Annual Report 2024
Clean Energy: Growing Globally
Some believe we cannot solve the climate crisis without major trade offs in profitability, affordability, jobs, equity, or reliability. But you will find a different message in RMI’s annual report — one of hope, possibility, and opportunity, with the evidence to back it up.
Momentum cannot slow down when the stakes are this high. We are grateful to our donors for your critical support to make possible RMI’s work to transform the global energy system. We are on the mission of our lives.
Strengthening Communities Globally
From Nigeria to Texas, RMI is helping people stay powered up with reliable clean electricity.
Electricity is critical to our everyday lives. Yet many in the United States and other industrialized nations take it for granted. With a flick of a switch, we have light. With an electrical outlet and a cord, we can keep our food cold, our air conditioners humming, and our medical appliances online.
But that reliability isn’t available elsewhere in the world, and with the increasing severity of storms, at times it’s not even a given in the United States either. RMI is working to bring clean, reliable electricity to all. From rural communities in Africa to climate-vulnerable islands to US grids that might go down from wildfires or hurricanes, we are supporting communities in staying powered up.
Powering a brighter future for Nigeria
Like much of sub-Saharan Africa, Nigeria struggles to provide its growing population with sufficient electricity. Electricity demand far outstrips the supply, meaning constant power outages. Yet, located just north of the equator, Nigeria’s potential to generate solar power rivals or exceeds the best conditions in Europe and the United States.
So RMI, along with the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet (GEAPP) and Nigerian utilities and solar developers, have implemented five interconnected solar minigrids. Today, two are operational — in the communities of Zawaciki and Toto — and three are in development. These minigrids are bringing reliable electricity to thousands of people, such as the Zawaciki minigrid, the first interconnected minigrid in Northern Nigeria.
Whether on remote farmland or wired into a buzzing city neighborhood, an interconnected minigrid supplies an underserved community that’s already connected to the conventional grid but that faces unreliable power. Interconnected minigrids consist of a renewable energy source such as solar panels, and sometimes battery energy storage and a backup generator. They are connected to the main electrical grid and can buy energy from the main grid when needed, especially at night to reduce the cost of battery backup.
For example, until recently, the 1,000 homes and businesses in northern Nigeria’s Zawaciki housing settlement had about four hours of electricity each day. And at times, the enclave went days without any electricity at all. Now, they have 16 to 20 hours of steady power daily from the 1 megawatt of solar panels and diesel generator backup.
Agriculture is the backbone of Nigeria’s economy, but smallholder farmers are struggling with the impact of climate change. Income-generating energy uses allow rural farmers and entrepreneurs to utilize clean electricity to support their businesses and increase their incomes. That is why RMI is working with Nigeria’s Rural Electrification Agency and the Global Energy Alliance for People and Planet to power agricultural processes with electricity.
Through our Energizing Agriculture Program (EAP), we are helping farmers replace their fossil fuel powered equipment with electric mills, cold storage, and vehicles. EAP’s latest study, Harvesting Sunshine, shows how productive uses of energy can change lives and transform power system economics, greatly reducing the cost of producing electricity. At the same time, rural communities can reap the benefits of more efficient equipment that produces higher-quality outputs.
“By integrating renewable energy into agricultural processing, we’ve reduced energy costs by up to 60 percent in many instances,” says RMI’s Deji Ojo. “Simultaneously, our innovative technologies have improved product quality, enabling farmers to command higher market prices.”
Electric two-wheeled vehicles also are making a big impact. “Compared to the [motorbike] that we used to use, this one makes life easy,” says Yakubu Abdulrahman Gwam, a field officer with One Acre Fund, a group that works with millions of smallholder farmers throughout sub-Saharan Africa. “Sometimes, to go to the field, you have to spend almost 3,000 naira [$1.83] to buy fuel. But with an electric two-wheeler, if you charge with just 500 naira [30¢] — and it will last almost three days.”
With support from RMI’s Acceleration Fund, we are adapting this work to scale two- and three-wheelers in Nigeria and Indonesia. A donor-supported source of flexible funding, the Acceleration Fund helps us scale proven work rapidly and broadly and refine emerging projects that that can offer a big return on philanthropic investment.
