Launched in 2020 with a $10 billion commitment from Amazon.com founder Jeff Bezos, the Bezos Earth Fund has announced the appointment of Andrew Steer as president and CEO. The fund also announced that it plans to spend down its assets by 2030.

Steer has served for the past eight years as president and CEO of the World Resources Institute, which was awarded $100 million by the fund in November as part of an inaugural round of grants totaling $791 million to sixteen organizations. "Jeff's goal is to spend [the fund] down between now and 2030, the date by which the SDGs must be achieved," Steer wrote in a Twitter post. "The Earth Fund will invest in scientists, NGOs, activists, and the private sector to help drive new technologies, investments, policy change, and behavior. We will emphasize social justice, as climate change disproportionately hurts poor and marginalized communities. If allocated creatively, wisely, and boldly the Earth Fund has the potential for transformative influence in this decisive decade."

Spending down by 2030 means the fund would have to distribute $1 billion a year, on average. That it plans to "invest...in the private sector" suggests that "at least part of [the fund's] structure [will take the form of] a limited liability company, since it is difficult for other philanthropic vehicles such as private foundations to make major investments in for-profit companies," Recode reports, while also noting that "an LLC, while more nimbly allowing for for-profit investments, is not required to file public tax documents that offer regular disclosures." Other LLCs that are being used as philanthropic vehicles by mega-donors include Mark Zuckerberg and Priscilla Chan's Chan Zuckerberg Initiative; Pierre and Pam Omidyar's Omidyar Network, which operates both an LLC and a philanthropic arm; Laurene Powell Jobs's Emerson Collective, and Jack Dorsey's #startsmall.

While at WRI, Steer oversaw the development of more than a dozen high-profile coalitions and initiatives, including work to reshape public understanding of the economics of climate change, the mobilization of a global commission to elevate climate adaptation as a political issue, and the launch of a $10 million-a-year initiative to help more than a hundred countries develop and implement national climate plans.

"The $10 billion Bezos Earth Fund has the potential to be a transformative force for good at this decisive point in history," said Christiana Figueres, co-founder of Global Optimism and former executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). "Andrew's global reputation, deep technical knowledge and experience, and commitment to social justice make him a perfect leader for the fund."

(Photo credit: World Resources Institute)