Environment
Starting in 2010, The John Merck Fund's environment grantmaking was separated into three program areas (Clean Energy, Environmental Health, Regional Food Systems). Grants made previously through a broader Environment Program are listed below.
2009 Grants
2009 | 2008 | 2007 | 2006 | 2005 | 2004 | 2003
The New England Environment
Air Quality, Clean Energy and Climate Change
Climate Counts$15,000
To publish a comparative analysis examining the costs of continuing to operate New Hampshire's only coal-fired power plant versus employing clean energy alternatives.
Connecticut Fund for the Environment$35,000
To identify cost-effective strategies for meeting Connecticut's carbon cap, implement and enforce efficiency building codes, and design model financing programs to increase efficiency investments.
Conservation Law Foundation$60,000
To reduce greenhouse gas emissions throughout New England by encouraging increased reliance on renewable energy sources and energy efficiency, and full implementation of the Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative.
Environment Northeast$100,000
To implement comprehensive energy policy reform in Connecticut, Maine, Massachusetts, and Rhode Island, that will shift nearly $1 billion to energy efficiency; advocate for upgrades to a regional transmission system that promotes renewable power; and work at the federal level to promote leading-edge energy and climate policy lessons learned from New England.
Jordan Institute$40,000
To help New Hampshire reduce greenhouse gas emissions by increasing energy efficiency in buildings, particularly in the commercial and industrial sectors.
Natural Resources Council of Maine$35,000
To boost energy efficiency, advance wind power development, and build support for climate action and other clean energy initiatives in Maine.
Northeast Energy Efficiency Partnerships$100,000
To assist Northeast states in adopting and implementing energy efficiency policies.
Regulatory Assistance Project$50,000
To improve design and implementation of the Northeast's Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative in order to assess its efficacy and share best practices with designers of a federal cap-and-trade program.
Vermont Public Interest Research and Education Fund$35,000
To identify and implement innovative approaches to promote renewable energy and energy efficiency in Vermont.
Environmental Health
Clean Water Fund$125,000
To reduce exposures to toxic chemicals by winning fundamental reform of chemicals policy in Connecticut, while contributing to the national movement for precaution and safer alternatives.
Environmental Health Strategy Center$50,000
To recognize 2009 Sparkplug Award winner, Environmental Health Strategy Center Executive Director, Michael Belliveau.
Environmental Health Strategy Center$100,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Institute for Agriculture and Trade Policy$125,000
To protect Minnesotans from toxic chemicals in consumer products through a health-based campaign that achieves near-term chemical policy successes while building toward comprehensive state and national reforms.
Learning Disabilities Association of Maine$25,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions
Maine Department of Environmental Protection$5,000
To provide professional facilitation for a stakeholder group reviewing the problem of toxic chemicals in children's products in Maine.
Maine Labor Group on Health$9,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association$10,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Maine People's Resource Center$53,500
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Maine People's Resource Center$20,000
To collaborate with Maine's Native American leaders to build support for reform of federal chemicals policy among Native communities nationally.
Maine Women's Policy Center$17,500
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Natural Resources Council of Maine$30,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Physicians for Social Responsibility of Maine$15,000
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Planned Parenthood of Northern New England$17,500
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Toxics Action Center$12,500
To protect human health from toxic chemical exposures where we live, work and play, in 2010 by: ensuring strong implementation of Maine's precedent-setting safer chemicals policy; participating in a national coalition to comprehensively reform federal chemicals policy based on the Maine model; and cultivating a new generation of state leadership as safer chemicals champions.
Protecting Farmland and Forests in Vermont
Food Works at Two Rivers Center$65,000
To expand the number and viability of the central Vermont farms within the Food Works network.
Highfields Institute, Ltd.$35,000
To promote on-farm composting and soil-building practices that create regenerative food and soil systems on Vermont farms.
Intervale Center$35,000
To provide incubation services for new farmers, support the development of land access partnerships, and take advantage of new land infrastructure opportunities within the Intervale.
Merck Forest & Farmland Center$40,000
To provide opportunities for students to create and participate in inquiry-based, professional-quality field research.