Reliable power for storm-ravaged islands
Solar microgrids are also helping climate-vulnerable islands with resilient local energy. The Morne Prosper Primary School and Paix Bouche Primary School were both severely damaged by Hurricane Maria in 2017, disrupting the education of hundreds of Dominican children. RMI, in conjunction with the Clara Lionel Foundation, the Dominica Ministry of Education, and local community members, rebuilt the schools with solar and battery-powered microgrids that are reinforced to withstand a Category 5 hurricane. The schools are acting as hurricane shelters for the wider community.
Since RMI started working in the Caribbean in 2014, we have been involved in 19 solar-powered microgrids, providing reliable power for more than 31,000 people.
Vulnerable grids in the United States
Even in the United States, where many take electricity for granted, vulnerable communities often lose power due to increasingly severe climate change-fueled storms. This past July, more than 2.2 million Texas homes, schools, and businesses lost power when Hurricane Beryl barreled across Houston. And 12 of the 22 deaths reported were due to electricity outages. Solar-plus-storage microgrids can help keep people safe during the next hurricane to hit the Gulf Coast.
This past year RMI organized a cohort of 12 local governments, Tribal communities, churches, and schools from around the country that want to take advantage of new federal funding to implement microgrids. The cohort is participating in RMI’s Microgrids for Resilient Communities Workshop, a series of eight workshops where community leaders can learn the ins and outs of financing, designing, deploying, and maintaining solar-plus-storage microgrids.
These microgrids will serve as community resilience hubs, not only keeping the power flowing in an outage, but also providing critical services in a disaster. These local microgrids will ensure that resources stay in communities to facilitate economic development, create savings, provide resilience, and help the communities achieve their emissions goals.
US utilities are also integrating renewable microgrids into their business models with the support of RMI’s Virtual Power Plant Partnership (VP3). Virtual power plants (VPPs) are an aggregation of distributed energy resources such as electric vehicles, smart thermostats, heat pumps, and solar-plus-storage systems.
During normal operating conditions, these assets can be harmonized to help balance electricity demand and supply on the grid, increasing reliability, lowering customer bills, and decreasing system emissions. During extreme weather events, microgrids enrolled in VPPs can provide critical services including backup power. A recent report from the Brattle Group found that across the United States, using VPPs rather than building new large power plants could save more than $15 billion annually by 2030.
With 19 members from the automotive, building, energy service, and software sectors, VP3 supports policy updates, regulatory reforms, and market rules that can unlock and scale VPPs. This past year, RMI published The VPP Flipbook, a collection of VPP case studies highlighting key program design elements and takeaways to help utilities and other stakeholders implement efficient and impactful VPP programs.
In the 21st century, with all of our technological advances, no person should be without critical services. From Africa to the Caribbean to the United States, RMI is working to ensure everyone has access to the clean, affordable electricity they need.
Personal Stories
Meet some of the people who live and work with reliable electricity thanks to RMI, GEAPP, and local partners.
Mary Alaele Baelanki is a fashion designer who makes women’s and men’s clothing out of a stall at Wuse market, the largest market in Abuja, Nigeria with over 2,000 stalls. The market is powered by a 1 megawatt solar microgrid with battery storage, that runs Baelanki’s sewing machines and iron.
“It’s good working with the solar panel because even though rain is falling the light is OK. And there is no need to buy [fuel] for our generator.”
Aheji Gembo runs a small shop with cold drinks out of his home in the Zawaciki housing settlement in northern Nigeria. The unreliable power from the grid made his business challenging. But he now has power from the 1 megawatt solar minigrid powering the community, helping him grow his small business from one fridge to four.
“Sometimes we even spent two days without electricity. But now that we have this minigrid... they give us at least 16 to 20 hours of electricity a day, every day.”
Blessing Bitru is a fish trader in Kiguna community, Nasarawa State, Nigeria, who used to buy fish and sell it at a low price because she had no refrigeration. She used to lose up to 50 percent of her fish due to spoilage. Now the community has a 60 kilowatt solar hybrid minigrid that powers a three-ton cold room.
