legwork,” Garza says of her dollar-store advocacy. In March 2019, Dollar General announced it would begin selling fresh produce in 450 of its stores, with a goal of eventually reaching 5,000. Then in May, as part of a delegation from the Campaign for Healthier Solutions, Garza attended Dollar General’s annual shareholder meeting in Tennessee and secured a commitment from CEO Todd Vasos to visit Albuquerque to meet with ACN farmers about a prospective partnership.

“This project is a really exciting opportunity to reach low-income customers at a price they can afford with culturally appropriate, fresh food grown by farmers in their community,” says NRDC senior attorney Sara Imperiale, who attended Dollar General’s May shareholder meeting alongside Garza.

Through the efforts of Imperiale and senior attorney Margaret Brown, NRDC has provided legal research and expertise to support Garza and the campaign’s community-driven advocacy. NRDC is also assisting ACN by identifying ways to scale up its business and allow the network’s farmers to sell consistently to retailers like Dollar General.

“Fundamentally, ACN wants to build power and wealth in the regional food system by meaningfully involving members of the local community,” Imperiale says. “So a successful project will not only get lettuce into some Dollar General stores but also lead to increased support for sustainable agriculture and local farmers. It will mean reduced pesticide and fertilizer use. It will mean better soil health. It will mean a reduced carbon footprint, and it’ll mean better, more nutritious options for low-income people of color in neighborhoods where these dollar stores are predominantly located.”

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Local residents filling containers with water from a municipal corporation tanker outside Ahmedabad, India

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SAVING LIVES IN INDIA AS TEMPERATURES SOAR Recent research from NRDC shows that six years after the implementation of South Asia’s first heat action plan, the strategy continues to save lives on a climatestressed continent.

A M I T D AV E / R E U T E R S

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H I S PA ST J U N E , I N D I A EX P E R I E N C E D O N E O F I TS

longest heat waves on record, with temperatures soaring as high as 122 °F. The scorching conditions killed more than 200 people, and the late arrival of the yearly monsoon resulted in a brutal water shortage. As India continues to suffer the impacts of the climate crisis, its people are facing increasingly dire health consequences. And in turn, many officials in cities throughout the country are doubling down on preparedness strategies for dealing with extreme heat.

Through recent research into South Asia’s first heat action plan, NRDC and partners showed that the commitment is yielding meaningful results.

Published in the Journal of Environmental and Public Health, the study focused on Ahmedabad, a city in western India with a population of about eight million, which has avoided an estimated 1,100 deaths annually since implementing the plan in 2013.

The plan, which NRDC helped craft in collaboration with the Indian Institute of Public Health and others, deploys a variety of tactics, including early-warning alert systems, robust public outreach campaigns, medical training to better diagnose and treat heat-related illnesses, and enhanced access to drinking water and shaded areas for the city’s most vulnerable populations.

Kim Knowlton, a senior scientist at NRDC and one of the study’s coauthors, says that the plan’s dynamism is one of the reasons behind its success. “The people of Ahmedabad, the city leaders, really owned [the plan], and they have improved it every year since,” she says.

Recent improvements have included activating central cooling locations during heat alerts and providing temporary night shelters for those without access to water or electricity during extreme conditions. And during last summer’s heat wave, the city government ordered a stop to all construction and distributed free buttermilk to quench people’s thirst in parks and other public spaces.

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Ahmedabad and Hyderabad—a fast-growing city in the hot and arid Deccan Plateau—also rolled out a “cool roof” program, a cost-effective means of keeping indoor temperatures down that saves energy. In 2017 and 2018, pilot programs in the two cities painted more than 3,000 roofs in slum communities, and in 2019, officials built on the pilots with citywide programs.

Cool roofs, now mandatory for all municipal, commercial, and government buildings and prioritized for low-income housing, can be made from a variety of materials. Some are created by coating a roof with reflective pigments; others are made of coconut husk and paper waste.

These structures have proved critical in limiting air conditioner use, which in turn reduces the urban heat island effect, carbon dioxide emissions, and emissions of hydrofluorocarbon (HFC) super pollutants.

Since its inception, the Ahmedabad Heat Action Plan has inspired 23 other heat-prone states and more than 100 cities and districts in India to adopt such plans of their own, with coordination assistance provided by the National Disaster Management Authority and the India Meteorological Department.

“It’s a real case study in how to scale,” says Anjali Jaiswal, director of NRDC’s India Program and a senior attorney who helped steer Ahmedabad’s action plan. “It’s just so rewarding to go back and see that these are really simple, lowcost solutions that can be implemented to save lives—and to see how quickly they can be done.”

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THE AHMEDABAD HEAT ACTION PLAN HAS INSPIRED 23 OTHER HEAT-PRONE STATES AND MORE THAN 100 CITIES AND DISTRICTS IN INDIA TO ADOPT SUCH PLANS OF THEIR OWN.

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C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P R I G H T: A M I T D AV E / R E U T E R S ; A D M I N I S T R AT I V E S TA F F C O L L E G E O F I N D I A ( A S C I ) A M I T D AV E / R E U T E R S ; S A M PA N T H A K Y/G E T T Y I M A G E S NRDC_2019AR_Communities_FINAL.indd 16

Clockwise from top right: Boys jumping into the Sabarmati River to cool off on a hot summer day in Ahmedabad; installation of a cool roof; the dried-up Ratanpura Lake in Ahmedabad; a dining hall handing out buttermilk during a heat wave in Ahmedabad

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people of color pay more, low-income families pay more, renters pay more.

Now, why is that? The reason is the quality of the housing stock. These homes are generally leaky; they’re older and run-down. They’re inefficient, so people are paying more money in homes that are less comfortable. That’s an injustice we need to help solve.

in conversation

DEFENDER OF ENERGY EFFICIENCY— AND EQUITY DAWONE ROBINSON , regional director of NRDC’s

Energy Efficiency for All Project, works to create opportunities for low-income communities of color to save energy and money.

Why are some communities unable to take advantage of energy efficiency opportunities?

I think if you were to ask the average person to close their eyes and think about how we can deliver energy efficiency programs to a family, they’ll picture mostly single-family home improvements, like adding attic insulation or sealing ductwork. This tendency to overlook residents of multifamily buildings is also true of policymakers and utilities. These residents have little incentive to invest in long-term energy efficiency upgrades themselves, and property owners often lack incentives as well, especially in cases where tenants pay their own energy bills. This “split incentive” challenge is a barrier to progress. The result is that low-income households and renters are left behind.

How does this inequity impact energy costs?

We partnered with the American Council for an Energy-Efficient Economy to look at energy costs for families in the 50 largest cities in the United States and found that renters pay more for energy as a percentage of their income than homeowners do. Low-income families pay more than your average family, and people of color pay more than white households across the board, even if you control for the size of the home. So for the equivalent square footage,

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How is NRDC helping to bridge this gap?

We’re still dealing with a huge disparity in the amount of resources that are actually going to the multifamily housing sector. Nevertheless, we do have some cases where we’ve been able to work with utilities to provide a pretty large sum of money for lower-income people and people in multifamily housing. In Virginia, we worked directly with the largest utility, Dominion Energy, through a shareholder-funded program to dedicate about $140 million over the course of 10 years for low-income weatherization, other upgrades, and some bill-paying assistance. The majority of that money has gone to multifamily housing.

How can policymakers help address this disparity?

More than half of the nation’s states have mandatory energy efficiency savings targets—the state or the utilities have to save a certain percentage of energy every year through efficiency measures. But how much of those energy savings is being achieved in low-income housing? Usually not much. We need to have equity-first energy policies that prioritize the needs of low-income families of color who are hit the hardest. That’s number one.

On the federal level, we need to fight to both preserve and increase funding to vital programs, including the Low Income Home Energy Assistance Program and the Weatherization Assistance Program. These resources are funded back down to the states to go toward weatherization and other heating and cooling assistance for low-income families.

And utility programs need to get more creative.

Instead of thinking about renewable energy and energy efficiency in a single box, put energy efficiency first. There’s a saying that the cheapest energy is the energy we don’t use. If we were just smarter about the way we used our current energy resources—if our homes and our appliances were more efficient—then we wouldn’t need to build more power plants.

How do you hope to see the Energy Efficiency for All project ramp up in the coming years?

We host a lot of energy equity forums; some past

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C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); R O C K Y K I S T N E R ; D O M I N I O N E N E R G Y

Dawone Robinson speaking at an annual meeting of the Network for Energy, Water, and Health in Affordable Buildings, Los Angeles

“WE NEED TO HAVE EQUITY-FIRST ENERGY POLICIES THAT PRIORITIZE THE NEEDS OF LOW-INCOME FAMILIES OF COLOR WHO ARE HIT THE HARDEST.” —DAWONE ROBINSON, NRDC

events have been in Columbus, Georgia; Detroit; Baltimore; and Norfolk, Virginia. We use them to explain to community members why their energy bills are as high as they are and what they can do about it. We offer people practical, DIY suggestions to make their home energy efficient and to ensure that their home is healthy, from making basic ceiling improvements to swapping out old incandescent bulbs for LED light bulbs. We’ve even had utilities show up and do outreach about programs they offer. That’s been very successful, and I hope to do more of those events. We’ve built a lot of connections with local officials and with utilities. We don’t need to be adversarial with all utilities. Sometimes we can partner up, connect people with the programs they need, and just do good community service.

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A Dominion Energy worker delivering one of 400 AC units to housing for the elderly

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HELPING CITIES TACKLE FOOD WASTE NRDC’s Food Matters Project is seeing results in two model cities, Denver and Baltimore, and sharing strategies with other local partners across the country.

U

goes uneaten—wasting not only the calories and the cost of a tossed meal but also the water, energy, land, and labor that went into growing, transporting, and storing it. Meanwhile, one in eight Americans struggles to put food on the table.

NRDC sparked a national dialogue about the alarming amount of food that goes to waste in our country back in 2012.

Now we’re working at the city level to tackle this paradox of simultaneous excess and scarcity. “Cities are uniquely qualified to reduce food waste,” says Darby Hoover, a senior resource specialist at NRDC. “They set up and pay for the waste-management systems in this country, so they want to keep those costs down. They also care about feeding their hungry and reaching climate goals.”

To help on all three fronts, NRDC has developed a comprehensive strategy and digital resources that provide concrete suggestions for cities looking to address food waste locally, as well as flexibility in shaping solutions to a metropolitan area’s unique needs. The tool kit also focuses on a key first barrier: understanding the scope of the problem. “We essentially want cities to do what NRDC did in our initial research—figure out how much waste there really is and where it’s coming from,” Hoover says. The data can then inform strategies to address the problem, such as redistributing surplus food from restaurants to soup kitchens or introducing a landfill ban on food scraps.

Critically, the tool kit is designed to reduce waste before it’s even created.

“Many cities think of composting or anaerobic digestion first when it comes to food waste, but these are actually the last lines of defense,” Hoover says.

Tactics to address food waste at its sources include launching public awareness campaigns—with the help of NRDC’s Save the Food advertisements and community outreach materials—to educate city residents about how to shop smarter and prepare and store items properly so they last longer, for example, and offering financial incentives to consumers in the form of a pay-as-youthrow trash system. Other times, solutions seek to unite city government officials across various departments to come up with food rescue tactics.

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T H E B A LT I M O R E C O M P O S T C O L L E C T I V E

P TO 40 PERCENT OF ALL FOOD IN THE UNITED STATES

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The Baltimore Compost Collective’s Marvin Hayes and youth composting food scraps

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“CITIES ARE UNIQUELY QUALIFIED TO REDUCE FOOD WASTE.” —DARBY HOOVER, NRDC C L O C K W I S E F R O M B O T T O M L E F T: M AT T N A G E R F O R N R D C ( 2 X ); M E R E D I T H D A N B E R G - F I C A R E L L I ;T I M G I L L I E S

“Food waste is not a siloed issue that only affects waste management,” Hoover points out.

Several cities are already piloting these strategies. In Denver, where restaurants are estimated to generate one-fourth of the city’s food waste, NRDC’s Food Matters Project is teaming up with dining establishments to ensure that good food ends up on people’s plates rather than in landfills.

Last spring, eight restaurants in the Highlands neighborhood participated in a pilot program that involved waste auditing, composting education, and sharing strategies on food waste prevention (such as changing ordering practices and creating new recipes that rely on food scraps). And 10 restaurants in the South Pearl Street neighborhood embarked on a similar project this past fall.

Meanwhile, in Baltimore, the Food Matters partnership with the city’s Office of Sustainability—and with funding provided by the Rockefeller Foundation—helped establish a food scraps collection point at a downtown farmers’ market.

By last fall, shoppers had dropped off more than 10,000 pounds of food waste, which market vendors hauled back to their farms and turned into animal feed and nutrient-rich compost for crops.

Simultaneously, the partnership is supporting 11 local nonprofits to help advance food waste prevention strategies. The youth-run Baltimore Compost Collective at the Filbert Street Community Garden used its grant to purchase a truck to more efficiently collect and transport food scraps, which in turn creates employment opportunities for youth in a high-crime and food-insecure area. “Not only can we transform food scraps into soil, but we can also give opportunities for young people to do entrepreneurial work,” says Marvin Hayes, program director, who sees the garden as a model for what can be achieved on a larger scale. “Collectively, we can move Baltimore toward zero waste.”

Building on the momentum of the tool kit and our work in pilot cities, NRDC hosted the inaugural Food Matters City Summit in New York City in February 2019 and a second in Denver in November. In both cities, local leaders came together to share ideas and best practices around food waste reduction. NRDC plans to take this collaboration a step further this year by launching a virtual knowledge-sharing network for city leaders to stay up-to-date on food waste work around the country. As Maddie Keating, lead NRDC food waste expert in Denver, says, “We’re helping support and connect the incredible existing ecosystems of people already doing food work in their communities.”

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Clockwise from top left: Composting and food waste bins at Denver’s Academy 360; ad provided by NRDC as one of the resources we offer to cities; Little Man Ice Cream, one of the nine restaurants to join Denver’s food waste pilot program, part of NRDC’s Food Matters Project; Scraps, a compost pickup service in Denver

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historic wins

YEARS

EMPOWERING COMMUNITIES PAGE

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LIFT HERE

Denver is one of two pilot cities partnering with NRDC on the Food Matters project, which includes composting initiatives like this one at Academy 360.

1994

1978

historic wins

GETS PESTICIDES OUT OF PROCESSED FOODS

LEADS NUCLEAR WASTE CITIZEN WATCHDOG EFFORT

NRDC wins a landmark case banning 36 carcinogenic pesticides from processed foods and ordering a review of 49 others.