New England Working Landscapes$18,000
To promote agricultural economic development, land and job preservation and new, value-added entrepreneurial enterprises in Vermont.
Northeast Organic Farming Association of Vermont$25,000
To develop and implement a new technical assistance program model to meet the critical needs of Vermont's organic dairy farmers.
Rutland Area Farm and Food Link (RAFFL)$20,000
To support new farmers and economically viable farm operations in the Rutland area.
University of Vermont Institute for Artisan Cheese$50,000
To deliver comprehensive risk management services to Vermont cheesemakers to ameliorate microbiological risks in the cheesemaking environment.
Vermont Agency of Agriculture$15,000
To launch an annual event celebrating Vermont's leading position in the artisan and farmstead cheese industry.
Vermont Fresh Network$45,000
To promote local, fresh food in Vermont, including via development of a website that provides a gateway for all agro-tourism experiences in Vermont.
Vermont Housing & Conservation Board$60,000
To support the economic viability and environmental sustainability of Vermont agriculture and agriculturally related enterprises.
Vermont Sustainable Jobs Fund$20,000
To develop an agriculture strategic plan for the Farm to Plate Investment Program, and facilitate strategic investments in sustainable food systems.
Vital Communities$35,000
To provide Upper Valley farmers with enough viable markets so that their businesses can survive and expand.
The Environment Beyond New England
Air Quality, Clean Energy and Climate Change
CERES: Coalition for Environmentally Responsible Economies$50,000
To catalyze the nation's largest public pension funds to reduce energy use in their real estate portfolios by investing in energy efficiency, encourage asset owners and managers to adopt best practices in efficiency, and spur companies they invest in to decrease energy use in real estate they build, control or manage.
Environmental Integrity Project$75,000
To protect public health from the dangers of toxic waste from coal-fired power plants by closing the loopholes that currently allow such waste to be disposed without any environmental rules or oversight.
Environmental Law and Policy Center of the Midwest$50,000
To implement strong energy efficiency policy initiatives in Iowa; and to successfully challenge a proposed major new coal plant in Michigan.
Michigan Environmental Council$50,000
To ensure that the Michigan Public Service Commission effectively implements new state-mandated energy efficiency standards; and to use the state's new Integrated Resource Planning process to prevent permitting for new coal-fired power plants proposed in the state.
Ohio Environmental Council$50,000
To protect and implement Ohio's recently adopted energy efficiency standards, and to advance important 'next generation' energy efficiency policies in the state.
Plains Justice$50,000
To support the transition to cleaner energy sources through public and business endorsement of strong energy efficiency standards for investor-owned and public utilities providing electricity and natural gas in Iowa.
Rockefeller Family Fund$60,000
To halt the development of new coal-fired power plants by stopping the flow of private and public capital into these investments.
Second Nature, Inc.$75,000
To make colleges and universities more sustainable by securing institutional commitments to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions.
Sierra Club Foundation$75,000
To prevent construction of new coal-fired power plants in the Midwest and begin the orderly retirement of the region's existing fleet of coal-fired plants.
SmartPower$100,000
To create one of the largest community marketing initiatives promoting renewable energy and energy efficiency in the country by challenging cities and households to reduce net energy use by 20 percent.
The Land Institute$75,000
To establish efficiency initiatives in six diverse communities; recruit influential and vocal champions for energy efficiency across the state; persuade the Kansas Corporation Commission to treat efficiency as a priority; and promote a statewide energy efficiency standard.
Environmental Health
Alaska Community Action on Toxics$50,000
To stimulate broad public support for implementing state, national and international chemicals policies that protect the health of Arctic people, wildlife and the environment from chemical pollution.
American Association on Intellectual and Developmental Disabilities$100,000
To raise awareness about the association between toxic chemicals and developmental disabilities and that those with developmental disabilities may face greater risks from chemical exposures; and to promote good health and reduced exposures by collaborating with environmental and other disability organizations to advance chemicals policy reforms.
