California · Nonprofit
The Breakthrough Institute
The Breakthrough Institute (California) receives grants from 39 organizations whose IRS filings report $29,255,921 to it, the largest being VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM ($9,301,000). 25 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 55% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- Revenue FY2025
- $5.1M
- Funders on record
- 39
- Grants received
- $29M
- Net assets
- $4.4M
What The Breakthrough Institute does
Mission
The Breakthrough Institute is a research center that identifies and promotes technological solutions to environmental and human development challenges.
As stated on its FY2025 Form 990.
Programs
Research Programs: Breakthrough's Research Programs consist of our Climate and Energyprogram, which focuses on policies and technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissionsand increase social resilience to a changing climate; our Nuclear Energy Innovation program, which oversees all engagement with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission and publishes cutting-edge analysis on nuclear technology; our Food and Agriculture program, which advances an innovation-and-productivity framework for enabling abundant andlow-impact food production; our Energy and Development program, which focuses onenergy and infrastructural equity and resilience in emerging economies; and our Environmental Regulatory Reform program, which develops and promotes credible and politically durable policy reforms that support the timely, lawful, and equitable deployment of critical infrastructure.
$3,369,938 spent$75,000 earned by the program70% of program spendingEvents: Network building is one of the principal ways that Breakthrough makes change in the world, and one way we execute on this is through our events. For over a decade, Breakthrough hosted two popular annual events the Breakthrough Dialogue in California and Ecomodernism in Virginia which convened and advanced ecomodernism, pro-nuclear, and other pragmatic environmental ideas and policy agendas. For the last three years, Breakthrough has been one of the leading organizers of the annual Abundance conference in Washington, DC. We also host numerous workshops, focused policy briefings, and other high-level meetings.
$1,055,846 spent$162,920 earned by the program22% of program spendingCommunications: Our communications program consists of regular publication of research, policy analysis, and argumentative essays on our website, and multiple weekly publications on our flagship Sub-stack, The Ecomodernist. We promote our research, writing, and staff on social media, and augment our institutional publications through speaking engagements at conferences and public events; as well as through essays and analysis for external outlets, including academic, peer-reviewed journals and high-leverage publications such as the Washington Post and the Wall Street Journal.
$393,284 spent$6,170 earned by the program8% of program spending
The 3 programs described on its FY2025 Form 990, listed largest first by expense. Program spending in total: $4,819,068.
The organization over time
Each line starts at 100 in 2017, so what you read is the shape rather than the size: 150 means half as much again as 2017, 50 means half. The number beside each label in the key is where it ended. The shaded band is where the middle 50% of its peers' revenue would sit, given their growth.
Balance sheet
Total assets and total liabilities at each year end, in dollars. The largest one-year move in total assets was 2021 to 2022, from $4.2M to $7.1M (+67%).
How it's funded, over time
Each bar is one year's revenue split into where it came from, and every bar is the same height — these are shares, not amounts, so a year that raised twice as much looks the same size. Hover a bar for the split.
Government-grant reliance: 2021 5%. Grants only. Government contracts and fees sit inside program revenue.
91% of The Breakthrough Institute’s revenue is contributions — more donation-reliant than the typical peer (88% for the typical peer).
Surplus & reserves
Operating surplus or deficit each year, and months of liquidity in hand. 2 of the last 9 reported years ran a deficit.
reserve
Leadership and staff
The officers, directors, trustees and key employees listed on each return. Joined and no longer listed compare each filing with the year before, matching people by surname and first initial; a year after a gap, or a roster under three people, has no comparison.
Board chair
Tisha Schuller
Board Chair
As listed on its FY2025 Form 990.
Who funds it, year by year
2017 → 2023: the base broadened from 7 funders to 18 funders, grant income rose $1.5M → $5.0M.
12 of 39 of your funders are donor-advised or pass-through sponsors (tagged DAF) — 55% of grant dollars received. That money is really individual donors directing a sponsor; the institutions to cultivate are the non-DAF funders.