NRDC becomes the primary citizen watchdog organization monitoring the federal nuclear waste program, and our legal actions force the U.S. government to deal with the millions of gallons of nuclear waste held in leaky tanks in South Carolina and Washington State.

c

1984

WINS A LAWSUIT AGAINST THE EPA TO TIGHTEN DIESEL POLLUTION REGULATIONS

1973

GETS THE LEAD OUT OF GASOLINE

1980

YEARS

STRENGTHENS TOXIC CHEMICAL TESTING BY THE EPA

1976

KEEPS CANCER-CAUSING POLLUTANTS OUT OF WATERWAYS

EMPOWERING COMMUNITIES

Litigation brought by NRDC compels the EPA to sign a landmark consent decree guarding against the discharge of 65 toxic pollutants, including many known or suspected carcinogens, into our water bodies.

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HELPS SAFEGUARD SWIMMERS

1989

HELPS BAN ASBESTOS In response to a petition

by NRDC, the EPA issues a ban on most uses of asbestos, the fibrous and carcinogenic mineral used in building insulation, brake linings, roofing, and pipes.

NRDC’s annual Testing the Waters report leads to the Beaches Environmental Assessment and Coastal Health Act, which sets national standards for recreational water testing and authorizes grants for beachmonitoring programs.

IMPACT

When beach managers determine that water contamination has failed relevant health standards, they notify the public through beach closures or advisories.

2001

HELPS REDUCE ARSENIC CONTAMINATION Following NRDC’s decadelong campaign, the EPA announces a stricter standard for arsenic in tap water, lowering Americans’ risk of contracting cancer from their drinking water.

Denver is one of two pilot cities partnering with NRDC on the Food Matters project, which includes composting initiatives like this one at Academy 360.

P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : E I KO O J A L A ( I L L U S T R AT I O N ); M AT T N A G E R F O R N R D C ( P H O T O)

1974

HELPS CURB ACID RAIN

PAGE

2000

LIFT HERE

NRDC successfully sues the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) for failing to issue air pollution regulations on lead, resulting in the phaseout of this toxic heavy metal.

2002

2018

TRIGGERS CLEANUP OF MAINE’S PENOBSCOT RIVER In a case brought by NRDC and the Maine People’s Alliance, a federal district court rules that the chemical company Mallinckrodt, which discharged mercury (a neurotoxin) directly into the Penobscot, threatened the health of those who fish and depend on the river’s resources.

2011

EXPOSES THE POLITICS OF POLLUTION IN DICKSON, TENNESSEE

IMPACT

F R O M FA R L E F T: J O H N M A R G O L I S ; N YC G O V PA R K S . C O M ; G A B O R K E N Y E R E S / S H U T T E R S T O C K ; C A R O L G U Z Y/ T H E WA S H I N G T O N P O S T V I A G E T T Y I M A G E S ; B R I T TA N Y G R E E S O N F O R T H E WA S H I N G T O N P O S T

In the nine-year study that followed, several species, including lobsters, black ducks, eels, and marsh songbirds, were found to have high mercury levels.

Remediation is ongoing.

2010

ACHIEVES BAN ON THE TOXIC PESTICIDE ENDOSULFAN USED ON FRUITS, VEGETABLES, AND COTTON

WINS CASE AGAINST MONSANTO IN CALIFORNIA Glyphosate, the active ingredient in Monsanto’s Roundup herbicide, is listed as a carcinogen under California’s Proposition 65, a voter initiative NRDC helped pass in 1986 to help citizens protect themselves from harmful chemicals.

2016

BLOCKS MEGA RAIL YARD IN WEST LONG BEACH

For decades, manufacturing companies had dumped trichloroethylene (TCE), a toxic industrial solvent, into a landfill in a mostly Black community. The EPA later detected TCE in the local well water but remediated the problem only for the area’s white residents. So NRDC joined the Holt family—who had not been warned about the danger and several of whom developed cancer—in successfully suing the polluters and county government.

2017

2013

2007

HOLDS TEXACO ACCOUNTABLE FOR POLLUTION After taking the oil giant to court five times in 20 years, NRDC and Delaware Audubon Society reach a $2.25 million settlement agreement with Texaco for its repeated unlawful pollution discharges into the Delaware River.

SECURES SETTLEMENT FOR NEW YORK CITY’S PUBLIC HOUSING RESIDENTS A settlement agreement in a class action lawsuit brought by NRDC and the National Center for Law and Economic Justice requires the New York City Housing Authority to address the severe mold and moisture problems plaguing many of its tenants.

WORKS WITH FLINT RESIDENTS TO SECURE LEAD PIPE REPLACEMENT Under the settlement agreement, the city of Flint must find and remove Flint’s lead and galvanized steel water service lines by 2020.

(See “Fighting the Tide of WateredDown Justice,” page 30.)

2019

REDUCES CHLORPYRIFOS IN OUR FOOD SUPPLY California and New York announce plans to phase out chlorpyrifos—a pesticide linked to learning disabilities in children—by the end of 2020, following years of pressure from NRDC and other groups.

IMPACT

California is the country’s top user of chlorpyrifos, spraying close to one million pounds per year mainly on fruits, nuts, and vegetables.

GUARDING NATURE

After a slew of recent alarming reports from the international scientific community, we know that many global ecosystems and wildlife populations are on the verge of collapse. Thankfully, a half century of work has also taught us that our public lands, waters, and wildlife populations can be conserved and restored—and that by safeguarding our environmental resources, we can simultaneously enhance human livelihoods. And we must. For if we don’t protect our forests, soil, and oceans, we will also accelerate the climate crisis—and risk losing up to one million species.

NRDC is taking the necessary steps to secure international commitments to stem the wildlife trade and galvanizing bipartisan agreements to protect our wild places and species. Propelled by science, smart policies, and the support of millions of activists speaking out on behalf of bumblebees and whales, of forests from the Amazon to the Canadian boreal, and of oceans everywhere, we are changing the course for nature.

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A gray wolf in Denali National Park, Alaska

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WHAT WILL IT TAKE TO SAVE THE LAST FRONTIER? Nothing less than a steady resistance in the courts, in corporate boardrooms, and on Capitol Hill will save the Arctic at this pivotal point in history.

never-ending, but so is NRDC’s commitment. In the past year alone, our advocates defeated President Trump’s illegal attempt to reopen 125 million acres of the Arctic Ocean to offshore drilling and helped stop a seismic exploration proposal that would have trampled some of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge’s most delicate ecosystems. NRDC also helped move the Arctic Cultural and Coastal Plain Protection Act through the House of Representatives and introduce the Arctic Refuge Protection Act in the Senate.

Meanwhile, the president and his allies are trying to bring oil drills into the Arctic Refuge, which would destroy one of the world’s last great wild places. The legal battle to keep drilling out of the refuge will be one of the most important fights in NRDC’s history.

Trump is also moving to ramp up logging of the Tongass National Forest, bringing roads into irreplaceable Alaskan wilderness that stores more carbon per acre than any other forest in the United States. The Tongass is home to wild Pacific salmon, the Alexander Archipelago wolf, and many other species that will suffer under Trump’s plan. To stop the destruction, NRDC is joining with partners, including Indigenous groups whose traditional ways of life depend on keeping the wilderness intact.

That same resolve to protect our national treasures has kept us in the fight against the proposed Pebble Mine for more than a decade. The hard

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The Arctic National Wildlife Refuge, Alaska

A L E X I S B O N O G O F S K Y/ U S F W S ; P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : F L O R I A N S C H U LT Z

H E BAT T L E F O R T H E S O U L O F A L A S KA F E E LS

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rock mine would produce an unfathomable volume of waste, all contained behind a dubious confinement dam on the edge of Alaska’s Bristol Bay. The project threatens the greatest wild sockeye salmon fishery in the world, the communities that depend on it, tens of thousands of jobs, and the bears, eagles, and wolves that call the region their home.

But in June 2019, in response to the Trump administration’s attempts to intervene on behalf of the mine’s backers, NRDC helped secure congressional oversight for Bristol Bay, putting a crucial brake on the government’s efforts.

An NRDC delegation also delivered a message of relentless opposition at the annual shareholder meeting of the mine’s owner, Canada’s Northern Dynasty Minerals. Appearing at these meetings, usually bearing hundreds of thousands of petitions in opposition from our members and activists, is a practice that NRDC has maintained since 2010. As noted by Joel Reynolds, western director and a senior attorney in the Nature Program, this tactic “has become an essential aspect of our advocacy with multinational corporations.”

For our Alaskan partners and the people of Bristol Bay, he adds, “salmon is life, and they passionately convey their unshakable resolve never to allow a giant mine to risk their lives, identities, and livelihoods.”

At the latest Northern Dynasty meeting, NRDC’s Taryn Kiekow Heimer, who works to protect marine mammals from industrial threats, sat at a conference table beside lifelong subsistence fisherwoman Gayla Hoseth, second chief of the Curyung tribe and director of natural resources for the Bristol Bay Native Association. Hoseth spoke passionately about the unyielding opposition the project faces from people in the region. Kiekow Heimer argued that “the proposed Pebble Mine is the wrong mine in the wrong place” and pressed the corporation to abandon it. “We will never relent in our fight to stop this terrible project,” she told them.

NRDC’s tactics are working: Investors have fled the project, scientists have spoken out about its risks, and our coalition with local partners has grown stronger. But there are no permanent victories in Alaska. The fight is endless. In the courts, on Capitol Hill, and in boardrooms where ecosystems are devalued and threatened communities ignored, we will continue to defend the Alaskan wilderness on behalf of its people and wildlife.

“We are not going away,” said Hoseth. “We will continue to fight. This is our home. I live on my ancestral land and I will protect it.”

NRDC will be behind her.

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An Alaskan brown bear salmon fishing in Katmai National Park and Preserve, Alaska

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“THE PROPOSED PEBBLE MINE IS THE WRONG MINE IN THE WRONG PLACE. WE WILL NEVER RELENT IN OUR FIGHT TO STOP THIS TERRIBLE PROJECT.”

D E N I S J E N S E N /A L A M Y

—TARYN KIEKOW HEIMER, NRDC

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A MONUMENTAL WIN FOR PUBLIC LANDS AND WATERS

EARLY 20 YEARS AGO, SHARON BUCCINO AND A COLLEGE

friend outfitted themselves with a canoe, camping gear, and enough food for five days and set off on a float trip along Utah’s Green River. The duo paddled through Labyrinth Canyon, making frequent stops to come ashore and explore the red-rock cliffs.

“You could go high above the river to take in breathtaking views— no one and nothing in sight,” Buccino says. “It was so peaceful.”

Buccino, who now directs the Nature Program’s Lands division, was just starting out as a lawyer at NRDC at the time, and even then she was aware of the vulnerabilities of these otherworldly canyons in the face of possible oil and gas development and mineral extraction. “Since they are located outside of the national park boundaries, they weren’t protected,” she says.

Flash forward to March 12, 2019: the day President Trump signed into law a sweeping lands protection package. Both the Senate and the House of Representatives passed the bill with overwhelming majorities, and Congress easily had the votes to override the president if he attempted a veto. The bill, renamed the John D. Dingell Jr. Conservation, Management,

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and Recreation Act (CMRA), protects lands in nearly every state. It safeguards more than 1.3 million acres of pristine natural habitat and nearly 620 miles of rivers. Advocates call the CMRA one of the biggest public land bills of the last quarter century.

More than half of the lands the CMRA protects as wilderness are in Utah—including the canyons Buccino admired two decades ago. (However, the bill doesn’t address the lands at issue in litigation over Bears Ears and Grand StaircaseEscalante national monuments.) NRDC has been working in Utah for more than 30 years and has built strong relationships with local conservation advocacy groups. One such partner is the Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance, whose staff Buccino has stood beside in court many

F R O M L E F T: P E T E R YA N / N AT I O N A L G E O G R A P H I C V I A G E T T Y I M A G E S ; J U A N C A R L O S M U Ñ O Z /A G E F O T O S T O C K

The Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act accomplished the seemingly impossible: Congress came together to act at a time when it seemed hopelessly divided.

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From left: Ute tribe petroglyphs in Sego Canyon, Grand Canyon, Utah; the Green River passing through Canyonlands National Park. Utah

times in efforts to block oil and gas drilling and other harmful activities.

This persistence and commitment to local stakeholders have long been part of the DNA of NRDC, adds Buccino. “We go someplace and we’re willing to stay there for the long haul,” she says. “At the same time, we keep our eyes open for the opportunity to act and seize it.” This is what happened with the lands bill, as payoff for years of work on the ground came when the stars aligned for Congress to advance the cause.

Yet the CMRA isn’t perfect. Under a provision from Senator Lisa Murkowski of Alaska, the act authorizes the privatization of hundreds of thousands of acres of federal lands in her home state (see "What Will It Take to Save the Last Frontier?" page 00). These wilderness expanses

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could now be lost—parceled off into subdivisions, commercially developed, or sold for mining or oil and gas drilling.

One more positive outcome of the CMRA’s passage was the permanent authorization for the Land and Water Conservation Fund. Previously, Congress had failed to reauthorize the fund, which provides crucial grants supporting federal, state, and local conservation programs, and it had expired. As a result, federal, state, and local agencies had fewer resources to help advance projects that would create more green space and enhance access to nature for communities.

Still, Buccino doesn’t expect this progress will end the fight to ensure that funding is faithfully appropriated annually. NRDC will need to continue to support that fund, in part by lifting up the voices of its diverse stakeholders.

Since Buccino first floated on the Green River, she’s come to realize that we’re all in this together. “We can no longer afford to look at issues in isolation,” she says. “What happens to our climate affects the lands we act to conserve. What lands we conserve affect what happens to our climate. How we treat people affects whether we can thrive together.”

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in conversation

OCEAN STEWARD SARAH CHASIS , a senior attorney in the Nature Program’s

Oceans division, has nearly 50 years of experience defending our coasts from offshore drilling.

In 1969, one year before NRDC’s founding, an offshore oil spill spewed three million gallons of crude into the waters off Santa Barbara. What was NRDC doing about offshore drilling when you came on board?

The Santa Barbara spill was a seminal trigger for the passage of key environmental laws, like the National Environmental Policy Act. When I arrived in 1973, two of NRDC’s founders, Ed Strohbehn and Tom Stoel, had sued to stop the Nixon administration from pursuing a lease sale in the Gulf of Mexico. But it wasn’t until the Carter administration that offshore drilling really became a national issue. As oil prices skyrocketed, Carter led a push for energy independence, and his Interior Department offered the first lease sales in the Atlantic Ocean. But there was no thorough assessment of environmental impacts and no meaningful consultation with coastal communities that could be impacted by the drilling.

