Your photography can help combat the climate crisis!

A heliostat is carefully cleaned at the Ivanpah Solar Project in California. More than 300,000 software-controlled mirrors reflect sunlight to boilers that generate renewable electricity. (Image credit: Dennis Schroeder / NREL)

TED Countdown, a global initiative to address the climate crisis, and image-based outreach project Climate Visuals have joined forces, with a goal to build a collection of evidence-based photos that document the reality of climate change around the world – and your photography can help them do it.

Through 'Visualizing Climate Change: An Open Call for Photography' the partnership seeks submissions that communicate positive climate solutions in five key areas: energy, transport, materials, food, nature.

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The initiative aims to support climate change photographers, educators, communicators and campaigners by the creation of a new free-to-access collection of the world’s most impactful photography.

The open call will source, license and promote 100 powerful images of climate change taken by both professional and amateur photographers from around the world. This initiative will distribute a total licensing fund of US $100,000 / £70,000 / AU$130,000 directly to the chosen photographers – with the final 100 images all selected by an independent jury.

A woman and child walk through the flood waters in east Jakarta, Indonesia (Image credit: Hendra A Setyawan / World Meteorological Organization)

A student goes to school wearing a mask to protect him from the smoke that blankets the city of Palangka Raya, Central Kalimantan (Image credit: Aulia Erlangga / CIFOR)

Huge numbers of vehicles contribute to the daily traffic jams in Dhaka, Bangladesh (Image credit: Asian Development Bank)

Construction workers are building stronger river banks along the Nile river to protect it from erosion (Image credit: Dominic Chavez / World Bank)

With higher temperatures threatening crops and produce, sustainable cooling is fundamental to arrest climate change (Image credit: Prashanth Vishwanathan / Climate Visuals for Ashden)

Selected photographers will also have the opportunity to be profiled and to exhibit their work virtually and physically at Countdown events and at the 26th UN Climate Change Conference in Glasgow, UK, in November, and will be featured in a global media campaign. The initiative aims to create a deliberately inclusive space for photographers who may otherwise lack the opportunity to showcase their work and ideas in such a global project.

Climate Visuals is the world's only evidence-based and impact-focused climate photography resource. For more details and to submit your work visit the Climate Visuals website.

Registration is already open for interested photographers, with submissions open from 1-30 June. The jury will convene to choose its 100 best images in July, with the selected photographers and images announced in August and the full image collection released on the Climate Visuals library in September.

If you are thinking of participating, why not look to some of the best compact cameras or the best mirrorless cameras, as well as many DSLRs, all of which are capable of the image size and quality needed to meet the submission criteria.

Laurence is an NCTJ-trained journalist with nearly 20 years' editorial experience gained on a wide range of publications, from The Beirut Times in Lebanon to The Sunday Times, and including recent freelance engagements with Future's cycling and automotive portfolios, Outdoor Fitness, and The English Home. He has recently been undertaking a sports broadcast journalism MA at Southampton Solent, gaining valuable TV and radio experience, and am currently videographer for Frome Town FC soccer team. He is the author of Bikepacking (Wild Things Publishing, 2016).

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