From the IRS filings of The Breakthrough Institute’s funders (the co-funder graph). Top 30 of 39 funders by total. Association, not causation. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How concentrated its funding is
The Breakthrough Institute has a broad base — no single funder exceeds 32% of grant income, and it takes 3 funders to reach half.
the vertical line marks half of all grant income — 3 funders to its left
67% of the income these shares are computed over arrives through pass-through sponsors or from payers whose filings do not say what kind of payment it is. Concentration is still measured over all of it, because the money is real; what it does not support is a claim about how many institutions have chosen to fund The Breakthrough Institute.
Largest funder’s share by year: 2017 37% · 2018 46% · 2019 41% · 2020 38% · 2021 37% · 2022 37% · 2023 36% — broadly stable.
“Effective funders” = inverse Herfindahl index (1 / Σ shareᵢ²) — the number of equal-sized funders that would give the same concentration. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
How long its funders stay
52% of The Breakthrough Institute's funders are still giving 3 years after their first grant; 64% give in more than one year at all.
Share of funders still giving k years after their first recorded grant, pooled across every acquisition cohort. A funder counts as retained in a year only if it made a grant that year. Measured to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving — a funder cannot be counted as lapsed in a year most filers have not reached.
Where its funders are
55% of The Breakthrough Institute's grant income arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors, whose addresses record where the money is held rather than where the donor is. Of the $13M that is directly attributable, 78% of it comes from funders outside California, across 13 states.
In-state vs out-of-state, by year
Funder states come from each funder’s own filing. $16M arriving through sponsors registered in 7 states is excluded from the map and the split above: a sponsor holds money on a donor’s behalf, so its registered address would place those dollars somewhere no donor need ever have been. Trends are read to FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving. FY2024–FY2026 are still being filed and are shown unshaded; they do not move any figure on this page.
Against its field
The Breakthrough Institute's revenue grew 101% between 2017 and 2025.
this organization peer median middle 50% of peers· 1,074 environment nonprofits $1M–$10M, FY2025
Organizations like The Breakthrough Institute
Organizations whose mission and program text most resemble this one, by semantic similarity over every organization in the US filings — the closest peers, and often the clearest route to shared or prospective funders.
In California
Nationally
Read directly from this organization’s own Form 990, as neutral context.
Where the money goes
83% of spending goes to programs.
Governance
Public support
86%
Share of support from the public (Schedule A) — the basis for its public-charity status.
Footprint & structure
Files a return copy in 26 states
Screen this organization
A dated, signed PDF of the compliance screen for The Breakthrough Institute: IRS status (Business Master File, Publication 78, auto-revocation), the OFAC sanctions lists, the Internal Revenue Bulletin, and California registration, with the Rev. Proc. 2018-32 §8.01 reliance elements stated element by element. Generated from the current files at the moment you download it.
Screens are triage, not determinations; a source that cannot be read reports not screened, never clear. Screen this nonprofit · How the screen works · on the API as GET /api/screening/{ein}?format=pdf
Questions and answers
- Who funds The Breakthrough Institute?
- The Breakthrough Institute (California) receives grants from 39 organizations whose IRS filings report $29,255,921 to it, the largest being VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM ($9,301,000). 25 of them have funded it in more than one year, and 55% of the money arrives through donor-advised or pass-through sponsors rather than from an institution directly.
- How many funders does The Breakthrough Institute have?
- IRS filings report 39 organizations giving $29,255,921 in grants to The Breakthrough Institute, 25 of which have funded it in more than one year.
- Who is the largest funder of The Breakthrough Institute?
- VANGUARD CHARITABLE ENDOWMENT PROGRAM is the largest funder on record, with $9,301,000 in grants. The full list of funders is on this page.
- How can an organization like The Breakthrough Institute find more funders?
- Start with the funders already giving here, then look at the foundations that back similar organizations in California. The funding by cause and by state pages list the largest funders for a given area and how to approach them.
These figures are read directly from IRS Form 990 / 990-PF e-file XML: this organization’s own return for FY2025 (financials across 2017–2025), and the filings of 39 funders that report grants to it. “On record” means captured in the filings we have parsed — a funder that does not e-file, or whose grant detail is not itemized, will not appear. Filings run roughly 12–24 months behind. Trends on this page end at FY2023, the last fiscal year that has finished arriving; later years are shown and marked, and move no figure. Data on this page was exported October 14, 2026. What this page cannot tell you · view filing