“This cold room has been very helpful. We are very appreciative of the cold room. Now we’ll buy fish, plenty of fish, and keep it there so our fish doesn’t spoil. And we don’t have to sell our fish very cheaply.”
“Our work with RMI has shown that many emerging economies are already leading on EVs. We are collaborating with RMI’s expert teams in Nigeria and Indonesia to demonstrate how philanthropy can supercharge this transition to boost local economies, create cleaner air, and support an equitable shift to clean energy.”
Using Less Energy to Do Much More
To deliver affordable, clean energy globally, efficiency gains are essential. At RMI, the quiet hero of the energy transition is getting a fresh focus.
Efficiency has been fundamental to RMI’s success since our earliest days. Consider the home of RMI cofounder Amory Lovins, which doubled as RMI’s first headquarters in the 1980s. The building is a living showcase of efficiency hacks, from the established — like super-insulated windows — to the more exotic, such as passive heating solutions that sustain a small grove of tropical banana trees year-round in Basalt, Colorado’s alpine climate.
Efficiency is deceptively simple. It means doing more with less, reducing both costs and waste in the process. Whether lighting a room using a fraction of the electricity or needing less heat to keep a well-insulated building comfortable, the solutions are often invisible. For decades, efficiency gains have helped countless technologies, industries, and the wider economy do more with less energy.
Yet as the world transitions to clean energy, efficiency has suffered from under-investment and inattention. RMI is working to re-elevate efficiency, making the case to recognize its critical value and boost investment in parallel with spending on conventional clean energy technologies.
Indeed, efficiency gains could accelerate the arrival of a carbon-free energy system by a decade or more, while making the transition cheaper and more equitable. And many businesses and governments have taken notice and are now applying RMI’s ideas and whole-systems approach to efficiency at an unprecedented scale.
With support from RMI’s Acceleration Fund, we are re-invigorating our efficiency work with new thought leadership, research, and analysis to ensure that policymakers and business leaders embrace efficiency and demand-side solutions as catalysts to reach our climate goals. A donor-supported source of flexible funding, the Acceleration Fund helps us scale proven work rapidly and broadly and refine emerging projects that that can offer a big return on philanthropic investment.
Building efficiency and affordability
Outside Mumbai, India’s largest city, a development called Palava City is “an efficiency dream in progress,” as RMI CEO Jon Creyts put it. RMI has collaborated with Lodha, one of India’s largest real estate developers, on the project since 2018. The 45,000-unit, 4,500-acre development boasts extensive on-site solar power and water-reuse systems, along with passive design features such as window shading, building orientation, and green space to cut the heat load. Lodha’s Net Zero Urban Accelerator “is a major step in this direction to drive collaborative, large-scale solutions for a greener future,” said Abhishek Lodha, managing director and CEO of Lodha Group.
Palava City also provides a living laboratory to test efficiency theories and push new technologies. The Global Cooling Efficiency Accelerator, cofounded by RMI, is gathering data there on real-world air conditioner (AC) performance. This testing is an essential step to unlock the kind of innovation showcased in the Global Cooling Prize, which RMI led along with India’s Department of Science & Technology and Mission Innovation.
Judged on their performance on both their climate benefits as well as their affordability compared to current technologies, the prize winners designed and built ACs that slashed electricity demand by 75 percent. But so far, outdated performance testing has hindered the commercialization and scaling of such innovative technologies. That’s why RMI and our partners are developing new performance metrics that reflect the true cost and energy savings of high-efficiency AC units.
As dangerously hot temperatures multiply worldwide, cooling is increasingly a necessity to protect public health — not an optional luxury. And as the technology spreads around the world, lowering its energy needs is vital. By mid-century, updated standards could triple the efficiency of cooling equipment, according to a recent UN Environment Programme report that featured contributions from RMI experts.
