International Organizations and Climate Change

1805 Words4 Pages

Since the onset of the industrial revolution during the 19th century, humanity has rapidly stripped the earth of its natural resources and dumped countless byproducts into our environment. While 97% of climate scientists agree that climate change is real as well as man made (Proceedings Of The National Academy Of Sciences) there is still debate as to the validity of this in the public debate. Philanthropic individuals and organizations play an important role in influencing public opinion as well as directly conserving at risk land and species in addition to fighting projects that could have disastrous environmental impact. These individuals play a major role in providing funding for environmental groups due a general lack of available government subsidies for the issue relative to subsidies provided for many other issues. (Kimble Pg. 2) These philanthropists come from varying sectors including finance, alternative energy, high technology, broadcasting, development and real estate.
In addition to the individuals that use their wealth and influence to attempt to save the environment, there are also many individuals and organizations on the other side of the issue. These individuals and organizations are not necessarily anti-environment rather they are those who have a large stake in industries like manufacturing and fossil fuel energy or those who feel that the high initial cost of changing existing infrastructure and researching new technologies are not worth the eventual gains for the environment.

Jeremy Grantham is the founder and chief investment strategist at Grantham Mayo van Otterloo, an asset management fund that manages $106bn a year for approximately 1,000 clients. He is also a founder, along with his children, of Grant...

... middle of paper ...

... May 5, 2014, from http://www.unfoundation.org/what-we-do/issues/energy-and-climate/tackling-global-climate-challenge.html
Ted Turner. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.tedturner.com/foundations/
The Captain Planet Foundation. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://captainplanetfoundation.org/
Turner Endangered Species Fund. (n.d.). Retrieved from http://www.tesf.org/
United Nations Foundation - Connecting You with the United Nations. (n.d.). United Nations Foundation. Retrieved May 5, 2014, from http://www.unfoundation.org/
Wile, R. (2012, July 30). Everyone’s Talking About The Koch Brothers-Funded Study That Proves Climate Change Is Real Read more: http://www.businessinsider.com/koch-brothers-funded-study-proves-climate-change-2012-7#ixzz30ssBeLyg. Business Insider. Retrieved from http://www.businessinsider.com/koch-brothers-funded-study-proves-climate-change-2012-7#!I8rla

Open Document