How We Work

PEDP serves as a convener and coordinator for the broader data preservation and advocacy movement:

• Collaborative projects: Managing cross-sector working groups focused on: building data steward capacity, new funding models, cross-organization collaboration, community-generated data, legal/policy strategies, and data interoperability.
• Coordination infrastructure: Bi-weekly coordination calls, joint funder briefings, and shared intelligence across the field.
• Network mapping: Documenting the ecosystem of organizations archiving environmental data to identify gaps and coordination opportunities.
• Cross-sector collaboration: Environmental data does not exist in a vacuum: our environment has profound impacts on public health, infrastructure, and or the economy. We increasingly coordinate with partners working in data across sectors to ensure solutions are holistic.

PEDP is composed of employees from member organizations who work together on PEDP projects as part of their jobs, alongside independent members who contribute in a primarily voluntary capacity.

Our work is organized into working groups (e.g. tool development, data preservation, advocacy, storytelling and communications, governance, external alignments, fundraising, etc.) led by 2-3 participating members, each meeting regularly to make decisions, prioritize tasks, and collaborate on new initiatives.

Fundraising is led primarily by the Environmental Data Governance initiative (EDGI), the Environmental Policy Innovation Center (EPIC), the Open Environmental Data Project (OEDP), and The Impact Project (TIP). When grants have specific deliverables, the relevant organization champions the work and establishes related processes. For discretionary funds that broadly apply to PEDP's mission, the steering committee collaboratively decides how funds should be spent on projects or support costs such as software and servers.

We are committed to additive work across our coalition: while our organizations’ goals overlap, each has unique expertise and focus. Our organizations therefore re-grant funds to one another, depending on expertise, to accomplish our goals.