Carbonfund.org
By:Thomas O'Hara and Dylan Zunski
Intro
Global warming affects all environments and peoples. It makes deserts larger and cold places smaller. Carbonfund.org is a charity that is trying to end and reverse the effects of climate change. This organization has been growing for for the past 13 years, and now it has multiplied into a global charity. Carbonfund.org carries out 3 types of environmental projects to battle or counteract the damages of climate change. They also have a 4 out of 4 star rating on a comparable charity rating site named Charity Navigator.
Mission Statment
Carbonfund.org is leading the fight against global warming, making it easy and affordable for any individual, business or organization to reduce & offset their climate impact and hasten the transition to a clean energy future. Carbonfund.org achieves its goals through: Climate change education Carbon offsets and reductions Public outreach We encourage everyone to continually strive to reduce their carbon footprint through sensible energy reductions combined with cost-effective carbon offsets to eliminate their overall carbon footprint. Carbonfund.org supports third-party validated renewable energy, energy efficiency and reforestation projects globally that reduce carbon dioxide emissions and the threat of climate change.
What issue does your charity support?
Carbonfund.org tries to help in the fight against climate change (Global Warming). Global warming is the warming of the earth's atmosphere due to an increase in greenhouse gases. This trend is not natural and it is a result of human activities. Greenhouse gas emissions are caused by the burning of fossil fuels. Fossil fuels are natural substances found on or below the earth's surface, and when burned they release a great amount of energy and carbon dioxide. Some fossil fuels are coal, oil, gasoline, nuclear energy, and natural gas. These fossil fuels release gasses like water vapor, carbon dioxide, methane, nitrous oxide, and chlorofluorocarbons (Houghton 239)These gasses are killing our earth and it needs to be stopped. Global Warming has had a large impact on the earth causing a change to our lives and all the other organisms on our planet.
Some worldly changes that are happening are the the melting of the polar ice caps. The melting of the ice caps is causing flooding and a change in water temperature. The change in water temperature is causing animals to migrate south. This can also be a reason of why there is a larger number of sharks in southern areas. This trend has been going on for 200 years and the world is 36℉ warmer than it should (Houghton 239). Now things like the melting of glaciers or the expansion of deserts are becoming possible because global warming is taking over (Ollhoff 13). For over a 100 years now global warming has been building up and creating a blanket of greenhouse gasses over our world. Global warming has been affecting our world and it has just been ignored until now because we are now starting to see the effects of global warming (Driscoll 1). Luckily we now have organizations like, Carbonfund.org putting a stop to global warming and putting our world back on the right path.
How did the organization grow into what it is now?
It states on Carbonfund.org ,” Carbonfund.org was founded by Eric Carlson and his wife Lesly Carlson. Eric has over 15 years of experience in promoting cost-effective solutions to climate change, with an extensive back round in energy efficiency and renewable energy ¨. They want to help business and regular people switch to fossil-fuel free, by making it affordable. Carbonfund.org has grown to be the leading non profit climate solution organization. About 600,000 individual people are supporting the charity, around 1,800 business partners. Together they have decreased more that 5 billion pounds of carbons emissions worldwide. (Carbonfund.org)
What does the organization do for the community?
Carbonfund.org does 3 types of offset projects: renewable energy, energy efficiency, and reforestation and deforestation project. Carbonfund.org states,” Each type of projects helps in a way to reduce climate change.”. The charity wants to persuade local economies into stopping the use of fuels and foreign energy sources. They help these places with financials and supplies to get them started on the path of a non-fossil fuel using economy.
The renewable energy project focus on using other sources for energy instead of fossil flues. In 2014 they funded many projects like the St. Leon wind energy facility, the Story County wind project , and the Meridian Way wind project. They produced thousands of megawatts of hours of wind powered energy by funding these companies. The energy efficiency project is all about using our energy in a efficient way. One project is the New Zealand compact fluorescent lightbulb project. The plan was to distribute 62,000 CFLs. between 2005 and 2007, but now the new goal is to distribute 3 million CFLS. If this current project is a success then we will reduce an estimated 1 million tonnes of CO2. Finally the reforestation and deforestation projects try to keep our forests healthy. The Envira Amazonia Project: A Tropical Forest Conservation Project is one that fall under this category. Carbonfund.org funds a local forest conservation company in the State of Acre, Brazil. These projects keep our world thriving on the right path.
How effective is the charity at accomplishing its goals?
Carbonfund.com is very effective in acoplishing its goals because we see on miltiple ocasions that their money is being put to good use and it is helping. 100% of all money income is from gifts and grants from regular everyday people like you and me. Something even more important is that 95.6% of all income goes directly to charity. That is pretty impressive considering that there are so many people that devote their lives to this company and their salary is based off of the 4.4% of funds left over (Charity Navigator). Over all this charity does care about its cause and we know that because almost all of their funds go to their charity.
In 2014 Carbonfund.org recieved a 4/4 over all rating on a well know chairty evaluator site named “Chairty Navagator”. This is huge for a company like this means that this organization's project that were talked about in the previous section are actually helping the cause. More specifically earned a 100% score on accountability and transparency. Also they earned about a 99% rating on Financial. These percentages mean that they are financially good and they are very reliable. They also earned 4/4 stars on both “Financial” and “Accountability and Transparency” ratings. Over all this charity is getting done what it needs to get done and it is having a large impact in the fight to counteract climate change (Charity Navigator).
Call to action
In summary, we have seen throughout this essay that carbonfund.org is doing many amazing things for our world. This may be true, but they need funds and to continue accomplish their goals. If you would like to donate digitally click here. You can also send a donation in the mail to this address, 3 Bethesda Metro Center Suite 700 Bethesda, MD 20814 tel: (240)-247-0630
Work cited
"Carbonfund.org." Chairtynavigator.org. Charity Navigator, 2016. Web. 8 Mar. 2016.
"Carbonfund.org Foundation." Reduce Carbon Footprint with Carbon Offsets. Carbonfund, 2014. Web. 8 Mar. 2016.
Driscoll, Sally. "Global Warming: An Overview." Canadian Points of View Reference Centre [EBSCO]. N.p., 2016. Web. Mar.-Apr. 2016.
"Environmental Solutions 2014 Annual Report." Reduce Carbon Footprint with Carbon Offsets. N.p., n.d. Web. 8 Mar. 2016.
Initiative, John Ray. "Global Warming." The New Book of Knowledge. By John Houghton. 1st ed. Vol. 7. Danbury, Connecticut: Hackett, 2008. 239-41. Print.
Ollhoff, Jim. World in Crisis. Edina, MN: ABDO Pub., 2010. Print.