Last week, we shared the exciting news that Hazon & Pearlstone are now legally merged with a powerful new identity: Adamah.
Our mission at Adamah is to cultivate vibrant Jewish life in deep connection with the earth, catalyzing culture change and systemic change through immersive retreats, Jewish environmental education, and climate action.
Today we are proud to share more big news: the founding partners of our Jewish Climate Leadership Coalition have just released their Climate Action Plans!
With our 20 founding partners, who represent major Jewish umbrella organizations, we publicly launched the Jewish Climate Leadership Coalition last September. We jointly signed a founding statement, recognizing the existential threat and moral urgency of the climate crisis as a Jewish issue, and publicly committing to take action.
As Coalition members, Adamah and the other founding partners have committed to creating climate action plans to ground and guide our organizational climate work. Along with all Coalition members, we will release these plans to the public each year so that we can track our communal progress on this existential challenge.
We are grateful to our founding partners for their commitment and effort in developing their climate action plans, and to the 180+ Jewish organizations nationwide that have also signed on to join the Coalition. We are proud to lead this effort and take climate action by their side!
These Climate Action Plans outline the actions our organizations have taken to-date, as well as our strategic priorities for reducing emissions and mobilizing Jewish communities everywhere in the year ahead. And this moment represents a significant milestone: it is the beginning of an unprecedented climate mobilization across the Jewish world, and a powerful statement regarding the impact of climate on Jewish life. It represents a critical step on the path toward to a vibrant, sustainable Jewish future.
Our own Adamah 2023 Climate Action Plan includes:
- Securing funding to build a 1 MW+ solar array system in 2024, which will cover 100% of the current electricity needs at our Pearlstone Campus;
- Doubling down on regenerative agriculture and land stewardship methods that sequester carbon on the 545 acres we manage at our two core campuses, Pearlstone in Maryland and Isabella Freedman in Connecticut;
- Launching a $1 million Climate Action Fund that will support Coalition members’ climate action efforts through interest-free loans and matching grants.
Join us! With 180+ Jewish community organizations already signed on, the Jewish Climate Leadership Coalition is growing every day and dramatically deepening our community’s commitment and capacity to confront this issue moving forward. And while we recognize the urgency of this crisis, we undertake this effort by centering love and community, hope and inspiration, empowering the next generation of Jewish leaders and bringing people together so that Jewish environmental education and climate action become catalysts not only for a more sustainable future, but also for flourishing Jewish communities living in deep connection with the earth.
We are at a historic inflection point – as Jews, as North Americans, and as human beings on planet earth – and we need to mobilize the capacity and power of the Jewish people to confront the climate crisis.
With humility and gratitude,
Jakir Manela, CEO jakir@adamah.org
Risa Alyson Cooper, Chief Climate Officer risa@adamah.org