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Danielle Deane-Ryan \u201997, director of equitable climate solutions at the Bezos Earth Fund, returned to the College on Thursday to deliver the Earth Week keynote address \u201cIs it too late? Moving into a decisive decade for addressing climate crisis.\u201d She discussed the need to focus on equity within environmental organizations and spoke to her experiences at the Bezos Earth Fund, in the Department of Energy\u2019s Office of Energy Efficiency & Renewable Energy \u2014 where she worked during President Obama\u2019s administration \u2014 and at the Hewlett Foundation.<\/p>\n
Deane-Ryan studied political economy and environmental studies at the College and was one of the only Caribbean students at the time.<\/p>\n
Growing up in Trinidad and Tobago spurred her involvement in environmental justice issues, Deane-Ryan said. Petroleum extraction, which is how the nation has acquired much of its wealth, damaged her country\u2019s beaches and motivated her to enter environmental justice work. \u201cVery early on, I realized, \u2018OK, so, we need energy,\u2019\u201d she said. \u201cWe need the money that it brings, we need the education, and [the question is] how do you not wreck this beautiful place?\u201d<\/p>\n
While she knew the extraction harmed the environment, she also acknowledged fossil fuel extraction\u2019s profound impact on her own life and ability to study at the College. \u201cOil company money paid for my education,\u201d she said. \u201cBehind what you see today is a Caribbean island girl that found herself at Williams College with a passion for working on issues around the environment, and justice and economic development.\u201d<\/p>\n
While some organizations focus on science alone, DeaneRyan has consistently pushed them to consider equity. A common theme throughout her life\u2019s work has been pressuring organizations to pursue environmental justice initiatives that acknowledge the ways that racial minorities and low-income communities are affected most harshly by climate change.<\/p>\n
At the Hewlett Foundation, Deane-Ryan worked to ensure that as much funding as possible was allocated to organizations that served marginalized communities. Large, mainstream environmental organizations pressured the Hewlett Foundation to fund efforts to reduce carbon before worrying about equity work, she said. Rather than accept this outcome, she worked with environmental justice advocates to ensure that their concerns were heard within the Hewlett Foundation, eventually leading to a provision requiring 35 percent of the Hewlett Foundation\u2019s donations to be dedicated to underserved communities.<\/p>\n
In her work in the Obama administration, Deane-Ryan encountered similar challenges. The original plan that the administration put forward to put solar in a number of communities was criticized for having disparate impacts, meaning that \u201csolar was ending up on roofs of wealthy folks, not poor folks,\u201d she said. \u201cAnd it was a real challenge. So [the administration had] to go back and figure out what we did \u2014 in terms of policies that were recommended, in terms of who\u2019s listening, in terms of how technology was developed \u2014 that led to that situation.\u201d<\/p>\n
Deane-Ryan referred to her current job at the Bezos Earth Foundation as the \u201celephant in the room\u201d during the lecture. The fund distributes Bezos\u2019 money to various environmental organizations, and was established in 2020, when he pledged to donate $1 billion of his personal wealth to the fund annually between 2020 and 2030. Bezos founded and currently serves as executive chairman of Amazon, the online retail giant that has faced widespread criticism for its labor<\/a> and environmental<\/a> practices.<\/p>\n Deane-Ryan\u2019s team alone has distributed $300 million to environmental justice organizations in the last two years, focusing on groups with rigorous standards regarding equity and justice. She explained that Bezos\u2019 wealth holds immense power for many environmental organizations, which may receive unprecedented donations of millions of dollars at a time. During the question and answer period, Natalie Silver \u201922 \u2014 who is currently taking a class on global sustainable development \u2014 asked Deane-Ryan to elaborate on how she reconciles Amazon\u2019s inequitable practices, which she called inequitable, with the agenda-setting power provided by the Bezos Earth Fund\u2019s massive donations.<\/p>\n \u201cTo be clear, it\u2019s not the Amazon foundation, it is the individual [Bezos] foundation,\u201d DeaneRyan said. \u201c[Bezos] made his money and cares about climate change and went to work on climate change \u2026 [with] many environmental justice leaders.\u201d She also emphasized that organizations that accept Bezos Earth Fund money can still speak freely about Amazon in their environmental advocacy. While some organizations have refused funding from the Bezos Earth Fund on the ground that the money isn\u2019t clean, DeaneRyan explained that the idea of clean money is a misguided one. \u201cA lot of money has complicated things attached to it,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n In a follow-up interview with the Record<\/em>, Silver explained that the answer Deane-Ryan offered to her question felt insufficient. \u201cI don\u2019t see the money as different and she made the claim that the money was different,\u201d she said. \u201c[But] Jeff Bezos\u2019 wealth is derived from Amazon.\u201d<\/p>\n Rwick Sarkar \u201923.5, Silver\u2019s classmate who also attended the lecture, found Deane-Ryan\u2019s statement similarly troubling. \u201cI have personal opinions that maybe are not in line with [Deane-Ryan\u2019s] because Amazon is actively continuing to create problems,\u201d he said. \u201cI think it\u2019s different if that wealth was just acquired, and then it\u2019s being put to this use, but Amazon is continuing to [create problems]. That being said, I understand her perspective.\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cI just don\u2019t believe that Jeff Bezos cares about climate change,\u201d Silver said, noting that $1 billion a year makes up only a small portion of his total wealth.<\/p>\n