The deep force of efficiency
At scales both large and small, efficiency — along with renewable energy and electrification — is transforming the global energy system and reducing demand for fossil fuels, RMI’s Kingsmill Bond, Sam Butler-Sloss, and Daan Walter write in their third annual energy transition report. Renewables and electrification are directly replacing fossil technologies, while efficiency gains — such as the two- to four-fold efficiency gains from switching to EVs and electric heat pumps — reduce the total energy needed (see exhibit above): As renewables multiply and efficiency expands globally, fossil fuels are being squeezed out everywhere.
China is leading the way in this transformation, but countries around the world, including in the Global South, are also seeing exponential growth as they seek to keep pace in the global clean energy race. “Cleantech is now 10 percent of global GDP growth,” the authors explain, “and there is a race to lead the cleantech industries of the future.”
Nevertheless, efficiency remains an underutilized — and under recognized — resource (see exhibit below). All too often, this lack of recognition means that efficiency misses funding, even when it often delivers the biggest bang for the buck. Much low-hanging fruit remains, such as upgrades to home insulation or air sealing that can shave 10 to 20 percent from energy bills — savings that can help all building owners and residents, especially low-income tenants. “Efficiency makes the energy transition faster, cheaper, more equitable, and more widely beneficial for the planet,” RMI’s James Newcomb and his colleagues wrote in an August article.
Keeping our foot on the accelerator
For more than four decades, RMI has pushed energy efficiency into the mainstream, as evidenced by the more than 100,000 visitors to Amory’s home and the emergence of efficiency-minded developments such as Palava City. But the job is far from done. As the energy transition takes off, RMI is doubling down on efficiency solutions that deliver economic, climate, and societal benefits for people around the world.
Amory Debuts in New York Times Crossword
The clue? Measure of energy savings, as when the meter runs in reverse
What’s an eight-letter word for energy savings? On February 1, 2024, Amory Lovins received what many crossword enthusiasts — and energy wonks — consider a lifetime honor: inclusion of “negawatt” in The New York Times daily crossword. In 1989, Lovins noticed a typo in a Colorado Public Utilities Commission report with "negawatt" instead of "megawatt". He adopted the term to help popularize the value of avoiding the need to generate more electricity through smart conservation and efficiency investment.
Spotlight: Efficiency is the Essential Catalyst
Today’s energy system is shockingly inefficient. Globally, we waste almost two-thirds of all primary energy — worth over $4.5 trillion or nearly 5 percent of worldwide GDP — before any bulbs glow, cars roll, or other kind of value is created with that energy.
Amory Lovins, Kingsmill Bond, and other RMI experts not only showed the inefficiency of the fossil fuel system in a June 2024 in-depth article, but also explained how the fundamentals of the global energy system are shifting, as coal, gas, and oil technologies are undercut by lower cost, more-efficient alternatives.
And in RMI’s 2024 report, The Cleantech Revolution, some of those same experts explain how, as electricity grows to become the largest source of useful energy, efficiency has reduced energy demand by a fifth. “Efficiency lies at the core of the energy transition to come, as was the case in energy transitions before,” the report states. “It should not merely be seen as one driver out of many but as an essential catalyst driving competitiveness, sustainability, and availability of all new clean technologies and systems.”
Spotlight: Global Cooling for All
Last year was the warmest ever recorded, with countries from the equator to the poles experiencing dangerous heat waves that are only predicted to worsen. This extreme heat is expected to drive a 2.5 times jump in cooling energy use from current levels, with an additional 5 billion air conditioners (ACs), by 2050. RMI, the Government of India, and Mission Innovation started the Global Cooling Prize in 2018 to come up with a more efficient and affordable air conditioner. In 2021, two teams won the prize for their units that emit five times less carbon than typical AC units.
With the technology piloted, the next barriers are regulatory and market based — so RMI is focusing on these fronts. In 2024, RMI and partners formed a coalition called the Global Cooling Efficiency Accelerator to take the products from promise to commercial reality. The ACs are now being field tested in Palava City, India, to help inform policy and bring affordable, super-efficient units to market.
