I often get asked from people outside the EA community what is the best place to make a donation to fight climate change. When I mention the options proposed by Founders Pledge (CATF, Carbon180), they are almost always put off and end up not donating at all. It seems to me like for them the concept of donating to policy advocacy or technology innovation is counterintuitive. Note that these people are usually not willing to invest hours reading about or listening to all the arguments that FP offers.
For those cases, I miss being able to confidently give an alternative that:
might be not as effective as those mentioned above,
but it is still at least an order of magnitude more effective than the usual donation
and it is kind of sexier/​more understandable (meaning probably nature-based or supporting specific actions).
I lately mention Eden Reforestation Projects based on this post, but I am not sure how reliable that is study.
I guess I could sum-up my recommendation strategy as follows: 1. Give to the organisations recommended by Founders Pledge 2. Try to convince them of doing so, explaining why it is so effective 3. Give to an alternative organisation that is still pretty effective and easy to understand
What are your thoughts about this situation? Is there any organisation that could reliably be recommended as second-best and is at the same time easily understandable for non-EAs?
Some of the reasons I heard are: * it is difficult to understand that donating for technology innovation is really a donation, it feels more like investing in companies. * policy advocacy sounds like lobbying * it is kind of abstract if one compares it to other donations more widely known like planting trees; or donating medicines, vaccines or books to improve the health of the poorest. * the impact of the donation is uncertain and based on estimations only. * such a donation does not give this inner glow/​good feeling that they expect to get when making a donation
Thanks for the good question, I hope they raise the topic at the event!
It might not be completely satisfactory to what you’re looking for, but from what I hear it seems like the work at givinggreen.earth seems to have exactly those people in mind by giving more recommendations than just policy.
I have anecdotal evidence from Swedish donors being happier with BURN Manufacturing as an evidence backed climate intervention with positive effects on the local community, than an option more effective on a co2e/​$ basis.
One question we might still want to ask ourselves, if Clean Air Task Force are >10x as effective as the more accessible choice – would it perhaps be worth losing 9 in 10 potential donors and still have a larger effect? Personally I would imagine a second best option can have a gateway effect to be more receptible to evidence based giving, and make this a priority in future donations.
This anecdotal evidence from Sweden that you mentioned is what I also noticed when talking to people interested in climate change, but not into the EA-movement.
It seems like the differentials between BURN and CATF are more than 10x and could be even 100x, if CATF eventually managed to have an impact of $0.20/​ton. This does not seem unrealistic considering that the estimations of $1/​ton are conservative.
The study I referenced about Eden Reforestation mentioned an estimated impact of $0.36/​ton. This would actually be in the same order of magnitude as the conservative estimates for the most effective organisation. This is why I mentioned that organisation as a potential alternative.
An additional point to consider is that it might not be the same: * making a personal recommendation to someone that might probably not donate otherwise. * recommending it on a website.
If an organisation is recommended on a website, there is the risk that people that would otherwise donate to the most effective organisations will change their donation to those less effective ones, having a relative negative impact. If I remember well, this was one of the arguments Johannes used, which I found fair enough, especially if we are talking about orders of magnitude of difference.
Looking forward to hearing more thoughts on this topic :)
Sorry, I was in a bit of a rush and should have looked at your link before giving too quick an answer – in that case I would have understood what you had already seen and considered. My bad!
It’s a trade-off, for sure, but I tend to believe the differentials are much larger than 10x because of the various independent impact multipliers from advocacy * neglectedness * innovation.
I often get asked from people outside the EA community what is the best place to make a donation to fight climate change.
When I mention the options proposed by Founders Pledge (CATF, Carbon180), they are almost always put off and end up not donating at all. It seems to me like for them the concept of donating to policy advocacy or technology innovation is counterintuitive. Note that these people are usually not willing to invest hours reading about or listening to all the arguments that FP offers.
For those cases, I miss being able to confidently give an alternative that:
might be not as effective as those mentioned above,
but it is still at least an order of magnitude more effective than the usual donation
and it is kind of sexier/​more understandable (meaning probably nature-based or supporting specific actions).
I lately mention Eden Reforestation Projects based on this post, but I am not sure how reliable that is study.
I guess I could sum-up my recommendation strategy as follows:
1. Give to the organisations recommended by Founders Pledge
2. Try to convince them of doing so, explaining why it is so effective
3. Give to an alternative organisation that is still pretty effective and easy to understand
What are your thoughts about this situation?
Is there any organisation that could reliably be recommended as second-best and is at the same time easily understandable for non-EAs?
Why do they find policy advocacy or technology innovation counterintuitive or off-putting?
Some of the reasons I heard are:
* it is difficult to understand that donating for technology innovation is really a donation, it feels more like investing in companies.
* policy advocacy sounds like lobbying
* it is kind of abstract if one compares it to other donations more widely known like planting trees; or donating medicines, vaccines or books to improve the health of the poorest.
* the impact of the donation is uncertain and based on estimations only.
* such a donation does not give this inner glow/​good feeling that they expect to get when making a donation
Thanks for the good question, I hope they raise the topic at the event!
It might not be completely satisfactory to what you’re looking for, but from what I hear it seems like the work at givinggreen.earth seems to have exactly those people in mind by giving more recommendations than just policy.
I have anecdotal evidence from Swedish donors being happier with BURN Manufacturing as an evidence backed climate intervention with positive effects on the local community, than an option more effective on a co2e/​$ basis.
One question we might still want to ask ourselves, if Clean Air Task Force are >10x as effective as the more accessible choice – would it perhaps be worth losing 9 in 10 potential donors and still have a larger effect? Personally I would imagine a second best option can have a gateway effect to be more receptible to evidence based giving, and make this a priority in future donations.
Thanks for the input, henrith.
This anecdotal evidence from Sweden that you mentioned is what I also noticed when talking to people interested in climate change, but not into the EA-movement.
Regarding Giving Green, there was a very interesting discussion in the forum.
It seems like the differentials between BURN and CATF are more than 10x and could be even 100x, if CATF eventually managed to have an impact of $0.20/​ton. This does not seem unrealistic considering that the estimations of $1/​ton are conservative.
The study I referenced about Eden Reforestation mentioned an estimated impact of $0.36/​ton. This would actually be in the same order of magnitude as the conservative estimates for the most effective organisation. This is why I mentioned that organisation as a potential alternative.
An additional point to consider is that it might not be the same:
* making a personal recommendation to someone that might probably not donate otherwise.
* recommending it on a website.
If an organisation is recommended on a website, there is the risk that people that would otherwise donate to the most effective organisations will change their donation to those less effective ones, having a relative negative impact. If I remember well, this was one of the arguments Johannes used, which I found fair enough, especially if we are talking about orders of magnitude of difference.
Looking forward to hearing more thoughts on this topic :)
Sorry, I was in a bit of a rush and should have looked at your link before giving too quick an answer – in that case I would have understood what you had already seen and considered. My bad!
I am happy to address this tomorrow!
It’s a trade-off, for sure, but I tend to believe the differentials are much larger than 10x because of the various independent impact multipliers from advocacy * neglectedness * innovation.
Where can I find the CO2e/​$ estimate for each of these leading organizations (CATF, Carbon180,...etc)? Thanks.