So Frances Beinecke and I launched NRDC’s Coastal Project [some 30 years before Frances became the organization’s president]. We worked to strengthen the Outer Continental Shelf Lands Act. We didn’t get everything we wanted, but the 1978 amendments brought about the five-year offshore drilling planning process, which was designed to make the leasing process more rational and transparent. After the amendments passed, we challenged the first five-year plan in court and won.

And then came the Reagan years. How did having a foe of environmental protection in the White House change your tactics?

Reagan’s Interior secretary, James Watt, perverted the planning process.

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He had a religious fervor about man’s obligation to develop the natural resources of the earth. He was really a zealot.

Watt proposed leasing a billion acres. Along with several coastal states, NRDC challenged the plan in its entirety in court. We lost but didn’t give up. We brought legal challenges to individual lease sales off Alaska, New England, and California.

The lawsuits bought Congress time to act. The administration had so overreached that members of Congress started putting riders on appropriations bills to prevent lease sales in their states’ coastal waters. While I was in court, Lisa Speer, who now oversees our International Oceans division, was working on the Hill to support passage of these riders. By the end of the 1980s, almost the entire outer continental shelf aside from the central and western Gulf of Mexico was protected by riders. It was amazing.

After the Exxon Valdez spill in 1989, President George H. W. Bush issued a presidential withdrawal of many of these areas, protecting them from drilling, and President Clinton extended the withdrawals. We had most of the continental shelf off-limits to drilling for more than 20 years. It was due in large measure to Watt’s overreach and the opposition that ensued.

One of NRDC’s greatest victories was ushering in a permanent ban on drilling in parts of the Arctic and Atlantic oceans. This came during Obama’s second term. What was the significance of that act?

It was huge. We’ve been fighting alongside local people and fishing groups to protect Alaska’s coasts since the 1980s (see "What Will It Take to Save the Last Frontier?" page 54). As for the Atlantic, we brought scientists together in 2000 to identify important ecological areas for protection. They highlighted the offshore deep sea canyons, where the upwelling of nutrients creates vital feeding areas for fish, whales, and dolphins. The hard substrate carved into the continental shelf is also home to deep sea corals and sponges. Safeguarding these magnificent areas is critical, which is why NRDC is now in court defending President Obama’s offshore withdrawals from being overturned.

So now that NRDC is back to fighting offshore drilling in courts and in legislatures around the country, does it feel reminiscent of the 1970s and ’80s?

In some ways. By proposing to open up vast areas off virtually every coastline to drilling, the Trump administration has overreached—the same mistake Watt made. And just like in the 1980s, we’re seeing bipartisan opposition. For example, in Florida and other places along the

C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); J A E C . H O N G /A S S O C I AT E D P R E S S ; N R D C

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A worker removing oil from Refugio State Beach, California, where it wound up after spilling from a ruptured pipeline in Santa Barbara

“SCIENTISTS ARE NOW CALLING FOR PROTECTING AT LEAST 30 PERCENT OF THE WORLD’S OCEANS BY 2030.”

—SARAH CHASIS, NRDC

southeastern coast, Republicans and Democrats have come together to stop offshore drilling.

NRDC has been fighting to protect our oceans for 50 years, and you’ve been there for 46 of them.

What are your hopes for the oceans for the next 50 years? Can we fix what’s broken?

Three of the most important things we can do to restore and protect the ocean are to substantially reduce greenhouse emissions, end overfishing, and expand protected areas. For example, scientists are now calling for protecting at least 30 percent of the world’s oceans by 2030 as a way to promote resilience in the face of climate change. NRDC is working on all these fronts to ensure that the ocean continues to sustain marine life and support the hundreds of millions of people who rely on it for their sustenance, livelihoods, and way of life.

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Sarah Chasis (left) with Lisa Speer before presenting the Interior Department with petitions from NRDC members opposing offshore oil and gas drilling in Alaska’s Bristol Bay, 1982

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A FIGHTING CHANCE FOR WILDLIFE As scientists warn of a looming biodiversity crisis, NRDC advocates and global leaders come together at CITES to put protections in place for some of the most threatened species.

P TO ONE MILLION PLANT AND ANIMAL SPECIES MAY

1

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go extinct, many within decades, if we don’t act fast, according to a recent bombshell report from the United Nations.

There is no single threat; wildlife faces pressures from a rapidly warming climate, habitat degradation, and industrial pollution.

Compounding these environmental threats, poaching and the international trade in animals and their parts are pushing at-risk species even closer to the brink.

It’s important to remember that people, too, will suffer from a crash in biodiversity. Intact, diverse ecosystems support our economies, provide food, and sustain our quality of life. As Zak Smith, a senior attorney in NRDC’s Nature Program, notes, “Abundant and flourishing wildlife is necessary for healthy people and thriving communities.”

The August 2019 meeting of the Convention on International Trade in Endangered Species (CITES) in Geneva offered an opportunity to change course. The only convention of its kind, CITES draws together representatives from nearly every country—as well as advocates from organizations like NRDC—in order to define international trade restrictions for imperiled species. The work begins long before the event itself. NRDC often spends years leading up to the meeting building the case for urgent conservation action on behalf of individual species. We regularly comb through and condense scientific research, support undercover investigations into the trade of wild animals and their parts, and present our findings to coalition partners and voting party members.

These efforts paid off at the 2019 convention. In addition to laying the groundwork for aggressive systemic change, we saw victories for every species we worked to protect. Here’s a rundown of what we achieved.

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1 | AFRICAN ELEPHANTS and rhinos

have been poached to the brink of extinction for their ivory and horns.

Although the international commercial trade in their parts has been banned for years, some nations sought to reopen this trade. NRDC helped beat back these proposals, in part by demonstrating how any legal international commercial trade in these species would only open parallel illegal markets, increase poaching, and raise security threats.

2 | THE VAQUITA, the world’s most

endangered marine mammal, is facing extinction because of the uncontrolled use of gillnets in the illegal poaching of totoaba fish in the Gulf of California.

Thanks in part to the advocacy of NRDC’s wildlife experts, CITES leaders threatened long-needed sanctions against Mexico if the country fails to enforce a ban on the trafficking of these fish.

2 4

3 | ASIAN OTTERS have declined by 30 percent due to habitat loss and the global demand for their fur. Increasingly, they are also sold as pets to cafés, driven in part by the trend of posting cute otter photos on social media. NRDC led the adoption of a proposal at CITES that completely bans international commercial trade in these otter species.

4 | MULTIPLE SPECIES OF SHARKS— routinely overfished for their prized meat and fins—gained new protections, thanks in part to NRDC advocacy efforts to stem the exploitation of these vulnerable predators across the world’s oceans. Customs and wildlife agencies in nations along the trade chain, like the United States, must now ensure that the shark fins passing across their borders are properly permitted and were caught legally and sustainably.

5 | GIRAFFES are in peril, having declined

more than 40 percent in the past 30 years, but NRDC helped build support for restrictions on the international commercial trade in their parts, which is a key factor driving their demise.

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C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P L E F T: T H O M A S A . J E F F E R S O N ; J Ü R G E N & C H R I S T I N E S O H N S /A L A M Y; R I C H A R D S E E L E Y/G E T T Y I M A G E S ; H E L M U T C O R N E L I /A L A M Y

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landowners killing carnivores in response. This creates a toxic cycle of killing that results in losses to ranchers and wildlife enthusiasts alike.

NRDC is helping to break that cycle by getting ahead of the conflicts and encouraging proactive strategies and policies that allow humans, livestock, and native carnivores to share the landscape more harmoniously.

DIPLOMAT FOR THE WILD Montana-based wildlife advocate JENNY SHERRY joined NRDC in 2018 with a mission to foster coexistence at the very top of the food chain.

Experts have warned that we’re in the midst of a serious biodiversity crisis. What does this mean for our bears, wolves, and coyotes?

Historically, large carnivores across the world have been gravely persecuted, and many have been pushed to the brink of extinction. That’s a serious problem, especially because large carnivore species often play an outsize role in maintaining balanced ecosystems. We should consider them our allies in combating the biodiversity crisis. Despite recovery efforts in the United States, many of these unique animals still occupy just a fraction of their former range, which has major impacts on the landscape.

Are humans also at risk if we lose these species?

The lives of humans and large carnivores are not inherently at odds. To the contrary, they are intertwined. I was reminded of this last fall when I visited the spring camp of the Dukha—an ethnic minority group whose livelihood in Mongolia’s northern taiga is tied to reindeer herding and subsistence hunting. The Dukha routinely move their herds and use fencing and dogs to protect the reindeer from wolves, but they believe that wolves also add invaluable benefits to their lives, for example by controlling the spread of disease. They see predation as one aspect of a give-and-take relationship with their environment. They don’t frame that relationship in terms of conflict.

Is human–wildlife strife a significant factor in the slow pace of the comeback for carnivores in the West?

Yes. Animals like grizzly bears and wolves are still being killed in alarming numbers today because of real or perceived conflicts with humans. In places like the Northern Rockies, these events often take the form of carnivores killing livestock, and government agencies or individual

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What kinds of nonlethal tools do we have to prevent these conflicts?

Instead of waiting for losses to occur, we are equipping ranchers with specialized fencing that can protect their vulnerable livestock from predation. Take turbo fladry, which is composed of nylon flags sewn onto electrified polywire and capitalizes on wolves’ fear of the unfamiliar.

The flags scare wolves to the point where they won’t cross over or under the wire. We use this tool to strategically enclose livestock pastures during certain seasons and so far have had complete success in preventing livestock losses inside an enclosure.

You’ve said before that wildlife brings people together. What do you mean by that?

In these divisive times, we have seen that we can successfully build partnerships with unlikely allies to make positive changes for both people and wildlife, here and now. It takes time, but our work is changing the status quo. By collaborating with federal and state agencies, tribal nations, communities, and individuals, we are moving toward a nonlethal-first approach to living with wildlife. We are showing people that killing is not the only option for responding to conflicts.

Many Americans would probably say they want their grandkids to be able to see a grizzly bear or a puma in the wild someday. What will carnivores most need from us to ensure their survival over the next 50 years?

Grizzly bears and other species need large, connected landscapes to thrive. It won’t work to draw lines around small, isolated pockets of wilderness and say, “This is where grizzly bears get to live.”

It can be hard to think big picture and long term about wildlife conservation, but I see more and more emphasis on the importance of large landscape connectivity. In Montana, for example, our conflict prevention work is helping to create more space for large carnivores, allowing them to move safely between areas of core habitat. We are laying the groundwork to help reconnect populations and increase their resiliency.

F R O M L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); Z AYA

in conversation

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Jenny Sherry with a reindeer and her calf at the spring camp of the Dukha, in the northern Khรถvsgรถl Aimag, Mongolia

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historic wins

YEARS

DEFENDING NATURE PAGE

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LIFT HERE

Polar bears received Endangered Species Act protections in 2008 thanks to pressure by NRDC.

Polar bears received Endangered Species Act protections in 2008 thanks to pressure by NRDC.

1995

HELPS ESTABLISH U.N. FISH STOCKS AGREEMENT FOR THE HIGH SEAS

historic wins 1980

WINS PROTECTION FOR ALASKAN LANDS After pressure from the bipartisan coalition Americans for Alaska, which NRDC helped build, President Carter signs the Alaska National Interest Lands Conservation Act. The new law secures federal protection for more than 100 million acres of Alaskan lands.

(See “What Will It Take to Save the Last Frontier?” page 54.)

1974

PROTECTS STORM KING MOUNTAIN

1984

IMPACT

This work helped lead to the Hudson River Peace Treaty in 1980, in which Con Edison formally abandoned its efforts to build the Storm King plant and donated the land for a state park.

1972

YEARS

PROTECTS KEYSTONE SPECIES FROM POISONING

NEGOTIATES WITH OIL COMPANIES TO PROTECT PRODUCTIVE FISHING GROUNDS IN BERING SEA

1976

STOPS GENERAL ELECTRIC FROM DUMPING INDUSTRIAL CHEMICALS INTO THE HUDSON RIVER

PAGE

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1990

HELPS PASS OIL POLLUTION ACT One year after the catastrophic Exxon Valdez spill—and after consistent pressure from NRDC—the federal government tightens regulation of the oil industry to ensure polluters adequately restore damaged natural resources after spills.

(See “Ocean Steward,” page 60.)

IMPACT

DEFENDING NATURE

NRDC wins a case that forces the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) to cancel the registration of predator-control poisons that were killing thousands of bears, bobcats, mountain lions, bald eagles, and other animals.

2000

Lawmakers mandated the use of safer double-hulled tankers.

SAVES LAGUNA SAN IGNACIO FROM DEVELOPMENT NRDC forces the Mitsubishi Corporation to abandon plans to build a massive salt factory next to the last unspoiled breeding ground of the gray whale off the coast of Baja California.

P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : E I KO O J A L A ( I L L U S T R AT I O N ); F L O R I A N S C H U LT Z ( P H O T O)

LIFT HERE

On behalf of its first client, the Hudson River Fishermen’s Association, NRDC helps halt construction of a Con Edison hydroelectric plant at New York State’s Storm King, which would have decapitated the mountain and decimated the spawning grounds of the river’s striped bass.

2016

HELPS CREATE ATLANTIC’S FIRST MARINE MONUMENT

2008

GIVES A BOOST TO POLAR BEARS

2001

SAFEGUARDS GREAT BEAR RAINFOREST NRDC helps protect 3.5 million acres of British Columbia’s ancient Great Bear Rainforest—home to the spirit bear and other rare and endangered wildlife species—from logging and destruction.

NRDC’s legal action, following a 2005 scientific petition, leads to the protection of the polar bear under the Endangered SAVES PRISTINE MARINE Species Act (ESA).

AREA NEAR BAJA

2012

IMPACT

The classification made it illegal for Americans to bring polar bear pelts or other parts across the border from Canada, where the majority were hunted.

Mexican President Felipe Calderón cancels a massive tourism development project next to Cabo Pulmo National Marine Park, which area residents and their supporters, including NRDC, had fought to protect through an international advocacy campaign.

2015

PROTECTS WHALES FROM OCEAN NOISE After years of NRDC litigation, the U.S. Navy agrees to put significant marine mammal habitat in Southern California and Hawaii off-limits to its high-intensity sonar and explosives training.

After years of advocacy and coalition building by NRDC and our partners, about 5,000 square miles of ocean—with giant canyons, underwater mountains, and more than 1,000 species— receive permanent protection when President Obama designates the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. (See “Ocean Steward,” page 60.)

