conservation

Cascadia: Regional Organizations and Resources in the Pacific Northwest

The Pacific Northwest (PNW) region is typically defined to include Oregon and Washington, and British Columbia (Canada) and the northernmost section of California are often included, as well. Some people also include other states that are in the wider northwestern section of the country, such as Idaho, Wyoming, Montana, and Alaska.

The Pacific Northwest “bioregion” (an area defined by natural boundaries, such as watersheds, topography, geography, climate, or ecosystems, rather than by arbitrary state borders) also can be interpreted in different ways. To some, it includes parts of Northwestern California (from Humboldt County north), Western Oregon and Western Washington, to Western British Columbia—west of the Cascade mountains; this bioregion is characterized by a lot of rain between fall and spring, and it includes some temperate rainforests. But others draw the lines differently and include Idaho and other areas in the bioregion. This region is sometimes called Cascadia. Bioregionalism is a philosophy that encourages people to organize themselves within and live sustainably within their bioregions. (Here’s a recent article from Resilience.org on “Bioregioning.”)

This listing includes some organizations that cover the whole PNW region, as well as organizations that are focused on specific issues within the states of Oregon, Washington, or the province of British Columbia (BC). (Each section below begins with groups that address issues across the PNW region or even across the West, followed by groups in specific states.) For now, the listing has a disproportionate representation of groups in Oregon (as it’s the state I’m currently most familiar with), but over time, I’ll be adding more groups based in Washington and in BC. While there are also countless local organizations in the region, for the most part this listing doesn’t include local or city/town-based initiatives; it does include a few multi-county regional groups.

Note: This is not a comprehensive listing, and I am not personally familiar with all of the groups listed here. If there are additional organizations you’d like to recommend, please mention them in the Comments.

The organizations listed here are organized into the following categories:

  • General Environmental
  • Climate and Energy
  • Land Conservation and Stewardship
  • Animal Protection
  • Societal Wellbeing and Social Justice
  • Media and Information Resources

This post is a work in progress. More organizations will be added to the listing over time.

 

General Environmental

Oregon:

Washington:

British Columbia:

 

Climate and Energy

Oregon:

Washington:

British Columbia:

 

Land Conservation and Stewardship

Oregon:

Washington:

British Columbia:

 

Animal Protection
(wildlife + farmed and domesticated animals)

Oregon:

Washington:

British Columbia:

 

Societal Wellbeing and Social Justice

Oregon:

Washington:

 

Media and Information Resources

Oregon:

Washington:

British Columbia:

 

Related Posts:

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October 31, 2025
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Sustainable Land Use, Land Conservation, and Rewilding: An Index of Posts

Listed below are some of The Green Spotlight posts that include information related to sustainable land use (urban, suburban, rural, and wilderness), e.g., land/habitat conservation and stewardship, sustainable agriculture and permaculture, regenerative and restorative land use and re-wilding, sustainable home/homestead and neighborhood planning and development, and resilience. Links to organizations and resources on these topics are also provided, at the bottom of this post.

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Organizations and Resources:

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February 28, 2025
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Goldman Prize Winners, 2021

The Goldman Environmental Prize is the world’s largest and most prestigious annual award for grassroots environmentalists. Many people refer to it as the “green Nobel.” Goldman Prize winners are models of courage, and their stories are powerful and truly inspiring. “The Prize recognizes individuals for sustained and significant efforts to protect and enhance the natural environment, often at great personal risk. Each winner receives a financial award. The Goldman Prize views ‘grassroots’ leaders as those involved in local efforts, where positive change is created through community or citizen participation in the issues that affect them. Through recognizing these individual leaders, the Prize seeks to inspire other ordinary people to take extraordinary actions to protect the natural world.” Over the 32 years that the Prize has been awarded, there have been more than 200 recipients of the prize.

This year’s prize recipients (one from each of the six inhabited continental regions of the world) are:

 

  • Sharon Lavigne—Louisiana, USA: In September 2019, Sharon Lavigne, a special education teacher turned environmental justice advocate, successfully stopped the construction of a US$1.25 billion plastics manufacturing plant alongside the Mississippi River in St. James Parish, Louisiana. Lavigne mobilized grassroots opposition to the project, educated community members, and organized peaceful protests to defend her predominantly African American community. The plant would have generated one million pounds of liquid hazardous waste annually, in a region already contending with known carcinogens and toxic air pollution. (Support: RISE St. James, Stop Formosa Plastics, and Louisiana Bucket Brigade)
  • Liz Chicaje Churay—Peru: In January of 2018, as a result of the efforts of Liz Chicaje Churay and her partners, the Peruvian government created Yaguas National Park. Comparable in size to Yellowstone National Park, the new park protects more than two million acres of Amazon rainforest in the northeastern region of Loreto. Its creation is a key step in conserving the country’s biodiversity—safeguarding thousands of rare and unique wildlife species and conserving carbon-rich peatlands—and protecting Indigenous peoples. (Support: Instituto del Bien Comun and Amazon conservation organizations)
  • Kimiko Hirata—Japan: After the Fukushima Daiichi nuclear disaster of 2011, Japan was forced to move away from nuclear power and, in its place, embraced coal as a major energy source. Over the past several years, Kimiko Hirata’s grassroots campaign led to the cancellation of 13 coal power plants (7GW or 7,030MW) in Japan. These coal plants would have released more than 1.6 billion tons of CO2 over their lifetimes. The carbon impact of Hirata’s activism is the equivalent of taking 7.5 million passenger cars off the road every year for 40 years. (Support: Kiko Network, Japan Beyond Coal, and 350.org)
  • Thai Van Nguyen—Vietnam: Thai Van Nguyen founded Save Vietnam’s Wildlife, which rescued 1,540 pangolins from the illegal wildlife trade between 2014 and 2020. Nguyen also established Vietnam’s first anti-poaching unit, which, since 2018, has destroyed 9,701 animal traps, dismantled 775 illegal camps, confiscated 78 guns, and arrested 558 people for poaching, leading to a significant decline in illegal activities in Pu Mat National Park. Pangolins are the world’s most heavily trafficked mammal despite an international trade ban. Heavy demand for their meat, scales, and blood threatens pangolins with extinction; all eight pangolin species are on the IUCN Red List. (Support: Save Vietnam’s Wildlife, WildAid, and Pangolin Crisis Fund)
  • Gloria Majiga-Kamoto—Malawi: Concerned about the environmental harm caused by mounting plastic pollution in Malawi, Gloria Majiga-Kamoto fought the plastics industry and galvanized a grassroots movement in support of a national ban on thin plastics, a type of single-use plastic. As a result of her dedicated campaigning, in July 2019, Malawi’s High Court upheld the ban on the production, importation, distribution, and use of thin plastics. This is the first Prize for Malawi. (Support: Break Free From Plastic, GAIA Zero Waste World, and Lilongwe Wildlife Trust)
  • Maida Bilal—Bosnia and Herzegovina: Maida Bilal led a group of women from her village in a 503-day blockade of heavy equipment that resulted in the cancellation of permits for two proposed dams on the Kruščica River in December 2018. The Balkans are home to the last free-flowing rivers in Europe. However, a massive hydropower boom in the region threatens to irreversibly damage thousands of miles of pristine rivers. This is the first Prize for Bosnia and Herzegovina. (Support: RiverWatch, Patagonia, EuroNatur, and EKO BISTRO)

Click on each recipient’s name to read a longer profile—or watch a brief video—about their remarkable efforts and achievements.

Here’s the video about Sharon Lavigne:

 

Posts on Goldman Prize winners from previous years:

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June 16, 2021
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