The Light House Project in Perumbakkam, Chennai, offers another example of scaling efficient building solutions with potential benefits globally. Inaugurated by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, the project provides 1,152 affordable housing units. Completed in just 17 months at a cost of around $14 million, the project demonstrates scalable solutions for India’s urban housing challenges. At the Light House Project, RMI applied high solar reflective index coatings to the roofs, demonstrating that simple, affordable solutions can help keep temperatures down. In this case, the roofs’ outside surface fell by up to 8°F during peak hours; indoor temperatures fell by up to 4°F.
Since first hearing Amory Lovins’ stirring message of the power of energy efficiency, I have been a supporter and promoter of RMI’s work. Amory’s advice to ‘always take your best buy first’ remains true. End-use efficiency makes every other energy buy more potent. I am thrilled to know that RMI has elevated its efficiency practice, and I will continue to support your work.
Spotlight: Financing Electric Two- and Three-Wheelers
India has the world’s largest fleet of two- and three-wheeled vehicles, which are used to make deliveries, as taxis, and for personal trips. But many of India’s cities have terrible air quality — a large part of which is due to the millions of petrol burning vehicles on their roads.
Shifting these two- and three-wheelers to electric, in India and around the world, is crucial for both environmental and equity reasons. But limited access to financing to help buy new, cleaner electric vehicles is a barrier. Today, just over 6 percent for two-wheelers and 21 percent for three-wheelers are currently electrified, versus the target of 30 percent by 2030, which would help reduce air pollution, save money, and improve health.
RMI’s report, De-Risking Lending for a Brisk EV Uptake is a practical guide for how market actors and financiers can more effectively manage and mitigate electric two- and three-wheeler lending risks. Indian financiers have been using the findings in the report to improve and grow their financing programs, including the Electric Mobility Financiers of Association of India (EMFAI). The implementation of these de-risking measures has now become a core strategy for EMFAI, and the identified practices are being leveraged to reduce perceived risks in electric vehicle financing.
Spotlight: EV Charging Solutions for All
Much of the current electric vehicle (EV) charging infrastructure in the United States is concentrated in higher-income communities characterized by single-family housing. This past year brought an unprecedented level of funding for EV charging infrastructure, and we must ensure that those charging solutions are affordable, reliable, and safe for all, including multifamily housing residents and lower-income neighborhoods.
So RMI engaged with residents in those communities to learn about their transportation needs and propose solutions. We published our findings in Plugging into Mobility Needs at Lower-Income Multifamily Housing, providing scalable, replicable solutions that policymakers and utilities can use to prioritize equity in their transportation electrification efforts. So far, the findings have been used by utilities and departments of transportation in Portland, Ore., Phoenix, Ariz., and Atlanta. Collectively, the three cities have committed to install new EV charging ports at 14 low-income multifamily communities.
“RMI was instrumental in helping Portland receive important community input which has informed our approach to EV charging-related programs and policy for low-income residents living in multifamily housing.”
Investing in People
RMI is training, equipping, and empowering people around the world to provide the skills required to win the clean energy race.
The shift to a carbon-free economy is the biggest economic opportunity of our era. And it starts with people. To reach net-zero by 2050, we need to train and develop a specialized workforce across the diverse ecosystem of financiers, utilities, developers, installers, and more. A recent International Energy Agency report estimated that to reach net-zero emissions by 2050, 14 million new clean energy jobs will need to be created globally by 2030, with another 16 million existing workers shifting to new roles in clean energy.
RMI has been working hard to unlock, equip, and empower this workforce. It will take the participation of everyone to achieve a clean energy economy and no one should be left out.
Modernizing the grid with people power
Our grid of the future needs technically savvy, ambitious, future-oriented planners. To invest in these leaders, RMI launched a Transmission Fellowship Program.
In the year-long program, eight fellows were embedded in clean energy and environmental NGOs across the United States. Fellows gained hands-on experience by supporting their organization’s efforts to plan and build transmission at the pace, scale, and sophistication needed. The fellowship included a combination of industry experience, an intensive curriculum, peer-to-peer learning, and mentorship, helping to fill a critical knowledge and experience gap.