2016

REINS IN THE ELEPHANT IVORY TRADE The Obama administration unveils final regulations to restrict the nation’s commercial trade in elephant ivory—a move NRDC had been pushing for through ads, advocacy, and other means.

2019

HELPS NEGOTIATE MAJOR PUBLIC LANDS BILL

2011

F R O M FA R L E F T: I S T O C K ; J A C K S M I T H /A P I M A G E S ; B R A N D O N C O L E /A L A M Y; C H R I S T I A N A S U L U N D/G R E E N P E A C E ; M I C H A E L H A R B I S O N / I S T O C K

2001

2017

PROTECTS THE NORTH PACIFIC FROM UNREGULATED FISHING PRACTICES

HELPS CREATE ROADLESS AREA CONSERVATION RULE NRDC plays a key role in a 200-group coalition that persuades President Clinton to protect 58.5 million acres of undisturbed, unlogged roadless areas in National Forest System lands.

NRDC works to secure the largest wilderness designation in 25 years, the broadly bipartisan John D. Dingell Jr. Conservation, Management, and Recreation Act. The law safeguards more than 1.3 million acres of pristine natural habitat and nearly 620 miles of rivers across the United States.

(See “A Monumental Win for Public Lands and Waters,” page 58.)

PROTECTS RUSTY PATCHED BUMBLEBEE The rusty patched bumblebee, which had lost almost 90 percent of its range since 1997, is officially added to the Endangered Species List, despite the Trump administration’s attempt to freeze the listing.

NRDC participates in negotiations that lead to a treaty allowing new bottom trawling only if the impacts to sensitive habitats and species, such as corals, are assessed and managed.

2002

PROTECTS UTAH’S CANYON LANDS FROM OIL EXPLORATION

2018

2014

CONVINCES CHILE TO STOP PLANS FOR FIVE MEGA DAMS IN PATAGONIA

GIVES VAQUITAS A FIGHTING CHANCE In response to a lawsuit filed by NRDC and our partners, the U.S. Court of International Trade orders the Trump administration to ban seafood imports from Mexico caught with gillnets, which kill the critically endangered vaquita porpoise.

2019

SECURES ENDANGERED SPECIES ACT PROTECTIONS FOR THE GULF OF MEXICO BRYDE’S WHALE

FUELING THE MOVEMENT

Seven hundred staff members across eight offices. Two million social media followers.

Three million members and online activists. As NRDC has grown in size and reach over the past 50 years, so has our network of partners and allies.

Together, we’ve increased both the visibility of the environmental challenges we face and the pressure to address them. Whether by partnering with Hollywood producers or news networks to weave climate issues into story lines, crafting ad campaigns to help inspire more sustainable consumer habits, or elevating perspectives of communities not often represented in the environmental movement, we continue to motivate new allies to join the fight. A healthier planet is possible when we rally for change together.

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Protesters at the Youth Climate Strike in New York City

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RAISING THE ISSUE WITH TISSUE After exposing the impacts of poorly sourced tissue paper on the Canadian boreal forest, NRDC is ratcheting up the pressure on Procter & Gamble, one of America’s largest toilet paper manufacturers, to change its practices.

H E WO R L D ’S L A R G E ST I N TAC T, O L D - G R OW T H

forest is under siege. As a result of rampant logging, more than a million acres of Canadian boreal trees are being clearcut each year. The destruction is fueled in part by Americans’ massive consumption of throwaway tissue products like facial tissue and toilet paper.

Along with the trees, we’re now losing one of our most important climate regulators, which stores nearly twice as much carbon as all the oil reserves in the world.

The logging practices also jeopardize boreal caribou and the cultural traditions of more than 600 Indigenous communities that call the forest home.

NRDC launched a campaign in February 2019 to call out one of the North American toilet paper industry’s worst corporate offenders: Procter & Gamble.

P&G purchases more tissue pulp from the boreal than any other company, to produce Charmin toilet paper and other tissue products (like Bounty and Puffs) that are made entirely of virgin wood pulp. Shelley Vinyard, NRDC’s boreal corporate campaign manager, says the company needs to own up to its environmental impact and start making toilet paper from recycled materials and other sustainable alternatives. “P&G needs to send a strong message to both the Canadian government and the U.S. market that the status quo is unacceptable,” she says. “But they have yet to commit to stop sourcing from this disappearing forest.”

NRDC’s first public move was to release a report, The Issue With Tissue: How Americans Are Flushing Forests Down the Toilet, that laid bare the little-known impacts of poorly sourced tissue on the Canadian boreal forest and on our climate. The report included a new, hard-hitting scorecard that ranked various brands from P&G and other leading companies on their current sustainability practices—doling out a failing grade to brands like Charmin, Angel Soft, and Quilted Northern while rewarding those that use recycled materials, like Trader Joe’s and Seventh Generation.

Since then, NRDC has ratcheted up the pressure. Our experts have shown up at industry conferences, like the International Meeting of Suppliers of Pulp, to confront the offending corporations and their suppliers in person.

We co-opted the corporate-engineered National Toilet Paper Day on August 26, 2019, using the occasion to urge our members and online activists to take

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An ad by NRDC and Stand.Earth targeting P&G’s CEO

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“THE CLIMATE IS CHANGING AND SO MUST MAJOR CORPORATIONS LIKE P&G. THE RISK IS SIMPLY TOO GREAT TO MAINTAIN THE STATUS QUO.”

NRDC. PREVIOUS SPREAD: RICK GERSHON FOR NRDC

—SHELLEY VINYARD, NRDC

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a pledge to use recycled toilet paper—or “wipe right”—to save more than one million trees from the tree-to-toilet pipeline.

And this past October, NRDC and our partners attended P&G’s shareholder meeting in Cincinnati, where the company is headquartered. We rallied local resistance by reaching out to dozens of local groups, prominent activists, professors at the University of Cincinnati, and green business leaders. Protesters stood outside the headquarters the day of the meeting with signs bearing slogans like “Stop flushing our forests.” We also hand-delivered a letter to P&G executives—backed by 116 partner organizations and 220,000 petition signers—demanding a change to their pulp sourcing. Every major news outlet in the city covered our work.

P&G has yet to agree to NRDC’s demands that it stop sourcing from threatened boreal habitat, use more sustainable alternatives to virgin forest fiber, and make sure its suppliers get the free, prior, and informed consent of Indigenous peoples when operating in their traditional territories. But Vinyard says our campaign has made the company sweat. “They’ve realized that this campaign isn’t going away,” she says. “Even in their own backyard, the public isn’t on their side.”

In fact, in response to our efforts, P&G announced it would increase its global purchases of fiber certified by the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), an organization that works to promote the practice of sustainable forestry worldwide.

“While that’s not enough, it’s a signal that our efforts are working,” Vinyard notes.

Moving forward, NRDC plans to build further support for boreal conservation and fight P&G’s blatant greenwashing. The company has long touted that it replants a tree for each one it uses, but it fails to mention that the replanted forest differs substantially from old-growth boreal in its ability both to store carbon and to serve as suitable habitat for at-risk species. As for using recycled content, P&G claims that its products’ texture would suffer too much to make the swap worthwhile.

“If you take a step back and consider what our planet is dealing with, it is outrageous that P&G claims they can’t change, that they need to make and market toilet paper in the same way they have for years,” Vinyard says. The longer the company waits to deliver meaningful action, the more our planet will suffer, she adds. “The climate is changing, and so must major corporations like P&G. The risk is simply too great to maintain the status quo.”

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C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P L E F T: N R D C ( 2 ); J E N N I F E R S K E N E / N R D C ; R I V E R J O R D A N F O R N R D C

Protesters, including NRDC’s Shelley Vinyard and Jennifer Skene (at right, from left), outside P&G’s headquarters in Cincinnati during the company’s shareholder meeting to demand that it stop cutting down trees from Canada’s boreal forest

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MARCHING FORWARD WITH THE YOUTH CLIMATE STRIKE NRDC knows the power of passionate young people can make the world a healthier and safer place for future generations. In fact, that’s how we got our own start.

INCE SWEDISH TEENAGER AND CLIMATE ACTIVIST

Greta Thunberg began skipping school to hold daily sit-ins in front of her country’s parliament building nearly two years ago, her singular act of protest has morphed into a youthled, worldwide movement. The Youth Climate Strike has fundamentally reshaped our climate discourse and galvanized millions of advocates on every continent. In September 2019, members of this movement organized and carried out the weeklong Global Climate Strike, in which 7.6 million people across 185 countries took part in more than 6,000 demonstrations designed to pressure governments to speed the transition from fossil fuels to clean energy. “These strikes are indicative of a tidal shift in the climate conversation, with young people showing us what moral courage and bold climate action can look like,” says Mitch Bernard, NRDC’s chief counsel.

As part of the adult-led coalition of strike partners, NRDC supported the youth groups and amplified the voices of individual advocates across the nation by sharing their words with our two million social media followers.

NRDC is proud to stand behind this newest generation of climate activists, says Rob Friedman, a policy advocate on NRDC’s environmental justice team.

As he watched thousands of high schoolers representing all of New York’s communities stream out of the City Hall subway stop on September 20, en route to the protest site at Foley Square and bearing signs with slogans such as “Make the Climate Great Again,” “We Deserve a Future,” and “Losing Nemo,” he felt energized. “This generation of young people is drawing the connections between the fossil fuel industry, environmental injustice, and the climate crisis in ways much of the mainstream movement refuses to,” he says. “With their leadership, we’re going to win.”

NRDC shares the strikers’ frustration over promises broken, commitments unmet, and solutions unexplored. We also share their faith that a solution to the climate crisis will emerge from laws and policies that truly reflect the will of the people.

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Another thing we share with the strikers: a belief in the power of passionate young people who are committed to ensuring a livable planet for their own and future generations. Fifty years ago, a group of young attorneys—part of the “Don’t trust anyone over 30 generation,” to quote NRDC cofounder John Adams—began gathering in an old Catskill Mountains farmhouse to discuss a strategy for accelerating the fight for cleaner water, cleaner air, and habitat preservation. These gatherings were some of the first meetings of the Natural

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A L E X A N D E R S PA C H E R / N R D C

Young people demanding climate action outside the Capitol building during the Global Week for Future, September 2019

Resources Defense Council, at the time just a small collection of lawyers determined to take on polluting industries and their environmentally destructive practices.

NRDC’s founders knew that putting an end to our reliance on fossil fuels would be essential to reversing the onslaught of climate change.

Today, as the youth movement has made clear, it’s become the most important global issue of our time. A week before participating in September’s demonstration, Sabirah Binth Mahmud,

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a 16-year-old from Philadelphia, put it starkly. “I will be striking along with youth across the world because my family in Bangladesh is dying.

I’ve lost three cousins already due to childhood cancer and one of my nephews due to a flood in which he drowned. No one deserves to have these climate disasters as their daily life, and we need to take action against this growing normality.”

We are all in this together. Scientists predict that by the time Mahmud and her peers turn 50, if we continue with business as usual, the average annual number of days in the United States on which the heat index exceeds 100 degrees Fahrenheit will have doubled. It’s on their account that we cannot back down from this fight.

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LIGHTS, CAMERA, ACTION ON CLIMATE Daniel Hinerfeld is partnering with TV and film writers, producers, and other Hollywood creatives to address climate change on-screen.

F DANIEL HINERFELD, NRD C’S DIRECTOR OF CONTENT PART-

nerships, gets his way, millions of television viewers could soon be watching a show that opens something like this.

Scene: Interior Suburban Home—Dimly Lit Bedroom A thirtysomething man and woman sit in bed, watching TV news coverage of wildfires ravaging homes. The couple is visibly distressed.

The man turns off the TV and falls back on the bed with a loud sigh.

MAN I mean . . . what will the world be like in 50 years—or even 10?

I want to have kids.

WOMAN Falls back beside him.

Are we crazy for trying?

“We’re building an initiative in Hollywood to increase climate storytelling,” says Hinerfeld, who works out of NRDC’s Los Angeles office. “We’re reaching out to creative professionals and celebrities, not to ask them to speak up personally but rather to change what they’re doing professionally a little bit—to focus on the climate crisis in their art.”

Hinerfeld has worked with the entertainment industry for nearly two decades to raise public awareness of environmental issues and harness the power of Hollywood to influence change. In 2016, he codirected and coproduced Sonic Sea, a documentary about the vast harm to marine life from industrial and military ocean noise. The film won two 2017 Emmy awards, premiered globally on the Discovery Channel, and was screened at film festivals around the world.

He is quick to note that NRDC has a long and storied history with pop culture, ever since Robert Redford turned the New York premiere of his 1976 film, All the President’s Men, into a benefit for the organization. Over the past five decades, James Taylor, Sigourney Weaver, Rashida Jones, Hasan Minhaj, and other

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celebrities have played important roles for NRDC, helping to raise support and inspire new activists.

Hinerfeld hopes that this new effort will build on their work. “We want to broaden our audience and reach people in a different way that may change their behavior and attitudes, particularly about climate change,” he says. In particular, he hopes that more Hollywood stories about the climate crisis will engage those people who still don’t accept the reality of climate change, as well as “the rest of us who accept the reality but live as if we don’t.” Openly portraying characters grappling with these issues on-screen is a critical first step to helping an audience overcome denial about the struggle we’re facing.

But just showing the depth of the climate crisis on television won’t be enough, Hinerfeld says. To ensure that viewers don’t just shut down, media producers also need to show them a path forward and give people hope that we can avert catastrophe by taking action. NRDC’s content partnerships team has been working to inspire media executives to take more responsibility for guiding public opinion in this way, through in-person meetings with writers, showrunners, networks, and studios; via public forums; and even by helping to develop new film and TV projects.

“Before we talk with creative professionals, we study their shows and think about how climate change could intersect with the characters, settings, and themes of the show,” Hinerfeld says. “We come in with ideas, questions, and research that can help spark the imaginations of writers.” Climate storytelling could be reflected through both small moments—like a character plugging in an electric car at a public charging station—and bigger ones, like a character making a choice about a job or a relationship that relates to climate change.

The recent shift in the business of television has made room for NRDC to step into this role.

Network TV depends on advertisers, many of whom are in the fossil fuel business or related industries and do not want programming about climate change. But the rise of premium cable and streaming content providers—which often don’t show commercials—has allowed more freedom for writers. “The companies that make subscriptionbased content are a lot less interested in what the fossil fuel industry or the auto industry thinks about climate stories,” Hinerfeld says.

