Explore how communities can take care of each other’s needs equitably during a changing climate future.

This tipsheet gives a definition of mutual aid, shares examples of mutual aid for the climate crisis, and shares resources for finding your own local mutual aid networks.

Harmony Labs and partners set out to map Energy Transition Materials (ETM) narratives, in 9 nations and 3 domains, and experiment with communications that build support for a just energy transition.

Join Maine People’s Resource Center, New Jersey Resource Project, the New Conversation Initiative, People’s Action Institute and the Climate Advocacy Lab to learn about two deep canvassing campaigns launched in 2024 to build support for offshore wind in coastal communities in Maine and New Jersey.

Since 2018, the Climate Advocacy Lab has distributed Climate Justice Microgrants to 25 environmental justice and climate justice organizations around the United States who are doing powerful work to protect and improve their communities.

It is critical that folks dedicated to protecting our children’s chance at a future continue to engage in solution-making processes, in local, national, and international governance systems and institutions that impact climate outcomes. We have been able successfully to kick open the doors to the highest levels of government, to force conversation on Dakota Access Pipeline, on Line 3 Pipeline, while simultaneously laying strong foundations and relationships for people’s movement building. Project-level fights oftentimes still result in industry wins, yet the social license of both industry and government alike continues to shrink under a wave of civil unrest. While the individual losses hurt, the collective movement and the desire to look to frameworks outside of extraction, outside of individualism, keeps growing. And in so much of Westernized movement spaces, most energy is poured into advocacy streams with little to no risk, streams that largely preserve the systems of individualism that must be undone for a habitable world to exist.

The Inflation Reduction Act provides an unprecedented opportunity to foster more equitable participation in clean energy development and channel resources into historically marginalized communities. Because of the IRA’s Direct Pay provision, nonprofits, and state, local, and Tribal governments can now access tax credits over 10 years for clean energy projects in underserved communities. This democratizes energy, unlocking the potential for diverse entities across the U.S. to own clean energy assets as a wealth-building opportunity.

Indigenous self-determination is a key climate solution — if the federal government can get behind it. The latest National Climate Assessment cites a 2021 study that concluded that Indigenous peoples in the United States lost 99 percent of their territories through colonization, and that the lands that they were forced to move to face higher wildfire risk and worse drought than their traditional homelands. According to the authors, Indigenous peoples across the continental U.S. and its island holdings hail from more than 700 tribes and communities, and while each community has a different relationship with the federal government, all share similar experiences of colonization through stolen land, cultural assimilation, and persistent marginalization. The report also detailed problems with the National Flood Insurance Program, a federal insurance program managed by the Federal Emergency Management Agency that helps homeowners insure against the risk of flooding, something that many insurance companies won’t cover. The program is supposed to help communities mitigate flood risk, but the report found that its implementation in Native communities has been flawed and ineffective.

This report finds an indisputable connection between the fossil fuel industry’s practices and negative impacts to African American/Black/ African Diaspora, Indigenous, Latina/Chicana, and low-income women’s health, safety, and human rights in the U.S. and parts of Canada. Specifically, fossil fuel-derived air, water, and soil pollution impact women’s fertility, mental health, and daily work and responsibilities. The negative effects from fossil fuel activity—including extraction, storage and transportation of coal, oil, and gas often in the form of liquefied natural gas (LNG)—stem from direct pollution of communities by fossil fuel companies’ contributions to industrial carbon dioxide and methane. The climate crisis does not and will not affect everyone equally, as factors such as gender, race, and socio-economic status make certain communities significantly more vulnerable to the increasing threats of climate change. Global inequalities, rooted in structural patriarchy, colonialism, white supremacy, and capitalism, continue to place people of the global majority, and specifically women, at risk.

Stories like Wakanda Forever demonstrate the level of violence that colonization, conquest, and genocide have caused throughout generations—and how we can overcome them. When we think about the future of technology and social innovation, we need to do so through an alternative lens, just like in Wakanda Forever, and believe in a future where everyone has the talent, vision, and access to build projects that are sustainable and beneficial to all. We need to visualize a world rooted in abundance that rejects the idea that Blackness and Indigeneity must continue to be considered nonexistent in the Americas. Creating a new vision is just the start. We also must ask ourselves what this fictional speculation about our futures means for us today, especially those of us in positions to influence philanthropic resources for communities of color. It is our responsibility to be proactive about centering those intersecting narratives and debunk the myth that innovation and creativity come only from those who can access or understand the latest technology or benefit from proximity to centers of innovation and power.