Ben Adams, a Transmission Fellow hosted by the Southern Alliance for Clean Energy ― a nonprofit that promotes equitable energy access across communities in the US Southeast ― called the fellowship an outstanding experience. “I came into this program with only casual knowledge of the energy sector and, thanks to a varied and extensive set of learning tools provided by RMI and my host organization, I have developed skills and knowledge that will help me make an impact on this critical component of our clean energy future,” he explains.
RMI also leveraged the fellowship curriculum to offer a transmission fundamentals training Program. Nearly 60 people from clean energy and environmental NGOs participated, attending a bi-weekly training course over 10 months.
In Nigeria and the Caribbean, partner utilities requested RMI’s support to develop training courses and guides on battery energy storage, modeling power systems, and utility-scale solar and storage. Developed in partnership with the US National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) and our regional partners, these training tools are being used by utilities across the Caribbean and Nigeria to upgrade their generation systems and provide more reliable, clean, and secure electricity.
Supporting women in the workforce
To address the lack of women in high-level energy positions, RMI supports the Women in Renewable Energy (WIRE) network, a professional networking group for Caribbean women working in energy. Gender balance in the energy workforce can breed innovation and provide agile solutions to more effectively make the shift needed for the energy transition. WIRE’s goal is to boost gender equality across the energy sector by ensuring a pipeline of motivated and experienced women.
One way that WIRE does this is through its two-year mentorship program. Each year, 12 women are selected and paired with more established women in senior leadership roles for guidance on how to make the most of their professional opportunities. The current WIRE Mentorship Program currently hosts 24 women across 14 nations in the Caribbean.
Shalenie Madho, a WIRE alumna from Trinidad and Tobago, says that her professional pathway was significantly shaped by her participation in WIRE. As the Climate Finance Access Network advisor in Jamaica, “WIRE was more than a network, it was a sisterhood,” says Madho, “having a supportive community is crucial for women in male-dominated fields. It can provide them with the confidence and support they need to succeed in their careers.”
Building on our success in the Caribbean, RMI is starting to expand the WIRE program to Africa.
With support from RMI’s Acceleration Fund, we are expanding these efforts and will launch a WIRE technical track focused on large-scale energy storage projects, helping build capacity among women energy leaders in the Caribbean Islands. A donor-supported source of flexible funding, the Acceleration Fund helps us scale proven work rapidly and broadly and refine emerging projects that that can offer a big return on philanthropic investment.
Access to finance
To build more clean energy projects, we also need to train more professionals to better access financing. RMI’s Climate Finance Access Network (CFAN) has been training and deploying climate finance advisors in governments throughout the Pacific since 2022. These advisors develop high-quality projects to make their islands more resilient to climate change and to help meet their climate goals.
In the past year, three more countries and the international development organization, The Pacific Community, were added to the mix, for a total of 12 Pacific advisors who have mobilized $67 million thus far. The money unlocked not only helps countries with adaptation and mitigation, but also creates more local clean energy jobs.
This past year, CFAN expanded into the Caribbean, with eight advisors supporting The Bahamas, Barbados, Grenada, Jamaica, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Lucia, the CARICOM Development Fund, and The Caribbean Community Climate Change Centre.
“We take a practical approach to addressing the climate challenge, one that is driven by country priorities and is fundamentally people-centered,” says Laetitia De Marez, RMI CFAN director. “In this effort to unlock climate finance, our advisors are the tip of the spear.”
Globally, CFAN advisors have a project pipeline totaling US$1.3 billion. These projects cover climate-resilient agriculture, sustainable forests, waste management, clean mobility, renewable energy, and more.
In the clean energy race, climate action is more than just about technology or economics, it’s about people. RMI is working hard to ensure we have enough people with the right skills and know-how to do the work we need to win the race for our future.
Spotlight: A Community to Catalyze Energy Solutions
Launched this past year, RMI’s Regulatory Collaborative (Reg Lab) is a cohort-style initiative that builds regulatory staff capacity and develops cutting-edge solutions to pressing issues. The first Reg Lab cohort brought together staff from 13 US states to explore the cutting edge of planning and federal funding. The goal was to help utility resource plans incorporate Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) opportunities to help utilities meet future grid needs. A new toolkit informed by the cohort, Planning to Harness the Inflation Reduction Act, provides a suite of tools and benchmarks that regulators can leverage to ensure that resource plans optimize federal funding to benefit ratepayers.