“We have only a few years left to head off possibly runaway climate change,” he continues. “In order to do that, we need the help of every sector of society, because what is required is a massive shift in the attitudes and behavior of tens of millions of people.” Now that’s a plot twist worth watching.

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F R O M T O P : J O S E M A N D O J A N A / D O C U V I TA E F O R N R D C ; N R D C

From top: Daniel Hinerfeld presenting at a discussion about Hollywood and the climate crisis at the Pacific Design Center; Hinerfeld (third from right) after winning an Emmy for Sonic Sea

“WE WANT TO BROADEN OUR AUDIENCE AND REACH PEOPLE IN A WAY THAT MAY CHANGE THEIR ATTITUDES, ESPECIALLY ABOUT CLIMATE CHANGE.” —DANIEL HINERFELD, NRDC

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MOBILIZER FOR CHANGE Social media community manager TEJAL MANKAD is working to amplify the voices of today’s younger, more diverse environmental movement and to foster more awareness and action among NRDC’s 2.2 million followers.

Why did you join NRDC, and what are you fighting for?

When I began my education studying environmental science, I quickly saw that the movement didn’t represent enough people who looked like me.

As a second-generation South Asian immigrant, I’ve already seen the ways in which climate change has impacted where my family is from. But in the environmental space, I felt alienated and wasn’t sure there was a seat at the table for me. At NRDC, I’ve been on a journey of trying to advocate from the margins and center the voices of those who have not typically been represented in these spaces. It’s only through engaging with those individuals and groups that we can bring about equitable change.

You’re a New York chair of NRDC’s Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee.

How does that work reflect back out into our communities?

On the social team, I’ve been working to uplift narratives of NRDC staffers who aren’t always represented in this movement or who may not feel empowered. For example, I featured videos of staff on our Instagram for Pride Month, Asian-Pacific American Heritage Month, and National Hispanic Heritage Month (see “Voces for Climate Action,” page 82) this past year, and our audiences responded really positively. I think those were important on so many levels. They gave us an opportunity to show how people’s diverse identities inform their work and how their work is then grounded in that perspective. And ultimately they help people see themselves in us.

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Young people made history in September 2019 by participating in what was likely the largest-ever strike for climate action. What was the response on our social channels, and what do you think NRDC can learn from young organizers?

The reaction to the climate strikes was astounding.

It was our most engaging content in the past six months. We definitely saw a hunger for more onthe-ground, direct action and mass mobilization, which was truly only possible at that scale because young people harnessed the power of social media.

I was proud that NRDC supported their efforts and centered their voices while out there striking alongside them, because we can definitely learn from young people, too. (See “Marching Forward With the Youth Climate Strike,” page 76.) Their imaginations are so vast. They know that our vision for the future doesn’t have to live within the confines of what we know or traditionally have engaged in—that in fact it can’t. Young people can help us imagine the society we want to live in, not just settle for. I want to help embody that spirit at NRDC so we can come up with innovative, bold, visionary ideas for moving forward.

F R O M L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); T R E V O R C H A R L E S G O WA N

in conversation

You help foster community on our social platforms.

Has that community changed over the past year?

I think both Trump’s anti-environment policies and the series of dire IPCC reports over the past year have caused a big surge in our social following.

People feel galvanized to create change and to resist attacks on our climate, ecosystems, and health— especially the health of our most vulnerable and those disproportionately impacted. People are more willing to mobilize, to reach out through social media, and to learn more about what they can do to help solve problems. The climate crisis is also seeping into the way people think about and take action on injustice and inequity. There’s been a renewed sense of urgency to bring about systemic change—like supporting initiatives to improve public transit in this country—while also changing individual habits to reduce personal carbon footprints, like choosing to ride your bike to work.

On the social media team, we’re attempting to bridge the gap between those two means of action.

For example, on our channels we’re regularly sharing tips on how to reduce single-use plastics in day-to-day life and explaining why that’s so important for our oceans, wildlife, and climate. But we’re quick to follow that up with an opportunity to support, say, a statewide plastic bag ban—which is the kind of systemic change that really carries the most weight. Transformation has to happen at both levels to stick.

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“AT NRDC, I’VE BEEN ON A JOURNEY OF TRYING TO ADVOCATE FROM THE MARGINS AND CENTER THE VOICES OF THOSE WHO HAVE NOT TYPICALLY BEEN REPRESENTED IN THE ENVIRONMENTAL MOVEMENT.” —TEJAL MANKAD, NRDC

Tejal Mankad in Gallatin County, Montana

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VOCES FOR CLIMATE ACTION NRDC staffers are helping to build environmental equity and empower Latino voices for climate action— a cause that hits close to home.

U R I N G NAT I O NA L H I S PA N I C A M E R I CA N H E R I TAG E

Month last fall, several NRDC staffers took to Instagram to celebrate their cultural roots and the ways in which their unique experiences influence their work. In one video, Lauren Gonzalez, a first-generation Mexican-American media relations assistant based in Chicago, noted that a recent mapping analysis conducted by NRDC and local community partners found that areas with high concentrations of Latino and African-American residents (like Chicago’s Southwest Side, where she grew up) are the most vulnerable to environmental pollution.

From early childhood Gonzalez struggled with asthma, a disease that wasn’t part of her family history but tied directly to her neighborhood’s industrial legacy. This experience helped bring her to NRDC and remains her biggest motivator for creating change. “No one is going to fight as hard to build equity and environmental justice in disenfranchised areas than those who have lived in those places,” she says.

More than 59 million Latinos live in the United States. The environmental injustices they face aren’t unique to Chicago; Latinos are at ground zero for climate impacts in many places where they live and work, and the problem is exacerbated by the challenges they often face in gaining access to health care. They’re also overwhelmingly supportive of protecting future generations from environmental threats; a 2017 study published by the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication found that three in four Latinos in the United States believe President Trump and Congress aren’t doing enough to address climate change. NRDC is committed to mobilizing and supporting Latinos in their push for stronger climate action.

Since joining NRDC in 2005, Linda Escalante has worked to empower Latinos to engage in advocacy and activism around climate and health. “We’re asking people not just to sign on to what we’re doing,” she says, “but to actually sit at the table and have a voice and some influence in the policymaking.”

Today, as NRDC’s legislative director for Southern California, Escalante lobbies, cultivates relationships, and builds coalitions that help amplify those voices. She was also instrumental in laying the foundation for NRDC’s Latino outreach with the creation of La Onda Verde and Voces Verdes, in 2008 and 2009, respectively. La Onda Verde is the organization’s Spanish-language website; Voces Verdes is a network of Latino business, public health, and community leaders and organizations uniting to engage on

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WILSON LEE

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Linda Escalante (far left), NRDC’s legislative director for Southern California, with California assembly member Eloise Gómez Reyes, actor Lana Parrilla, R21.org founder and U.N. goodwill ambassador in Argentina Charly Alberti, and California assembly member Eduardo Garcia at a Latino climate leadership event at the 2018 Global Climate Action Summit

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“AT A TIME WHEN WE’RE EXPERIENCING HEIGHTENED XENOPHOBIA AND BIGOTRY, IT’S MORE IMPORTANT NOW THAN EVER TO BE VISIBLE, TO BE PROUD, AND TO SHOW OFF OUR LATINIDAD.” —FABIOLA NUÑEZ, NRDC

climate change issues and to advocate for strong clean energy legislation.

As with Gonzalez, Escalante’s dedication to this work is personal. She moved to California from Bogotá, Colombia, at 10 years old, her family finding housing a half block from a Superfund cleanup site. Her single mother worked in what she calls “every hard immigrant job” she could find to make ends meet. “Living in that struggle, that economic hardship, made me understand how hard it is to deal just with the day-to-day, much less with the existential threat of climate change,” Escalante says.

NRDC strategic communications manager Fabiola Nuñez (center) before a press conference at Paradise Baptist Church in Newark, New Jersey

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Escalante (far right), with NRDC director of California advocacy Annie Notthoff (far left), California Senate president pro tempore Kevin de Léon, and NRDC California legislative director Victoria Rome; NRDC media relations assistant Lauren Gonzalez (below) in the Chicago office

C L O C K W I S E F R O M T O P R I G H T: N R D C ; I VA N M O R E N O/ N R D C B R YA N A N S E L M F O R N R D C

EACHING PEOPLE WHERE THEY ARE, ON TOPICS THAT RESONATE

with their daily lives, is a critical part of NRDC’s communications strategy to harness the desire among Latinos to act on climate.

Fabiola Nuñez, a strategic communications manager, stresses the importance of Spanish-language outreach to ensure that people can stay informed about how environmental issues affect them directly. To that end, the media team has focused on cultivating partnerships with outlets including Univision’s Despierta América (the top morning show on Spanish-language television) and SuMédico.com (a website focused on health and wellness) to share stories that highlight topics such as the extreme health costs of climate change, a burden that is likely to disproportionately impact Latinos in the United States.

Nuñez, a native of Nicaragua, also recorded her own National Hispanic American Heritage Month Instagram video. In it she emphasized Latinos’ unity around caring for the environment but also highlighted an important reason why it’s so critical to be at the table, on the streets, and on our televisions.

“At a time when we’re experiencing heightened xenophobia and bigotry, it’s more important now than ever to be visible, to be proud, and to show off our Latinidad,” she said. “Because that in itself is an act of resistance.”

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in conversation

Federal Communications Director ED CHEN keeps reporters focused on NRDC.

You help ensure that the issues NRDC fights for are covered in major media outlets. Is it difficult to interest reporters in these topics?

It’s no longer a heavy lift to persuade beat reporters to cover the climate crisis, especially when we have something new to convey, whether it’s factual data or a fresh perspective. On climate and most other environmental issues, health remains the single-best tried-and-true lever.

With reporters who have less experience covering our issues, it’s helpful to provide them access to the voices and faces of real people affected by a problem we want to see highlighted. We also try to instill in them a sense of competition—that other reporters may already be on to the story and therefore they risk being scooped.

The most important tactic we have is to continue hammering on benefits and solutions. We paint a picture of why everybody will benefit from actions that slow, stop, and reverse climate change—highlighting the economic gains, the jobs created, improved public health, and personal property protected.

As certain political figures continue talking about the climate “debate,” do you find yourself engaging in that debate with reporters?

Most journalists no longer inject the he-said/she-said false equivalence regarding climate science into their stories. Thank goodness. There also seems to be an almost planetary alignment helping to keep climate change a top story: hearings and legislation in the House of Representatives, fossil fuel companies professing to support carbon pricing, Republicans speaking out on climate action, and growing support for a carbon dividend. Even the Federal Reserve is warning about the coming economic hit because of climate change. Undergirding all of that is the overwhelming public support for strong climate action.

How has the media landscape evolved in your 10 years at NRDC to include more coverage of the environment? What do you consider your biggest victories in this regard?

The diversity and proliferation of new media outlets have become staggering in velocity—it’s almost impossible to keep track. So even with the shrinkage

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You were a White House correspondent before coming to NRDC. Now you’re on the other side of the fence, as an advocate looking for coverage. Did you take any lessons with you when you crossed that divide?

Timing is everything. After the Waxman–Markey cap-and-trade bill [aka the American Clean Energy and Security Act] died in the Senate in 2010, many environmental groups continued talking as if the bill still had life and doggedly pressed the media to cover the issue. Even as Obama shifted his focus to health-care reform, some climate activists continued lobbying us, thus coming across as clueless or in denial, with their reputations taking something of a beating.

So we’ve learned the importance of shifting focus when you can’t break through on a certain issue. This often depends on an agile pivot from some news event or development, whether that’s an extreme weather incident or a game-changing IPCC report.

The key is getting ahead of the curve—alerting reporters in advance to such points of inflection and letting them know to expect input from us.

Another example is using the United Nations Climate Summit or the Green New Deal as a peg for all kinds of messaging.

Because we’ve been able to sculpt coverage this way, I can say that among the Washington press corps, NRDC leads the pack when it comes to credibility, judgment, and authoritativeness.

F R O M L E F T: R . V E C C H I O I M P R I N T S ( P O R T R A I T ); A LY S S A S C H U K A R F O R N R D C

THE MESSENGER

of mainstream media, additional options like Utility Dive, Wonkette, or Mongabay, for example, provide us with a near-endless array of potential outlets for our messaging efforts. When it comes to the mainstream media, we continue to deploy a belt-and-suspenders approach: targeting the top markets—the New York Times, the Washington Post, the Associated Press, National Public Radio, etc.—and then watching the information flow downward. We also target the trade press at the bottom of the media food chain and let the information bubble up.

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Ed Chen in front of the White House

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historic wins

YEARS

BUILDING A MOVEMENT PAGE

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LIFT HERE

NRDC cofounder John Adams at a 2011 Keystone XL pipeline protest outside the White House

2000

historic wins

ESTABLISHES THE BUSINESS VOICE FOR THE ENVIRONMENT

Glowingly reviewed by the New York Times, the Nuclear Weapons Databook provides a comprehensive picture of nuclear weapons production, stockpiles, and deployments, establishing NRDC as a key player in the movement to reduce the risk of nuclear war.

1994

LIFT HERE

OPENS THE CENTER FOR POLICY ADVOCACY IN WASHINGTON, D.C., TO INFLUENCE FEDERAL LEGISLATION

1989

1996

SOUNDS ALARM ABOUT PESTICIDES IN CHILDREN’S FOOD

YEARS IMPACT

MAKES A HOLLYWOOD DEBUT

BUILDING A MOVEMENT PAGE

88

This new arm of the organization supports and strengthens NRDC’s scientific research and analysis and helps communicate our results clearly and accurately to the public.

A milestone for NRDC’s international vision and reach, the project promotes the benefits of energy efficiency and introduces the concept of green buildings to cities across China, helping to guide the country’s environmental revolution.

The report sparked a chain of events that led to critical improvements in food-safety policy, including the 1996 Food Quality Protection Act.

The film All the President’s Men premieres, and actor Robert Redford makes the sold-out event a benefit for NRDC, beginning a key partnership for amplifying environmental issues in the public eye.

2006

ESTABLISHES THE SCIENCE CENTER

LAUNCHES CHINA CLEAN ENERGY PROJECT

NRDC’s Intolerable Risk study inspires a widespread, industry-changing consumer boycott of apples. The report reveals that the fruit—and other produce loved by children—contains dangerous levels of cancer-causing pesticides.

1976

Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2)—a national, nonpartisan group of business owners and investors— advocates for policies that are good for both the environment and the economy.

IMPACT

1991

JOINS THE FIRST NATIONAL PEOPLE OF COLOR ENVIRONMENTAL LEADERSHIP SUMMIT

NRDC helped create China’s first regional building codes designed to improve energy efficiency.

