Apply for a grant

Our community gives grants to strategic, high-impact climate action.

Next grant round

Our next grant round will be open for EOI and application from July 1 to August 9, 2024.

We will be distributing approximately 5 x $40,000 grants.

This round our grantmaking will focus on supporting advocacy to ensure climate action emerges as a winner in the 2025 Federal election.

Please note: Groundswell Giving is political, but not partisan. We can support charities to campaign on political issues to advance their charitable purposes, including during election periods, as long as they meet the requirements of charity law and other relevant legislation, however we cannot support any direct election campaigning.

Specific guidelines on the kinds of advocacy we can and can’t support will be shared in July once our funding round goes live.

How to apply

New applicants

Please read our grantmaking criteria below thoroughly, and if you believe you are a good fit, we welcome you to submit an expression of interest. If successful, you will receive a full application form to complete.

Previous applicants

If you have been previously approved to apply for a grant at EOI stage, please submit an abbreviated form here below.

Should your EOI be successful, we will invite you to submit a formal application. To give you an idea on what this involves, you can find sample questions below.

What we fund

We support organisations creating the social, economic and political conditions to reduce emissions to levels that will avoid the worst impacts of climate change.

We fund climate action that:

Builds the movement: Powerful community-led campaigns that bring new and diverse people into the climate movement to shape the national conversation on climate action. Success looks like a powerful, vibrant, well-connected movement that is continually growing and achieving more ambitious reforms to cut greenhouse pollution and solve the climate crisis. 

Changes the story: Storytelling that reaches a wide range of Australians and motivates people to do what it takes to make the world we need. Success looks likes published narratives that expose the damage of fossil fuel polluters and inspire a cultural shift towards ambitious climate action.

Shifts the money: Strategies that shift the financial sector away from fossil fuels and into renewable energy, including divestment campaigns, shareholder activism and corporate social license campaigns. Success looks like reduced flows of capital for dirty industries and increased levels of capital flowing for clean economy initiatives.

Changes the politics: Campaigns and strategies designed to directly influence politicians to take greater leadership on climate change, such as think tanks or constituency groups. Success looks new policy and laws being introduced and enforced to solve the climate crisis.

This framework for action was developed by Sam La Rocca of the Sunrise Project, and Climate Action Network Australia, as part of a collaborative strategy process for what it would take to make progress in Australia on climate action.

Is a Groundswell grant for you?

If you’re a not-for-profit organisation working to reduce emissions to safer levels this decade, then you’re exactly who we fund. If your work focuses on climate justice and making sure no one is left behind in the race to decarbonise, then we’d also love to hear from you.

When it comes to protecting the environment, we know reducing waste and plastic pollution are incredibly important, but these issues sit outside our funding mission and so if this is your organisations focus area, you’re not eligible for a Groundswell grant.

We recognise First Nations peoples protection and care of Country as a fundamental and urgent climate solution and strongly encourage Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander organisations to apply for our grants.

We believe in the outsized impact grassroots groups can have and are conscious that small to medium sized organisations have the least access to funding, so if your revenue is less than $5 million a year we strongly encourage you to apply.

Please note, only organisations in the Australia Pacific region with DGR1 status or working in partnership with a DGR1 organisation are eligible to apply. If you have questions about this, please contact admin@groundswellgiving.org