Sea Change Foundation

The Sea Change Foundation has been the center of controversy since 2014 when a U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee Republican staff report accused the foundation of using its wealth to exert influence over Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) policy. The report also noted that Sea Change had received extensive funding from a Bermuda-based “dark money” group, Klein Ltd. ^{5 6}

In 2015, the right-of-center Environmental Policy Alliance released a follow-up report that alleged Klein Ltd. had connections to Russian interests. The report accused Sea Change of accepting financial contributions from Russian to advocate against fossil fuel energy production. ⁷ Sea Change has denied the allegations, as has the NRDC, one of the foundation’s grantees. ^{8  9}

Sea Change was founded in 2006 by Nathaniel Simons, the billionaire son of Renaissance Technologies co-founder and liberal mega-donor James Simons. ¹⁰ The foundation, based in San Francisco, California, was created as a 501(c)(3) exempt private foundation. ¹¹ The foundation’s mission is to address “serious threats posed by global climate change.” ¹²

Between its creation in 2006 and 2018, Sea Change has paid out $480 million in grants to other nonprofits. ¹³

Founding

Also see Nathaniel Simons

The Sea Change Foundation is funded by Nathaniel “Nat” Simons, co-founder of Prelude Ventures, a “clean technology” investment fund. ¹⁴ Funding from the foundation comes from the personal wealth of Simons and his wife, Laura Baxter-Simons. ¹⁵ The foundation also receives funding from Renaissance Technologies, the successful hedge fund that Simons’ father and major Democratic donor, James Simons, created and where Simons spent years as a portfolio manager. ¹⁶ Nat Simons currently serves as a board member and vice-chair of Renaissance in addition to managing Meritage Group LP, a spin-off portfolio of hedge fund and direct investments. ¹⁴

Focus Areas

As of May 2026, the Sea Change Foundation listed four focus areas on its website. ¹ First, the foundation helped launch and fund the Kigali Cooling Energy Efficiency Program, a climate initiative supporting the Kigali Amendment to the Montreal Protocol climate agreement which would phase out hydrofluorocarbons used in cooling and refrigeration while promoting more energy-efficient technologies. ³

Sea Change Foundation also supported Climate Action 100+, an international investor-driven campaign that pressures major corporations to adopt aggressive emissions targets, expand climate disclosures, and align operations with environmentalist climate priorities. ⁴

The foundation also focuses heavily on transitioning public utilities from relying on fuel energy sources to weather-dependent energy alternatives, including wind and solar. ¹⁷

Finally, the Sea Change Foundation has supported European campaigns calling for stricter transportation emissions policies and accelerated electric vehicle adoption, that would influence governments and automakers to shift away from traditional fuel-powered transportation. ¹⁸

Criticism and Controversy

Lack of Transparency

The philanthropy website Inside Philanthropy noted the quiet profile that Nathaniel Simons and Sea Change have taken, stating in 2014 that Sea Change had “what is quite possibly the world’s least informative website.” ¹⁰

Bermuda “Dark Money,” and the Environmentalist “Billionaire’s Club”

In 2014, the Sea Change Foundation came under scrutiny in a report released by the Republican staff of the U.S. Senate Environment and Public Works Committee titled, “The Chain of Environmental Command: How a Club of Billionaires and their Foundations Control the Environment and Obama’s EPA.” ⁵

The report contended that “an elite group of left-wing millionaires and billionaires . . . . directs and controls the far-left environmental movement” and exerted undue influence over major policy decisions at the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) during the Obama administration. The report identified the Sea Change Foundation as a “dominant organization” in a movement that received funding from a foreign company called Klein Ltd., a Bermuda-based company noted as a donor to the Sea Change Foundation in its annual tax returns available when the report was published. The report alleged that Klein Ltd. “exists on paper only” and had “undisclosed donors” which allowed Sea Change to funnel millions of dollars in so-called “dark money” to prominent environmental activist organizations that seek to influence energy policy.  ^{5 6}

Between 2010 and 2011, Klein Ltd. donated $23 million to Sea Change, accounting for 49 percent of the foundation’s total contributions in 2010 and 33 percent of its total contributions in 2011. ¹⁷ The report claimed, “As a practical matter, an overseas company contributing tens of millions to organizations dedicated to abolishing the use of affordable fossil fuels is highly problematic,” especially considering the “lack of transparency” which “shields Klein Ltd. from any responsibility.”  ⁵

Klein Ltd., the “foreign company with undisclosed donors” identified in the report that allegedly “exists on paper only,” is a Bermuda-based company noted as a donor to the Sea Change Foundation in its annual IRS Form 990 financial filings (private foundations, unlike other types of nonprofits, are required to disclose the names of their donors). Between 2010 and 2011, Klein Ltd. donated $23 million to Sea Change, accounting for 49 percent of its total contributions in 2010 and 33 percent of its total contributions in 2011. ¹⁹ As the report put it: ²⁰

As a practical matter, an overseas company contributing tens of millions to organizations dedicated to abolishing the use of affordable fossil fuels is highly problematic. This is only compounded by the fact it is deliberately and completely lacking in transparency. However, it is likely this lack of transparency shields Klein Ltd. from any responsibility to the American businesses and families it hurts. . . .

The role Sea Change plays as a member of the Billionaire’s Club is deeply troubling, especially in light of recent revelations that environmental activists, many of whom are clearly
benefiting from this extreme “dark money,” do not have any moral qualms over where their money comes from – so long as it supports the far-left cause.