Those measures then served as models for efficiency codes now in place nationwide.

1998

INTRODUCES CONSUMER CAMPAIGN FOR FISH After NRDC launches the “Give Swordfish a Break” campaign, hundreds of chefs, hotel chains, cruise lines, and grocery stores pledge not to offer this imperiled fish. The effort results in tighter domestic and international controls on fishing North Atlantic swordfish.

NRDC cofounder John Adams at a 2011 Keystone XL pipeline protest outside the White House

P R E V I O U S S P R E A D : I L L U S T R AT I O N S : E I KO O J A L A .

P H O T O : J O S H L O P E Z / TA R S A N D S A C T I O N V I A F L I C K R

1984

RELEASES CRITICALLY HAILED NUCLEAR WEAPONS REFERENCE BOOK

historic wins

2009

2019

HELPS MOBILIZE ACTIVISTS FOR U.S. YOUTH CLIMATE STRIKE As an official coalition partner, NRDC joins young climate activists in striking to demand bold, transformational action in response to the climate crisis. (See “Marching Forward With the Youth Climate Strike,” page 76.)

CREATES PLATFORM FOR LATINO VOICES ON CLIMATE NRDC launches Voces Verdes, an innovative platform for Latinos across the country to engage on climate change issues and support the passage of strong clean energy policies. (See “Voces for Climate Action,” page 82.)

2016

RELEASES SONIC SEA This documentary film, which illuminates the devastating impact of human-produced ocean noise on whales and other marine life, premieres globally on the Discovery Channel—and in living rooms across the nation— and wins two Emmy awards.

LIFT HERE

2016

RALLIES CONSUMERS TO GET KFC’S CHICKENS OFF DRUGS

F R O M FA R L E F T: S T O C K S Y; J E F F H U/ I S T O C K ; R O B E R T B R E M E C /G E T T Y; ELIJAH NOUVEL AGE FOR NRDC; MAKI SHMAKI/ISTOCK

2012

SPARKS A NATIONAL DIALOGUE ON FOOD WASTE

2008

YEARS

LAUNCHES THE INDIA INITIATIVE

NRDC establishes itself as a key voice in India’s clean energy market through partnerships with local nongovernmental organizations, going on to launch several projects that address the country’s public health, energy, and climate challenges.

BUILDING A MOVEMENT PAGE

88

2017

CO-LEADS THE WOMEN’S MARCH ON WASHINGTON

The first edition of our Wasted report finds that up to 40 percent of food in the United States goes uneaten; later it inspires a major national public service campaign to combat food waste from its largest source—consumers.

IMPACT

Three years later, the USDA and EPA announce federal targets to cut food waste in the United States by 50 percent by 2030.

Building on years of fighting antibiotics overuse, NRDC joins a broad coalition of public interest organizations to urge KFC to stop buying chickens raised with the use of medically important antibiotics. NRDC and partners unite more than 475,000 people to show support for the cause, which later inspires reforms across the poultry industry.

2018

PERSUADES RETAILERS TO STOP SELLING LETHAL PAINT STRIPPERS After NRDC and allies, together with hundreds of thousands of concerned consumers, call on CEOs to put consumer safety first and remove products containing methylene chloride from store shelves, Lowe’s, Sherwin-Williams, Home Depot, Amazon, Walmart, and others take action.

NRDC cofounder John Adams at a 2011 Keystone XL pipeline protest outside the White House

THAN K San Juan National Forest, Colorado

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For 50 years, you have ensured that we have the resources to deploy our strategies in the most effective way possible. None of this would happen without your passionate support. Thank you for your unwavering commitment to protecting life on our planet.

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JOIN US JOIN A LEADERSHIP CIRCLE

PUSH FOR PROGRESS

With a gift of $500–$999, join the Friends of NRDC and receive a complimentary copy of War of the Whales by Joshua Horwitz, the gripping story of NRDC’s fight to protect whales from deadly U.S. Navy sonar. You will also receive a subscription to Nature’s Voice and more.

Be a part of our Council of 1,000 with a yearly donation of $1,000–$4,999, and we will send you a copy of Polar Obsession by acclaimed wildlife photographer Paul Nicklen, invitations to regional events and special teleconferences, and more.

Become a member of the President’s Circle with an annual gift of $5,000 or more, and you will receive access to confidential issue briefings and progress reports, invitations to special events with NRDC’s president, a complimentary copy of Edge of the Earth, Corner of the Sky by acclaimed nature photographer Art Wolfe, and much more.

NRDC never stops championing new issues as we learn more about where our expertise is needed from our grassroots partners and environmental scientists. It is critical that we be able to respond when new opportunities—or challenges—present themselves. Significant gifts to NRDC make it possible for us to pick up that baton and do what we do best: create a brighter future for our planet. To learn more about how to become a major donor, or to join our Global Leadership Council with a gift of $25,000 or more, please contact us at 212-727-4543.

BECOME A MONTHLY PARTNER Increase the impact of your NRDC membership by becoming part of our valued monthly support network. Monthly Partners provide a reliable and steady source of funding that allows NRDC to wage and win long-term campaigns in defense of imperiled wildlife and wilderness.

MAKE A ONE-TIME DONATION

DIETER TELEMANS

Become a full-fledged member of America’s most effective environmental action group by making a contribution of any amount. Your gift will be put to work right away in our top-priority campaigns.

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MAKE THE EARTH YOUR HEIR You can make a lasting commitment to the environment when you include NRDC in your estate plans. A gift through your will, trust, or retirement or life insurance plan will help preserve our magnificent natural heritage and protect the planet for generations to come.

For more information on how to include NRDC in your estate plans (or if you have already done so), please contact Michelle Mulia-Howell, director of gift planning, at 212-727-4421 or giftplanning@ nrdc.org.

GIVE THROUGH YOUR WORKPLACE Donating with an automatic payroll deduction is a simple way to support NRDC. To find out if your company participates in EarthShare, or to add an environmental option to your company’s workplace giving campaign, please call NRDC at 646-448-3804.

For more information, contact the NRDC Membership department.

Membership@NRDC.org 212-727-4500 www.NRDC.org/JoinGive

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EVENTS 30 Years of NRDC Victories in Southern California MARCH 14, 2019 SANTA MONICA, CALIFORNIA

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ALIFORNIA HAS BEEN AT THE VAN-

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guard of environmental policy for decades, passing first-of-its-kind laws that have served as models across the country and around the globe. In 1989, NRDC became the first national environmental organization to plant roots in Los Angeles and establish an office dedicated to protecting the region’s public health and unique natural heritage.

To commemorate the 30th anniversary of NRDC’s Southern California office—and our three decades of hard-fought victories in Los Angeles—the Board of Trustees hosted a festive dinner. Honorees were Kelly Chapman Meyer, a Trustee since 2012, and NRDC Western Director Joel Reynolds, who has been at the helm of the office since its inception. These two individuals have been instrumental to the institution’s success in Los Angeles and beyond.

From defending low-income neighborhoods facing environmental discrimination to protecting vast swaths of coastline from rampant development, NRDC’s Southern California office has worked tirelessly to make the region a healthier place to live.

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1. NRDC Trustee and event honoree Kelly Meyer 2. NRDC Chair Alan Horn 3. NRDC founder John Adams 4. From left: Dr. Jenny Jay, NRDC Western Director and event honoree Joel Reynolds, Meyer, NRDC Chief Counsel Mitch Bernard, NRDC Trustee Laurie David

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A Monumental Moment: Preserving the Beauty and Wonder of Our Public Lands MAY 9, 2019 SAN FRANCISCO

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OSTED BY THE SAN FRANCISCO OF-

fice, 300 supporters and friends came together at San Francisco City Hall to celebrate NRDC’s long-standing fight to protect monuments and public lands. “A Monumental Moment” featured a panel discussion—moderated

by Jamie Redford, cofounder of KPJR Films and cofounder and chair of the Redford Center— centered on the importance of adding Indigenous voices and experiences to the conservation and management of public lands. The lively discussion featured former NRDC president Rhea Suh; Hilary C. Tompkins, a partner at Hogan Lovells, LLP, and a former solicitor in the U.S. Department of the Interior; and Abby Abinanti, chief judge of the Yurok tribal court and the first Indigenous woman admitted to the California bar. The event was an inspiring night that further enforced the continued importance of safeguarding our natural heritage for future generations.

1

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1. From left: Lara Ettenson, NRDC energy efficiency initiative director; educator Kyle Redford; panel moderator Jamie Redford 2. From left: Judge Abby Abinanti, NRDC Chief Counsel Mitch Bernard, attorney Hilary C. Tompkins, former NRDC president Rhea Suh, Redford 3. From left: Tompkins, Abinanti, Suh, Redford

ORANGE PHOTOGRAPHY

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LOL: A Comedy Benefit for Our Planet APRIL 17, 2019 CHICAGO

D AV I D C . S A M P S O N

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N T H E L E A D - U P T O E A RT H DAY, N R D C

hosted a stand-up comedy event at Chicago’s Sleeping Village to raise a younger audience’s awareness of climate change. Matty Ryan of the Parlour Car comedy show curated an incredible lineup featuring some of Chicago’s top comedians, including Alex Kumin, Erica Nicole Clark, Azhar Usman, Adam Burke, and Chastity Washington.

Delicious food and drinks from the local restaurant Lonesome Rose were provided by event partner Land and Sea Dept. Afterward, legendary house DJ Duane Powell kicked off a dance party for guests.

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1. DJ Duane Powell 2. The stage at Sleeping Village 3. Comedian Matty Ryan

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Plant Forward: A Dinner to Combat Climate Change JUNE 5, 2019 CHICAGO

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vegetable-focused restaurant, was the backdrop for “Plant Forward,” a fundraising dinner focused on the connection between food and climate change. The event was hosted by Amanda Hanley, co-chair of NRDC’s Midwest Council, along with cohosts and fellow Midwest Council co-chairs Susan Manning and Doug Doetsch and Midwest Council members Lisa Fremont, Clarisse Perrette, Todd Smith, Marcia Friedl, and Carla and Bill Young. Guests enjoyed vegan and vegetarian dishes alongside a presentation from Sujatha Bergen, director of NRDC’s Health & Food division, who highlighted how everyday food choices can be powerful tools in the fight against climate change.

1

1. From left: Will Young with cohost Bill Young 2. Bad Hunter restaurant 3. From left: Eileen O’Halloran and NRDC Midwest Council member Lisa Fremont with event host and Midwest Council cochair Amanda Hanley

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EXPO Chicago SEPTEMBER 21, 2019 CHICAGO

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Selections from “The Coming World: Ecology as the New Politics 2030–2100”

OR THE PAST SEVEN YEARS, NRDC HAS

partnered with an artist or museum to create a public art exhibit to engage visitors on critical environmental issues at the annual EXPO Chicago, the international exposition of contemporary and modern art hosted at Navy Pier’s Festival Hall.

This year, NRDC partnered with the Garage Museum of Contemporary Art to present selections from “The Coming World: Ecology as the New Politics 2030–2100,” an exhibition that brings together historical and new works by more than 50 artists. The works allude to a period of time in the not-too-distant future when the human race will be forced to live with the fact that “there is no planet B.” This collaboration, which marked the first time the renowned museum exhibited in the United States, featured works by Kim Abeles, Dan Perjovschi, Alexander Obrazumov, and Denis Sinyakov.

As in other years, the inspiring artwork sent a powerful message to viewers, this time opening their eyes to the urgency of climate change.

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NRDC’s Night of Comedy APRIL 30, 2019 NEW YORK CITY

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N PARTNERSHIP WITH DISCOVERY, INC.,

EVENTS

NRDC held our biannual Night of Comedy benefit at the New-York Historical Society. The event brought together 400 guests and raised a record $1.8 million. Guests enjoyed a spectacular lineup of comedians, including Mike Birbiglia, Tiffany Haddish, Hasan Minhaj, John Mulaney, John Oliver, and Sarah Silverman, with Seth Meyers as our emcee. Guests enjoyed an after-party with great food, music, and dancing. David Zaslav, Discovery’s president and CEO, was honored that evening with a special award for his inspiring leadership and work helping to protect the planet.

We are extremely grateful to NRDC Trustee Anna Scott Carter for her vision and leadership in helping to make this event a great success.

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R O Y R O C H L I N / G E T T Y I M A G E S F O R N R D C (3); J U S T I N B I S H O P F O R N R D C ( T O P R I G H T )

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3

1. Former NRDC president Rhea Suh with NRDC Chief Counsel Mitch Bernard 2. From left: Author and producer Robyn Todd Steinberg and her husband, comedian David Steinberg; NRDC Trustee Anna Scott Carter and her husband, former Vanity Fair editor-in-chief Graydon Carter; Discovery CEO David Zaslav and his wife, Pam Zaslav 3. Mariposa Foundation president and NRDC Trustee Claire Bernard 4. Suh (center) with comedians (from left) Hasan Minhaj, Mike Birbiglia, Tiffany Haddish, John Oliver, John Mulaney, Sarah Silverman, Seth Meyers

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Farm-to-Table Dinner JUNE 13, 2019 BROOKLYN, NEW YORK

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RDC’S EIGHTH FARM-TO-TABLE DIN-

ner benefit took place at Williamsburg’s North Brooklyn Farms, where more than 100 guests enjoyed an evening of cocktails, bluegrass music, a farm tour, and a dinner catered by the popular neighborhood restaurant Marlow & Sons. The event—attended by NRDC Trustees, major donors, New York Council members, and E2 members—also included remarks from NRDC Chief Counsel Mitch Bernard and senior attorneys Margaret Brown and Jen Grossman. NRDC’s experts discussed their efforts to create transformative change locally as they work to advance a sustainable, healthy, and equitable food system.

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1. Event co-chair Abby Scheuer (far right) and Ella Atema (second from right) with guests 2. North Brooklyn Farms 3. NRDC Trustee Frederica Perera and Chair Emeritus Frederick Schwarz 4. NRDC senior attorney Margaret Brown

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D AV I D W H I T E

EVENTS

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2019 FINANCIAL STATEMENT

M AT T E O D I I O R I O

RDC FINISHED FY19 IN A STRONG

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financial position. Revenue for the year was $199.9 million, which outpaced expenses of $183.6 million. Net assets at the end of FY19 totaled $376.3 million, $25.5 million higher than prior year end.

The majority of NRDC’s FY19 revenue came from members, individual major donors, and foundations. The generosity and continued dedication to our work on the part of these critical supporters are deeply appreciated. NRDC also received revenue from bequests, in-kind contributions, investment return, awarded attorney fees, and other miscellaneous sources.

