OUR IMPACT

“I am extremely grateful to Climate Cabinet for continued support during my time in office... They recently provided me with transparently sourced data on green energy industry and jobs that I'm now using to form platform and strategies to help pass meaningful legislation to promote green energy for Texas.”

Representative Jon Rosenthal (Texas House District 135)

"Your work bringing us together in partnership, the sharing of ideas, and your encouragement are deeply appreciated."

Representative Art Staed (Iowa House District 66)

"The Building Blocks framework is exactly what our State Climate Policy Network members need to stay focused on the big picture. This is one of the most useful documents we’re seen out there to educate movement leaders on what policies we actually need to focus on, state by state. We are using Climate Cabinet’s framework in our own state policy tracking moving forward, and are promoting the framework to our members to serve the decarbonization mission."

Jonah Kurman-Faber, Research Director, Climate XChange

“I think [the Texas Environmental Justice Explorer] is going to help us move the hearts and minds of some Members
who maybe didn’t realize the severity of issues within their own districts.”

Representative Erin Zwiener (Texas House District 45)

Supporting Climate Champions in office:

We created the Building Blocks of State Climate Policy when we realized that most state legislators didn’t have a concept for what “climate policy” meant in practice - let alone what was under their jurisdiction, how it intersected with equity and justice, or where to find examples and resources.

Download Building Blocks

In 2020, we hosted a State Legislature Climate Action Summit, fostering cross-state coordination and strategizing amongst 80+ state legislators from 12 states.

Since then, over 200 policymakers or policy staffers
in state and local office have downloaded the tool.

Adding Capacity for the Climate Movement

We believe every legislative support network and every climate advocacy organization should have high quality climate policy resources at their fingertips. That’s why we’re proactively working to share and integrate our toolkits into existing networks.

At least 3 cross-state legislative support networks are using components of our Building Blocks of State Climate policy toolkit in their work.

Environmental Justice

Environmental justice is a throughline of our work. It’s a cornerstone of our policy toolkits, and an essential piece of our data work.

We don’t need to tackle the climate crisis for the sake of the planet alone: we need to protect people - and we need to protect ALL people regardless of race, class, or zipcode.

We need to make a concerted effort to invest in communities that have been historically blighted.

In 2020, we worked side-by-side with Texas Rising to create the Texas Environmental Justice Explorer, visualizing the unequal impact of pollution across underserved communities in Texas.

VISIT THE TEXAS ENVIRONMENTAL JUSTICE EXPLORER

Using Data and Technology to Build Infrastructure for Local Action

Information is out there. But so much is out there, that it’s not getting to the people who need it most. At the same time, state and local governments are on the frontlines of addressing these issues: but there are so many of these local offices, we need a systemic way to identify high-leverage opportunities. We’re using data to put big opportunities on people’s radars.

In 2020, we created the first national database of public utility board races. We’re using this database to activate relevant local groups.

We’re also combining big datasets to build a “heatmap” of high priority opportunities for strategic climate investment.