We—Larry Birenbaum, Andrew Verhalen, and David Schwartz—first crossed paths 40 years ago while working together in the tech industry. Our professional relationships quickly evolved into strong friendships built on shared values and interests. Climate was one of those interests. Year after year, we watched the world fall short of its climate goals until the severity of the situation became impossible to ignore. The escalating threat of climate change became a catalyst for us to take action.

In 2018, we decided to pool our time and resources to make a tangible impact in the fight against climate change. This led to the formation of the LAD Climate Fund.

Over the next many months, we listened, we watched, we read, we met. We concluded that emissions mitigation, while vital, would no longer be sufficient to prevent climate calamity. However, we became aware of a potential intervention that, while not a cure, could alleviate widespread climate harm by dramatically reducing temperatures globally: sunlight reflection methods. 

SRM is not without risks and has become a controversial subject. As a consequence, it has been shunned, even vilified, in the climate community and garnered insufficient attention and funding, both private and public. For these reasons, we saw it as an area where our philanthropic efforts could have an outsized impact.  Supporting SRM became our focus.

Andrew W. Verhalen