The following graphic from the report further illustrates Sea Change Foundation’s pass-through system and how it benefits left-wing environmentalist groups such as the League of Conservation Voters and Sierra Club: ²¹

Despite the criticism of Sea Change’s funding scheme, the overwhelming majority of Sea Change’s funding before, during, and after 2010 and 2011 has come from Nathaniel and Laura Simons, as well as several trusts under his name. ¹⁹ Nevertheless, Sea Change’s role as a pass-through to major left-wing activist groups has earned it scrutiny from conservative observers and watchdog groups.

Allegations of Russian Funding

Although Nathaniel Simons and Laura Baxter-Simons have provided much of the Seas Change Foundation’s funding, the foundation’s role as a pass-through to major left-wing activist groups has drawn attention from right-of-center observers and watchdog groups. In December 2015, the right-of-center Environmental Policy Alliance released a follow-up to the 2014 Senate committee report that alleged Klein Ltd. had connections to Russia and Russian president Vladimir Putin. The alliance report claimed that Klein Ltd. and Sea Change Foundation acted as a conduit for funneling Russian government money to U.S. environmental groups in order to undermine American natural gas and oil production to Russia’s benefit: ⁷

According to its Articles of Incorporation, Klein was formed by two employees of Wakefield Quin (WQ), a Bermuda law firm. A Klein director and WQ senior counsel, along with another WQ senior counsel, have pasts that should be considered questionable at best. Both held directorship positions in a group, owned by Russian minister of telecommunications and longtime Putin friend Leonid Reiman, which was the subject of a 2008 money laundering case. The group was ultimately convicted in British Virgin Islands court. WQ’s Russian involvement doesn’t stop there. Marcuard Spectrum, a Moscow-based investment firm, operates a hedge fund in Bermuda based out of WQ’s office. Both of the aforementioned WQ lawyers are listed in leadership positions. Further, one of the founders of Marcuard is also the chair of Russian-owned oil giant Rosneft.

According to the report, the shell company Klein Ltd. was established in March 2011 by Wakefield Quin, a Bermuda law firm which under Bermuda law is permitted to conceal foreign sources of funding. As of 2018, Simons had renamed Klein Ltd. “Sea Change International,” reportedly in response to the negative publicity Klein Ltd. received. ²² However, Sea Change International (formerly Klein Ltd.) shares the same address as Wakefield Quin and, at the time, “more than 20 other companies apparently run through the law firm.” ²³ The Environmental Policy Alliance illustrated this relationship in the following graphic:

In September 2018, Daily Signal investigative journalist Kevin Mooney submitted a background report to the Pennsylvania Senate Environmental Resources and Energy Committee titled, “Foreign Involvement on Natural Gas Development in the US & Pennsylvania.” (archived here).²⁴ Mooney’s report cited the Sea Change Foundation as a major example of foreign involvement in efforts to disrupt natural gas development in the United States, noting that other firms and entities associated with the Simons family and Renaissance Technologies have been “domiciled in Bermuda, using multiple law firms, primarily Wakefield Quin” and Appleby Ltd., the former of “which has been found guilty in international court of aiding a Russian money laundering scheme.”

The report contended that Nat Simons sat on the board of Planar Technologies with Roderick Forrest, senior counsel at Wakefield Quin. Forrest was implicated in a 2008 money laundering scandal at Russia’s IPOC. Furthermore, the report suggested Wakefield Quin’s connections to Russian energy companies and Putin ally Leonid Reiman, a former Russian minister of telecommunications. Mooney claimed that, based on these connections, there is a “paperless money trail” that runs from Putin’s government in Russia into Klein Ltd. in Bermuda, then into the Sea Change Foundation, and from the Sea Change Foundation into U.S. environmental groups in the form of grants. ²⁵

In 2020, the first Trump administration EPA called for a Department of Justice investigation into Russian funding of American environmental groups. The DOJ never launched an investigation into Sea Change. ^{26  27  28}

A 2022 Washington Post opinion piece denounced the allegations that Sea Change had received funding from Russia. Author Glenn Kessler decried the allegations as a baseless Republican-led effort to denigrate the environmentalist movement in the United States. ²⁹ In 2023, prominent Sea Change Foundation grant recipient Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) denied ever accepting Russian funding through Klein Ltd. and claimed the allegations were fabricated by a right-of-center communications firm called Berman and Company. ⁹

Financials

The Sea Change foundation’s largest grant recipient is the Energy Foundation, a major left-of-center nonprofit that acts as a pass-through for foundations like Sea Change to support liberal environmental groups. Between 2007 and 2018, Sea Change paid out $125 million to the Energy Foundation. ³⁰ Between 2019 and 2024, Sea Change issued another $129,950,000 in grants to the Energy Foundation. ^{31  32  33  34  35  36}

Other major grantees include the Sierra Club, World Wide Fund for Nature (formerly the World Wildlife Fund), Natural Resources Defense Council, Food and Water Watch, the League of Conservation Voters, and Center for American Progress (CAP). ³⁰

Donors to Sea Change Foundation

Between 2006 and 2018, the Sea Change Foundation received $413 million in donations, primarily from Nathaniel and Laura Simons, trust funds associated with them, and from Nathaniel’s father, James Simons. ^{37  38  39}

As of May 2026, Stephen Colwell was the interim executive director of the Sea Change Foundation and its consulting group Tempest Advisors. ⁴⁰ Colwell previously worked as executive director of the Coral Reef Alliance and the Ocean Foundation as well as an advisor to other environment-focused grant-makers including the David and Lucile Packard and Gordon and Betty Moore Foundations. ⁴¹