NRDC devoted 81.2 percent of overall operating expenses to programs that work to ensure the rights of all people to clean air, clean water, and healthy communities, both domestically and internationally. We applied the remaining 18.8 percent to management and general activities, fundraising, and recruitment of new members.

Thanks to the tremendous financial success realized in FY19, NRDC was able to increase resources where needed across the organization in order to battle the urgent threats we face during this crucial moment in history and to build a better, livable future for generations to come.

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HOW WE USE OUR FUNDS

Grand Canyon North Rim, Arizona

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81.2%

$149.1 million on programs SUSTAINABLE COMMUNITIES

$49,167,231

CLEAN ENERGY FUTURE

$ 45,765,631

WILDLIFE & WILDLANDS

$ 26,016,855

INTERNATIONAL

$ 20,484,768

PUBLIC ENGAGEMENT

$ 4,306,985

MEMBERSHIP SERVICES

$ 3,317,586

TOTAL PROGRAM SERVICES

$ 149,059,056

9.4 %

$17.4 million on management and general operations

9.4%

S T E P H E N WA L K E R

$17.2 million on fundraising efforts to support ongoing operations and membership development

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in memoriam

HENRY HENDERSON Midwest Director THANK YOU TO THE FOLLOWING DONORS WHO CONTRIBUTED TO THE HENRY L. HENDERSON FUND FOR ENVIRONMENTAL PROTECTION.

Holly Babington • Badawi Walton family • Peter Bartholomaus • Jody Becker and Steve, Danielle, and Jamie Barrett • Jennifer Bernstein • Bunny Bloom • Tami and Rob Bloom • Alice Bluestone and family Bouchet family • Susan Bowey • Joan Broderick • Carol Brown • Budde family • Susan Reed Burneson • Elise Cagan • Jan, Shannon Cahill & Co. • Susan CaseyLefkowitz • Ralph Cavanagh and Deborah Rhode • Pat Cleveland • Jennifer and Janet Daly • Jennifer Dao • Ken Davis and Lina Paul • Familia De la Torre-Salinas • Duquette family • Dwyer family • Natasha Egan • Doug and Julie Elmore • Albert Ettinger • Eyler family • Marcia Friedl, Todd and Grace Smith • Molly Flanagan • Foszcz family • Fabienne, Juliette, Caroline et Emmanuelle Geisinger • Emily Gray • Angela Guyadeen • Halaby family • Janice and Steve Hamilton • Heather Hancock/Cam Balzer • Amanda Hanley • Barb and George Hay • Jacqueline, James, and Ben Henderson • Karen Hobbs, Peter and Elizabeth Haas • Daphne Hoch-Cunningham and John Cunningham • Hogan family • Becky and Brad Holden • Alexandra Holt and Thomas Serafine • Greg Jacobs and Liz Siegel • Jan and Bill Jentes • Jane Johnston • Eden Juron and Neal Pearlman and family • Blair Kamin and Barbara Mahany • Melinda Kassen • Rob Kelter • Kit Kennedy and Matthew Diler • Nancy Kohn and Art Friedson • Beatrice et Yann Kulp • Lucy and Ken Lehman • Debra J. Lessin • Ron and Emily Squires Levine • Gail and Peter Lobin • Jessie Mandel and Tom Underberg • Susan Manning and Doug Doetsch • Kate McKenney • Janine Mileaf and Matthew Witkovsky • Peter Miller • Maureen Mizwicki • Olson, Bzdok & Howard, P.C. • Bobbi and Michael Ortiz • Carole and Dale Pashea • Tami Peden • Clarisse Perrette and Larry Freed • John and Susie Pratt • Penny Primo • Shelley Poticha • Rebecca Quigley • David and Cordelia Reimers • Pat Remick • Eleanor and Bill Revelle • Tom and Laura Robinson • Diane L. Rosenfeld • Thomas W. Roush • Bettylu and Paul Saltzman • Rev. Brian Sauder • Abby Schaefer • Beth Schermer and Tom Potter • Doug and Tammy Scott • Scott-Hennelly family • Haley Siculan • Eva Silverman • Jennifer Amdur Spitz and Jeff Spitz • Barbara Stob and John Detzner • Jennifer Stone • Susan and Roger Stone • Dick and Cheryl Streedain • Pattie Sullian • Dylan Sullivan • Niv and Joanne Tadmore • Mary Tobin • Ann and Henry Tonks • Bill Trumbull • Mijo Vodopic • Nancy Wachs • Nancy Watson, John and Cassie Metzger • Diana Weinberg • Stan Weiss • Chris Wheat • Carol Wilinski • Abra Wilkin • Christina Nowinski Wurst • Carla, Bill Young and family • Mercedes Sahagun Zavala • Anonymous (7)

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ENRY HENDERSON, NRDC’S LONGTIME MIDWEST DIRECTOR,

was a fierce advocate for everyone’s rights to clean air, clean water, and a safe environment. His work is a legacy that will be regarded for decades to come as foundational to the safeguarding of public health in Chicago and the greater Midwest.

At NRDC, Henry found the perfect platform for using the law as a tool to redress a disturbing power imbalance between communities that bore the burden of industrial pollution and a government that wasn’t always willing to provide justice unless pressure was brought to bear.

Under his leadership, NRDC launched campaigns to protect residents of Chicago’s Southeast Side from the rampant dumping of toxic chemicals in their communities; to close a pair of highly polluting coal plants that were spewing emissions into working-class Latino neighborhoods; and to compel ComEd, the largest electric utility in Illinois, to pour half a billion dollars into new efficiency measures for commercial buildings. This last effort sharply reduced Chicago’s carbon footprint, is saving $5 million annually in energy costs, and helped pave the way for Illinois’s Future Energy Jobs Act, one of the most aggressive state-led climate efforts in the nation.

Outside Chicago, Henry’s leadership helped address significant threats to air and water quality in the Midwest. He and his staff fought vigorously to prevent construction of nine unneeded coal plants proposed in Michigan and Ohio, and they challenged tar sands oil refineries in Illinois and Indiana to force the addition of hundreds of millions of dollars’ worth of pollution controls.

More recently, Henry lent his expertise and support to litigation NRDC brought on behalf of the residents of Flint, Michigan, to combat the city’s horrific water crisis. The result of the court battle led to the commitment to replace every lead line in the city—which is currently ongoing—and finally ensured the transparency of the city’s water quality for members of the long-suffering Flint community.

Fueling Henry’s work at all levels was the unswerving belief that law and public policy build relationships that are essential to the creation of safe, healthy communities. Unsurprisingly, Henry was committed to forging such relationships himself—mentoring young staff, seeking out and finding common ground, and doing whatever else he could to broaden and strengthen his own community of environmental advocates.

Before joining NRDC in 2007, Henry served as Illinois’s assistant attorney general and later as the founding commissioner for Chicago’s Department of the Environment. “I’ve always been proud of the fact that we were the first big city to create a department of environment, and we’re all fortunate that Henry was able to serve so passionately as its first commissioner,” said former Chicago mayor Richard M. Daley, who picked Henry for the job in 1992. While there, Henry designed a string of groundbreaking initiatives in pursuit of cleaner air, stronger utility regulations, and a more sensible energy policy. Only one year after taking the job, he oversaw the Chicago Brownfields Initiative, a massive citywide project entailing the rehabilitation of abandoned industrial sites that had been plaguing Chicago for generations.

As deeply as Henry’s absence has been felt, his benefaction continues to be felt even more—in the communities he fought so hard to protect; in the laws and policies he helped to draft and worked to pass; in the continuing efforts of the advocates whom he mentored and inspired; and in the realization of his dream of a community ever improving, ever innovating, and ever rededicating itself to promoting environmental equity and justice for all its people.

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TE E L AT KH AY EM H EPRHEO T O G R A P H Y

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TU J E EL K I EAY C HHAESREE B A L D O C C H I

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in memoriam

KIRBY WALKER Honorary Trustee

A RT O F T H E N R D C FA M I LY S I N C E

1985, documentary filmmaker Kirby Walker often merged her passion for hard-hitting storytelling with her passion for the environment and public health. In fact, several years ago she was so disturbed by a discussion about flame retardants at an NRDC brown bag lunch that she ended up codirecting and coproducing a documentary about the issue, titled Toxic Hot Seat. The film was instrumental in NRDC’s campaign to change a California law, TB 117, in order to protect consumers and firefighters from these harmful chemicals, which are used in furniture and children’s products and have been linked to neurological damage and cancer. San Francisco firefighters honored Walker with the White Helmet, an award for civilians who have given back to the firefighter community.

In her early days with NRDC, Kirby and her friends helped build San Francisco support by organizing dinners for 100 people to listen to NRDC staff discuss their work. Through one such event, Kirby—whose family owned forestland— learned about NRDC’s work of improving forest management through Forest Stewardship Council

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(FSC) certification. With this new knowledge, Kirby’s family took the lead in embracing FSC certification—and soon after, other forest owners in the area followed suit.

Kirby produced and directed numerous awardwinning educational films for clients such as Apple, Gap Inc., Levi Strauss & Co., and Pacific Telesis. She always loved the outdoors, spending childhood summers at her beloved Lake Tahoe and exploring the Rockies as an undergraduate at the University of Colorado in Boulder before she returned to California for her master’s degree in communications at Stanford University. Following graduation, she cofounded Omega Productions, through which she was able to tell impactful, compelling stories through filmmaking, inspired by her innate curiosity about the world.

Kirby, who joined NRDC’s Board of Trustees in 1993 and became an Honorary Trustee in 2002, also served on the boards of the Marin Country Day School, Summer Search, the Redford Center, and the Golden Gate National Parks Conservancy.

We are grateful for Kirby’s humanity, lifelong dedication to protecting the earth, and priceless contributions to her community. She is missed by all who had the pleasure of knowing her.

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MEMBER VOICES What motivates three million members and online activists to support NRDC? Here, answers from just a few of the people who inspire us to keep up our fight.

MARC AND THOMAS WOLPOW

SHARON VOLCKHAUSEN

ANNE LEE

MEENA R. MANSHARAMANI

JERRY DOTY

HOMETOWN Hanover, NH (Marc) and Middlebury, VT (Thomas)

HOMETOWN Brooklyn, NY

HOMETOWN New York City

HOMETOWN New York City

HOMETOWN Long Island/New York City

PASSIONATE ABOUT Climate change, air and water quality, waste management

PASSIONATE ABOUT Conservation, smart cities, environmental justice

PASSIONATE ABOUT Clean and healthy food

PASSIONATE ABOUT Protecting our environment for future generations

WHY I JOINED I worked with NRDC attorneys on an Endangered Species Act case two decades ago. And when my father passed away, in tribute to his passion for the environment, my family partnered with NRDC’s Beijing office. Now we help send four interns there every year.

WHY I JOINED I can attest that “rage-giving” and “panic-giving” are real! But every email I get from NRDC documenting its efforts—from protecting endangered vaquitas to banning single-use plastics—gives me faith that its network is engaging with the issues I care about.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE I’d like to see us approach zero waste and 100 percent renewable energy for the whole planet. My teenage daughters are activists and make me feel like we can get there. Inspired

by Greta Thunberg, Emma, 13, spent Fridays on the steps of Brooklyn Borough Hall. Anna, 15, single-handedly got her school to purchase TerraCycle recycling boxes.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE To address climate change and mass extinction, humanity will come together.

Not only will we turn to renewable energy, but we will also designate a third of our planet as protected and evolve our agricultural practices.

Father and son, Members since 2017

PASSIONATE ABOUT Climate action, environmental justice WHY WE JOINED Our family’s support of NRDC was instigated by Thomas, and we are really proud of his passion around climate change. As the global community works together to address the single greatest threat to humanity and reduce greenhouse gas emissions, NRDC continues to prove that its legal strategy can help move us in the right direction— and combat those who try to take us backwards.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE We’d like to see action-oriented compassion for those hit hardest by climate change across the world, net-zero carbon emissions, and the protection of our biodiverse ecosystems.

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Member since 1994

Member since 2015

Member since 2008

WHY I JOINED My passion is inspired by my personal experience and how good-quality ingredients make me feel. I have been drawn to and now embrace a vegetarian diet, given my desire to protect as many animals as possible. We all need to raise our consciousness about where our food comes from and how it is treated before we consume it. It’s important to me that NRDC leans into initiatives like keeping harmful pesticides off our produce and fighting the overuse of antibiotics in our food supply.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE I’d like to see a vibrant and thriving planet that is healed from all our mistreatment.

Member since 2012

WHY I JOINED Initially I joined because of my spouse, Dan McCarthy.

He and others fought for the protection of our oceans and unique coastal lands. Now I support NRDC in his honor and for NRDC’s 50 years of proven leadership.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE My grandnieces and grandnephew will be able to recall a time— this moment—when we realized that preserving resources for future generations was more important than serving just the wants of the present one.

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FACEBOOK SUPERFANS

Meet some of our social followers who helped spread the word about NRDC by launching their own fundraisers.

NICK NOLTE HOMETOWN: Waverly, IA MY FACEBOOK FUNDRAISER: Help Fight Against Trump’s Climate Plan, November 2016 WHY I CHOSE TO SUPPORT NRDC: Trump’s stance on the climate is a doomsday scenario: He promises to withdraw from the Paris Agreement; approve the Keystone XL pipeline; stop clean energy funding; and expand fracking, coal mining, and oil drilling on our wildlands and coastlines. NRDC is fighting these ruinous plans for the environment. While we may feel powerless alone, NRDC shows us that we have the ability to enact change when we all come together and fight.

DIYA LANSBERG

Member since 2019 HOMETOWN Palo Alto, CA PASSIONATE ABOUT Taking local action to protect animals and restore our planet

COURTESY OF NRDC MEMBERS

WHY I JOINED I decided that I had gathered up too much money (for a 13-year-old) from dog walking, and so I wanted to donate it. I chose NRDC because once I found the site, I saw articles on topics that I’m interested in, such as bees and pesticides. I hope NRDC can keep going with this work to help our world get better!

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE To be very idealistic, I would like almost all of our carbon emissions to be completely gone. I’d also like for everyone to be informed about how our planet will not survive if we dump all this trash, both solid and gas, into our world. I would really like to see our planet restored!

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AMANDA HANLEY

Member since 2007 HOMETOWN Chicago PASSIONATE ABOUT Addressing the climate crisis. Our house is on fire, and there is no time to lose.

WHY I JOINED As cofounder and director of the Hanley Foundation, I saw that NRDC is an unparalleled legal, scientific, and technical powerhouse fighting to protect people and the environment. And it employs a hefty toolbox—making positive change from smart policy to inspiring art.