Autism Society$100,000
To examine the expanding research on the connections between environmental toxins and autism; educate the society's primary constituency and others on the risks of environmental neurotoxicants; and work collaboratively with local and national environmental, health and disability groups for comprehensive chemicals policy reform.
Breast Cancer Fund$50,000
To harmonize state and federal advocacy seeking to ban the endocrine disruptor Bisphenol A from food and beverage containers, and to infuse public health and breast cancer prevention perspectives into the federal chemical policy reform debate.
Center for International Environmental Law$60,000
To win fundamental reform US domestic and foreign policy on hazardous chemicals and stimulate the United States' re-emergence as a global leader in achieving international protections from chemicals pollution.
Center for Progressive Reform$25,000
To develop and begin to implement an agenda for regulatory reforms of federal chemicals policies at the Environmental Protection Agency.
Clean Production Action$75,000
To advance the use of green chemicals through chemicals policy by gaining business support for chemicals policy reform, promoting safer alternatives to toxic chemicals, and disseminating safer alternatives using the 'Green Screen' Wiki (a web-based resource.)
Columbia Center for Children's Environmental Health$35,000
To reduce and prevent environmentally related disease in children by informing pregnant women, parents, physicians, public interest organizations, policymakers and the media about Columbia's research findings.
Coming Clean$50,000
To reform the chemical industry so that it is no longer a source of harm through: chemical policy reform; promoting safe substitutes, clean production and green chemistry; developing strong communication tools; coordinating market campaigns; and championing environmental justice.
Commonweal$160,000
To educate national learning and developmental disabilities groups about environmental links to learning disabilities, translate emerging science, cultivate opportunities to support chemical policy reform, and increase the groups' collaboration and partnerships.
Ecology Center$110,000
To reduce children's and adults' exposure to toxic chemicals and protect health by achieving steps toward state and federal comprehensive chemicals policy reform.
Ecology Center$65,000
To accelerate demand for chemical policy reform through HealthyStuff.org, by broadly providing information about the presence of toxic chemicals in consumer products.
Environmental Defence$40,000
To extend Canada's precedent-setting ban on the endocrine-disrupting chemical Bisphenol A in baby products to all canned food containers.
Environmental Health Fund$150,000
To facilitate an integrated national campaign to reform US chemical policy while continuing state-level efforts to ban specific chemicals, market-based strategies to reduce chemicals use, and public interest representation within international deliberations to improve chemicals regulations.
Institute for Local Self-Reliance$50,000
To educate purchasers, policymakers and environmental and public health activists on the benefits and tradeoffs of biomaterials, and to guide the marketplace toward sustainable products.
International Chemical Secretariat (ChemSec)$48,000
To promote a market transition towards less toxic consumer electronic products, and stricter rules in the European Union, and potentially beyond, to control or eliminate the use of toxic chemicals in the electronics sector.
International Persistent Organic Pollutants Elimination Network (IPEN)$25,000
To advance international and national toxic chemicals reforms that reduce harm to human health and the environment from persistent organic pollutants.
Learning Disabilities Association of America$100,000
To raise awareness of environmental factors, particularly toxic chemicals, that can harm brain development and contribute to learning disabilities and behavior disorders; to prevent toxic chemical exposures, especially among pregnant women and children, through changes in chemical policies and practices; and to build a nationwide members' network working to reduce the incidence of learning disabilities in future generations.
Mercury Policy Project$75,000
To substantially reduce the mercury content of compact fluorescent lightbulbs, foster purchase of the least toxic and longest-lasting energy efficient lighting, and promote shared business responsibility financing for the recycling of discarded mercury-containing lightbulbs.
MomsRising$50,000
To use online and on-the-ground organizing to educate and mobilize mothers and families around environmental health issues such as toxic chemical exposure in consumer products, air quality, food and water safety.
National Caucus of Environmental Legislators$30,000
To improve state legislators' capacity to better defend and promote initiatives to ban the use of toxic flame retardants and other dangerous chemicals, inform legislators about policy options states can consider moving toward comprehensive chemical policy reform, and engage legislators in the federal chemical policy reform debate.
