Check Out These 4 LGBTQI Environmental Organizations 


Support the LGBTQI community this Pride Month

By Maya Richard-Craven

June 17, 2022

Rainbow flag pin on a denim backdrop

Photo by iStock/firebrandphotography

Queer activism doesn’t stop when Pride Month ends. Across the United States—and globally—LGBTQI environmental organizations are making a difference in issues of sustainability, environmental justice, and equitable access to the natural world. That work spans efforts to support climate resilience and to share outdoors skills within historically excluded communities. Pride Month events celebrate the accomplishments, history, and activism of queer people, but their meaningful work is ongoing. Here is a list of change-making groups to support all year.

Queer Nature

Queer Nature creates multiday courses for the LGBTQI community—including wildlife tracking, survival skills, and camouflage—as part of a mission to build resilience in marginalized populations. It’s what married co-founders Pinar and So Sinopoulos-Lloyd call “the ecology of belonging,” pointing out the queer community’s longtime lack of cultural access to such outdoor pursuits. From a home base in Washington State’s Okanagan County, Queer Nature also offers custom courses in collaboration with basket weavers, herbalists, and hide tanners. In summer 2023, it’s launching “The Multispecies Monastery,” a 10-day retreat program inspired by traditional rites of passage. Follow Queer Nature on Instagram here.

Out for Sustainability

Providing a platform for climate and environmental work in the LGBTQI community, the Seattle-based nonprofit Out for Sustainability has mobilized queer activists for a greener future since 2008. Today, Out for Sustainability is working to expand an initiative, called Qready, that promotes disaster preparedness and resilience among LGBTQI communities, especially queer and trans Black and Indigenous people of color. Past initiatives included Earth Gay service projects around the United States, which brought I volunteers and allies to local parks, community gardens, and food banks. Its Greener Pride project raised awareness about the need for carbon-neutral, zero-waste Pride celebrations worldwide. Follow Out for Sustainability on Twitter here.

Queer Ecojustice Project

Founded in 2016 as a reading group with a focus on queer ecologies—it’s an approach that brings queer theory to understanding the natural world—the Queer Ecojustice Project (QEP) supports communities hoping to found their own “nodes” for learning and activism. While it still maintains the reading list, the QEP has expanded its community-building scope. Today, its work includes an interview series on eco-queer activism called The Rhizomatic Project. QEP is also a backer of Fire and Flood: Queer Resilience in the Era of Climate Change, a documentary highlighting the impact of Hurricane Maria and the 2017 Santa Rosa, California, forest fires on the LGBTQI community. Follow the Queer Ecojustice Project on Instagram here.

Queers X Climate

International organization Queers X Climate invites members to pledge a 50 percent reduction of their carbon footprint by 2030, part of a six-step process that combines personal change with community advocacy. The pledge is the centerpiece of the organization’s work to raise environmental awareness in the LGBTQI community. In 2019, Queers X Climate joined the United Nations Secretary-General Climate Action Summit, where founder Diego de León presented the organization’s pledge. Learn more about the Queers X Climate six-step pledge to reduce carbon emissions here.