VISION FOR OUR FUTURE In my wildest dreams, NRDC puts itself out of business by ensuring we have, and enforce, the strongest environmental and health protections. Everyone’s kids will be assured of a stable climate; clean water, energy, food, and air; diverse wild places; and a just, thriving economy.

BECKETT, ALLE, AND TENLEY HOMETOWN: San Francisco OUR FACEBOOK FUNDRAISER: A Little Kindness: Kids Cooking for a Cause, May 2018 WHY WE CHOSE TO SUPPORT NRDC: Together with their friends, my two little chefs, Beckett (13) and Tenley (11), spent Earth Day 2018 whipping up a five-course meal for 80 hungry guests to benefit NRDC. They may be young, but they have an impassioned point of view on their responsibility to preserve Mother Earth and to help people with their own two hands. And the kids felt amazing for taking a stand for what they felt was right. It turns out that compassion, creativity, and good old-fashioned elbow grease are the perfect recipe for making a difference, no matter how old you are.

LARMON LUO HOMETOWN: Sacramento, CA MY FACEBOOK FUNDRAISER: Mr. Trump, Climate Change Is Not a Hoax, June 2017 WHY I CHOSE TO SUPPORT NRDC: As one of the largest emitters of carbon emissions in history, the United States has a key role to play and a moral obligation to take responsibility for our burning of fossil fuels. We, the people of this earth, should keep working toward a better world. Our voices deserve to be heard. I’m supporting NRDC to be part of the movement advocating for our politicians to wake up and lead our nation against the threat of an irreversibly damaged global climate.

JESSIE MAO HOMETOWN: Markham, Ontario, Canada MY FACEBOOK FUNDRAISER: Jessie’s Birthday Fundraiser for NRDC, April 2019 WHY I CHOSE TO SUPPORT NRDC: If you’ve ever heard me talk about watching Planet Earth II, you’ll know that I cry whenever I see an animal in peril. But what is truly sad— and actually existentially scary—is the peril that our planet is in. Yet NRDC gives me hope. Since many of the negative effects impacting the planet have only been around for several decades, it’s not too late to get it together and change the course of our future for the better!

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Special thanks to all our councils for their hard work and support during the past fiscal year.

GLOBAL LE ADERSHIP COUNCIL NRDC’s Global Leadership Council (GLC) is a group of leading supporters and advocates from across the country who help draw attention to the most pressing environmental and health threats facing the planet—along with the solutions at hand. The GLC was launched in 2008 with NRDC Founding Director John Adams at the helm, and since then, members have helped defend and advance meaningful protections at the regional, federal, and international levels.

John H. Adams, co-chair

Christopher Elliman

Nathan and Cynthia Kellogg

Gale Picker

Elizabeth Steele

Ira Ziering, co-chair

John Esposito

Jena King

Joanna Pozen

Edward Strohbehn

Christopher and Patricia Arndt

Jon Friedland

William Kistler III

Eleanor Phipps Price

Carol Tolan

John Gates

Clate Korsant

Peter Resnick

John and Nancy Bellett

David Goodman

Christina Lang-Assael

Susan Cohn Rockefeller

Joseph Varet and Esther Kim Varet

Anthony Bernhardt and Lynn Feintech

Oliver Grantham

D. Roger B. Liddell and Florence W. Liddell

Wendy Rockefeller

Julie Walters

Larry and Victoria Lunt

Sam Rose Marcie Rothman

Elizabeth and Steven Weinstein

Howard Rubin

David Welch

Lou Salkind

Marianne Welch

Val Schaffner

Karen White

Jacob Scherr

Michael Wolf

Nancy Field Schulder

Rosanne Ziering

Liana Schwarz

Anonymous (7)

Robert O. Blake, Jr. Andrew Blank

Ray and Nina Gustin Douglas L. Hammer and Patricia Durham

Timon and Lori Malloy

Amanda Hanley

Kathy Mele

Barbarina Heyerdahl

Kelly Chapman Meyer

Andrea Nadosy Bunt

Jill Tate Higgins and James P. Higgins

Mary Moran

Jim Cabot

Fred Hipp

David Noble

Katie Carpenter

Cindy Horn

Ryan Nolan

Anna Scott Carter

Jesse and Mary Johnson

Donald Novak

Kyra Sedgwick and Kevin Bacon

Dr. Peter Danzig

Jill Joyce

Mark Pasculano

Nathaniel Shapiro

Liam Donohue

Jo Ann Kaplan

Noel Perry

Jill Soffer

Dayna Bochco Pierce Brosnan and Keely Shaye-Smith

LOS ANGELES LE ADERSHIP COUNCIL Since 2001, NRDC’s Los Angeles Leadership Council has harnessed its members’ exceptional environmental commitment, personal and professional expertise, extensive networks, and financial means to support NRDC’s mission.

The group’s volunteer members are engaged in NRDC’s work at the local, national, and international levels, with an emphasis on factbased advocacy and media outreach.

John J. Murray

Beate Chee

Jill Howerton

Jan Ross

Laurie David

Mari Snyder Johnson

Audrey Sarn

Lauren Donner

Jo Ann Kaplan

Milissa Sears

Christiane Donnersmarck

Jena King

Hannah Skvarla

Isabelle Duvivier

Lisa Kring

Nancy Stephens

Elyssa Elbaz

Warren Lieberfarb

Sarah Timberman

Judy Fishman

Julia Louis-Dreyfus

Dora Fourcade

Barbara Mack

Joseph Varet and Esther Kim Varet

Janet Friesen

Adam and Shira McKay

Paula Bennett, co-chair

Laurie Benenson

Cami Gordon

Kelly Meyer

Carson Meyer, co-chair

Dayna Bochco

Andrea Blaugrund Nevins

Rosanne Ziering, co-chair

Gary Borman

Rebecca and Aaron Gundzik

Edie Baskin

Scott Burns

Ellen Bronfman Hauptman

David Rosenstein

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Susan Reiner

Lauren Weithorn Steve and Betsy White Ira Ziering Suzanne Zimmer Kim Zucker

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NE W YORK COUNCIL

MIDWEST COUNCIL

NRDC’s New York Council is a varied group of New Yorkers who share a strong commitment to protecting the environment and who are dedicated to furthering NRDC’s mission on the regional, national, and international levels. Council members work to develop their knowledge of NRDC’s programs, contribute their time and engage their social and professional networks to increase awareness of environmental issues, and raise funds for NRDC.

NRDC’s Midwest Council brings together a diverse group of business, civic, philanthropic, and academic leaders to support NRDC’s mission. Council members help shape and implement the organization’s programs in the Midwest while securing resources and raising awareness of NRDC’s efforts in the region.

Willis Fries, co-chair

David Hutchinson

Olivia Massey, co-chair

Lauren Kurtz

Emily Bina

Lori Meyer

Elizabeth Braswell

Sarah Paley

Cassidy Catechis

Scott Ryan

Joshua Chung

Doug Doetsch, co-chair

Rhona Hoff man

Amanda Hanley, co-chair

Becky and Brad Holden

Bill Abolt Suzanne BookerCanfield, Ph.D.

Rebecca and Stephen Sheldon Rebecca Sive

Stewart Hudnut

Anne Slichter

Tony Karman

Natalie and Barry Slotnick

Stephanie Comer

Nancy Kohn

George Covington

Susan Krantz

Alex Darragh

Peter Lobin

Eric Dayton

Nancy McKlveen

Janet Wyman

Riddhi Sanwal

Lisa Fremont

Clare Munana

Carla and Bill Young

Peter Coffin

Vig Siva

Matthew Doherty

Mia Soreli

Jeanne Gang and Mark Schendel

Kay and Geoff Nixon

Neetin Gulati

Fandi Tang

Gale Gottlieb

Clarisse Perrette

Elizabeth Horvitz

Lauren Taylor

Leslie Graham

Diana Rauner, Ph.D.

Julia Hsueh

Chris Wilson

Karen Gray-Krehbiel

Debbie Ross

Jennifer and Jeff Spitz Kelly R. Welsh

Bobbi and Mike Ortiz

SAN FR ANCISCO COUNCIL Founded in 2006, NRDC’s San Francisco Council is a volunteer group of individuals in the Bay Area who come from a variety of backgrounds and professions but share a strong commitment to the environment and are dedicated to furthering NRDC’s mission.

SF Council members join in exclusive educational opportunities led by NRDC scientists, attorneys, and policy experts to stay informed on and build awareness of critical environmental and health issues facing California. Additionally, members help raise funds for NRDC’s programs through educational and social activities, as well as other initiatives.

Boyd Arnold

Patricia Hong

Rohan Mehra

Jonathan Saylors

Ker Walker

Emily Baker

William Hutchinson

Brian Midili

Bridget Scallen

Teddy Ward

Ria Boner

Danielle Jezienicki

Lindsay Millar

Charlotte Schmidlapp

Casey Weiss

Daniel Chen

Fleur Keyes

Wyatt Millar

Lori Sinsley

Suelyn Yu

Lauren Finkelstein Gray

Laura Kreitler

Michael Millstein

Mark Sutton

Ailey Zhang

Brian Gulotta

Janet Lai

Ken Nabity

Alex Swart

Rica Zhang

Tanya Hanson

Stuart Landesberg

Eliza Nemser

Kate Swimley

Lindsay Hayes

Sam Leichman

David W. Rhoads

Jacob Tehrani

Claudia Ho

Andrew Ma

Serena Torrey Roosevelt

Heather Loomis Tighe

Deborah Holley

Ian Magruder

Dylan Sage

Sarah Van Cleve

WORK PL ACE CON T RIBU T IONS NRDC thanks those individuals who have supported our work through payroll-deduction plans offered by EarthShare. To participate, see information on page 91.

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NRDC BOARD OF TRUSTEES CHAIR Alan F. Horn Co-Chairman and Chief Creative Officer, The Walt Disney Studios

CHAIR EMERITUS Frederick A.O. Schwarz, Jr. Chief Counsel, Brennan Center for Justice at NYU Law School; Senior Counsel, Cravath, Swaine and Moore LLP

CHAIR EMERITUS Daniel R. Tishman Chairman, Tishman Construction; Vice Chair, AECOM; Principal, Tishman Reality

TREASURER Mary P. Moran Environmentalist; foundation director John H. Adams Founding Director, NRDC; Chair, Open Space Institute Geeta Aiyer President and Founder, Boston Common Asset Management, LLC Hon. Anne Slaughter Andrew Advisor, Sustainable Energy Investments Richard E. Ayres Environmentalist Atif Azher Corporate Partner, Simpson Thacher & Barlett LLP, Palo Alto Patricia Bauman President, Bauman Foundation; Co-Chair, Brennan Center for Justice; Chair, NRDC Action Fund Anita Bekenstein Environmentalist; foundation director Claire Bernard President, Mariposa Foundation Anna Scott Carter Environmentalist; Co-Founder, Clean by Design initiative Sarah E. Cogan Of Counsel, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP, New York Laurie David Producer, Author, Advocate; Co-Founder, NRDC Los Angeles Leadership Council

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Leonardo DiCaprio Founder and Co-Chairman, Earth Alliance

Eric Wepsic Managing Director, The D. E. Shaw Group

John E. Echohawk Executive Director, Native American Rights Fund

George M. Woodwell, Ph.D. NRDC Distinguished Scientist; Founder, Director Emeritus, Woods Hole Research Center

Nicole E. Lederer Chair and Co-Founder, Environmental Entrepreneurs (E2) Julia Louis-Dreyfus Actress/producer Josephine A. Merck Artist; Founder, Ocean View Foundation Kelly Chapman Meyer Co-Founder, American Heart Association Teaching Gardens Peter Morton Chairman/Founder, 510 Development Corp.

Wendy K. Neu Chairman and CEO, Hugo Neu Corporation; Grassroots community organizer and activist Frederica P. Perera, Dr.P.H., Ph.D. Professor, Columbia University Mailman School of Public Health; Founding Director, Columbia Center for Children’s Environmental Health, and Director, Program in Translational Research Robert Redford Actor; director; conservationist Laurance Rockefeller Conservationist Tom Roush, M.D. Private investor; environmental activist William H. Schlesinger President Emeritus, Cary Institute of Ecosystem Studies Gerald Torres Jane M.G. Foster Professor, Cornell University Law School; Faculty Fellow, Atkinson Center for a Sustainable Future, Cornell University David C. Vladeck A.B. Chettle, Jr., Professor of Law, Georgetown University Law Center David F. Welch, Ph.D. Founder, Chief Innovation Officer, Infinera Corporation Kathleen Welch Founder and Principal, Corridor Partners

Dan Yates Executive Chairman, Dandelion Geothermal

HONOR ARY TRUSTEES Dean Abrahamson, M.D., Ph.D. Professor Emeritus, Humphrey Institute of Public Affairs, University of Minnesota Henry R. Breck Partner, Heronetta Management, LP Joan K. Davidson President, Furthermore Grants in Publishing; Former NY State Parks Commissioner; President Emerita, J.M. Kaplan Fund Sylvia A. Earle, Ph.D. Chair, Deep Ocean Exploration and Research, Inc. Robert J. Fisher Director, Gap Inc. Charles E. Koob Partner, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP Philip B. Korsant Member, Long Light Capital, LLC Ruben Kraiem Senior Partner, Covington and Burling LLP Burks B. Lapham Environmentalist Maya Lin Artist/designer Shelly B. Malkin Artist; conservationist Daniel Pauly, Ph.D Professor of Fisheries and Zoology Cruz Reynoso Professor of Law, University of California, Davis John R. Robinson Attorney Jonathan F. P. Rose President, Jonathan Rose Companies LLC Christine H. Russell, Ph.D. Environmentalist; Foundation Director

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James Gustave Speth Professor of Law, Vermont Law School; Distinguished Senior Fellow, Demos Max Stone Managing Director, The D. E. Shaw Group James Taylor Singer/songwriter Frederick A. Terry Jr. Senior Counsel, Sullivan & Cromwell Thomas A. Troyer Member, Caplin & Drysdale Elizabeth R. Wiatt Environmentalist; Co-Founder, NRDC Los Angeles Leadership Council

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CHARITY NAVIGATOR AWARDS NRDC ITS 4-STAR RATING. NRDC GETS TOP RATINGS FROM CHARITY WATCH. CITED BY CNBC IN 2015 AS ONE OF THE TOP 10 CHARITIES CHANGING THE WORLD.

N AT U R A L R E S O U R C E S D E F E N S E C O U N C I L

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