National Council of Churches$150,000
To engage people of faith in building support for comprehensive state and national chemical policy, and mobilize the faith community to lend its powerful moral voice to the ongoing and urgent debate around federal chemical reform policy.
Natural Resources Defense Council$75,000
To reduce the public's exposure to hazardous chemicals by promoting fundamental reforms of the federal regulatory structure.
Physicians for Social Responsibility-Greater Boston Chapter$50,000
To use the findings of the Environmental Threats to Healthy Aging report to move policies that will foster healthier living for all ages by building alliances with key organizations, particularly AARP.
Planned Parenthood Public Policy Network of Washington$26,880
To secure adoption of groundbreaking policy reforms that protect human health and the environment from the impacts of toxic chemicals while serving as a model for other states and a driver for federal reforms.
Product Policy Institute$35,000
To coordinate a national strategy that promotes extended producer responsibility policies; build momentum in eight states ready to consider those policies; establish extended producer responsibility as an effective tool to address climate change; and increase organizational capacity.
Product Stewardship Institute$10,000
To support 45 member states and more than 100 local government members in developing and implementing policies to minimize the release of mercury from fluorescent lamps.
Science and Environmental Health Network$45,000
To employ science, policy development and legal reforms in implementing the precautionary principle in state and federal chemicals policy.
State Alliance for Federal Reform of Chemicals Policy (SAFER)$90,000
To establish a new precautionary federal chemicals policy by 2015 by launching and winning a critical mass of comprehensive policy reform measures in key states to tip the balance for achieving reform at the federal level.
University of Massachusetts Lowell Center for Sustainable Production$40,000
To stimulate the design and application of safer chemicals and products consistent with principles of sustainable production and green chemistry, and to provide technical assistance to states and public advocates in reforming chemicals policies.
Washington Physicians for Social Responsibility$24,000
To secure adoption of groundbreaking policy reforms that protect human health and the environment from the impacts of toxic chemicals while serving as a model for other states and a driver for federal reforms.
Washington Public Interest Research Group Foundation$15,000
To secure adoption of groundbreaking policy reforms that protect human health and the environment from the impacts of toxic chemicals while serving as a model for other states and a driver for federal reforms.
Washington State Nurses Association$25,000
To secure adoption of groundbreaking policy reforms that protect human health and the environment from the impacts of toxic chemicals while serving as a model for other states and a driver for federal reforms.
Washington Toxics Coalition$134,120
To secure adoption of groundbreaking policy reforms that protect human health and the environment from the impacts of toxic chemicals while serving as a model for other states and a driver for federal reforms.
Genetically Engineered Food and Agriculture
Center for Food Safety$225,000
To prevent any new approvals and/or commercialization of genetically engineered crops and contain the crops already approved by promoting strict environmental and human health federal and state regulations on genetic engineering, including mandatory labeling of genetically engineered food products already on the market; and to prevent monopolies on the global seed supply by opposing patents on seeds and corporate takeovers of seed companies.
National Family Farm Coalition$25,000
To advocate within the USDA's agricultural biotechnology rulemaking process for an appropriate balance between the interests of farmers and the environment and those of the biotech industry; and to educate and organize farmers through the new Farmers Rights, Farmers Choice Campaign.
Rural Advancement Foundation International-USA$35,000
To maintain 'certified organic' as a credible GE-free label; create a regulatory framework that recognizes the economic harm to farmers and rural communities from contamination by genetically engineered crops; and protect the right and capacity of farmers to grow non-GE varieties.
Union of Concerned Scientists$85,000
To promote a resilient agriculture system based on sustainable practices rather than one focused entirely on short-term productivity by: seeking a federal ban on the outdoor production of pharmaceutical and industrial crops; strengthening the regulatory framework for all agricultural biotechnology products; and assessing the role genetically engineered products and sustainable practices play in confronting the looming crises of global warming and food scarcity.
Western Organization of Resource Councils Education Project$55,000
To attempt to stop commercial introduction and any further planting of genetically modified crops, specifically alfalfa and wheat, until environmental, economic and health questions about the release of these plants into the environment can be answered and potential problems addressed.