MISSION
We aim to preserve glacial ice through respectful, low-impact strategies that enhance the reflectivity of ice and snow.
Our mission is grounded in partnership—with Indigenous communities, local leaders, and scientific collaborators—ensuring that our work honors place-based knowledge while directly benefiting those most at risk. Guided by humility and a commitment to do no harm, we act with care and precision in the global effort to slow glacial loss.
FOCUS
Our work centers on brightening glacial ice to reduce the pace of melt. We concentrate efforts in regions facing the most urgent threats from glacial retreat—places where communities, ecosystems, and freshwater supplies are directly affected.
In line with the Oxford Principles, we only work where we are invited and always prioritize collaboration with local scientists, authorities, and Indigenous knowledge holders. These partnerships shape the work from planning to implementation, ensuring solutions are both effective and ethically grounded.
APPROACH
We’ve watched bright, reflective ice give way to darker, heat-absorbing surfaces—accelerating melt and threatening lives and ecosystems. That’s why we’ve focused our research on materials that restore glacial reflectivity without environmental harm. One promising solution: a safe, clay-based material that stays in place on sloped glacial surfaces. Our field test in the Himalayas (starting in November 2024) has been showing encouraging results in slowing melt rates.
This is complex work in a world that often favors short-term profit over long-term planetary health. But we remain committed—to transparency, to science, and to justice. Our team shares regular updates, publishes open-access findings, and builds trust through authentic, ongoing collaboration.
MINNESOTA
Before transitioning to a clay-based solution, we tested Hollow Glass Microspheres (HGMs) on a Minnesota pond to increase ice reflectivity. Made from sand-based materials used in marine coatings and road markings, these bright, durable bubbles performed well in thin layers over flat, glacier-like ice. The bubbles were spread by hand onto the pond’s glacier-like ice, and the testing was closely monitored by the homeowner and his local team.
ICELAND
In collaboration with the Icelandic Meteorological Office, we tested clay-based reflective materials on Langjökull Glacier to evaluate their impact on melt reduction. Throughout the season, our team measured snow and ice thickness, temperature, and albedo (reflectivity). Results showed the material to be both safe and effective—even on a sloped, actively melting glacier.
Read more about our trip to Iceland here.
A note from our founder…
“In 2006, I shifted my work focus to finding an effective way to address the enormous challenges of climate change, out of deep concern for my children’s future. Watching An Inconvenient Truth was a wake-up call for me. I put “habitable planet” on my to-do list and got to work. Over the years, I’ve had support from amazing colleagues, volunteers, scientific experts, family, and friends. The work has evolved over time, but having a habitable planet, in which everyone and everything we love can thrive, is still the over-arching mission for me.”
- Dr. Leslie Field
Your support means the world—to all of us.
Donations are crucial to our progress—past, present and future. Your generous support is integral for sustaining our collaborative, international, scientifically-grounded efforts to develop practical solutions that meet the needs of the communities we work with.