Spotlight: Accelerating Local Clean Energy Opportunities
RMI and the Brookings Institution developed a free resource — the Clean Growth Tool — that matches cities and regions across the United States to clean energy industries and technologies. The tool shows where clean energy industries are best poised to thrive in communities across all 50 states, given existing workforce strengths and related economic capabilities, and it shows the workforce gaps that communities can bridge to improve their long-term industrial competitiveness. The tool’s insights have been discussed by stakeholders across the country, from economic developers in the Pacific Northwest, to state energy officials in the Midwest to staff on Capitol Hill.
Personal Story
Skeeta Carrasco: Financing Critical Infrastructure Projects in the Caribbean
Skeeta Carrasco grew up in Saint Lucia, and lived without access to electricity for the first 16 years of her life. Living on a low-lying island often hit by severe weather also made her very aware of climate change’s effects on aging infrastructure and across the agriculture, health, and utility sectors. Carasco knows, after years working with Saint Lucia’s water and energy regulator, that what’s needed are investments to climate-proof and harden infrastructure to make it more resilient to storms.
Through the Climate Finance Access Network (CFAN), Carasco is now the Climate Finance Advisor for Saint Lucia, helping to unlock much needed finance for the climate adaptation and mitigation projects that the island wants to pursue. The island needs upgrades; increased water storage capacity within water systems; more water treatment and collection systems; improved infrastructure for roads, pipes, and intakes; and a more resilient energy system.
But Carasco also knows that good intentions can go awry if they don’t take into account the perspectives and insights of the communities they’re designed to serve. This is where key facets of Carasco’s role come into play, including stakeholder consultation as a critical part of her work to design climate finance project proposals. She meets with the engineers, healthcare workers, utility representatives, community residents, and others to make sure that critical perspectives are taken into consideration. “I always knew this sort of consultation was important, but it’s never been so evident,” Carasco says. “Bringing those diverse perspectives and knowledge together helps ensure the success of a project.”
Carasco is currently working on procuring funding for several solar microgrids on critical facilities across the island including schools, hospitals, and a water treatment center. “CFAN has allowed me to connect the dots between critical infrastructure work, climate resilience, and the needs of communities,” Carasco says. “I am now in the best position to make a difference, because finance is the biggest challenge that Caribbean countries face.”
The Heinz Endowments is thrilled to partner with RMI to support Pittsburgh’s transition to a new clean energy economy. RMI’s unique ability to conduct critical analysis, convene diverse stakeholders, and drive investment to the region is helping the city serve as a national model for other US cities looking to do the same.
Driving Investment in Clean Energy
Suppliers don’t grow if they can’t connect with customers. So when it comes to scaling carbon-free solutions, RMI is banding together buyers to nurture demand and grow markets.
Many of the solutions to our most pressing decarbonization problems exist today, but not at the scale or price point that the world needs to reach its net-zero goals. In heavy industry, one of the most challenging sectors to decarbonize, solutions can get lost in a chicken-and-egg paradox. The high up-front investment required to produce clean products forces suppliers to increase prices, at least initially, making it harder for more costlier, low-emissions products to compete in traditional markets. The product languishes in the purgatory of “almost there.”
At RMI, we know that “almost” is not enough to face up to the challenge of catastrophic climate change, so we’ve devised a solution: buyers’ platforms that bring customers together to aggregate demand. Much like how crowdfunding platforms such as a startup’s Kickstarter campaign can prove that customers are ready to pay for a product that may not yet exist, these buyers’ platforms signal that real customers are committed to paying for future products.
Alongside our partners, RMI has played a key role in several platforms and collaborations bringing together customers in the aviation, shipping, steel, and concrete sectors.
The Sustainable Aviation Buyers Alliance: To accelerate the shift to net-zero aviation, SABA facilitates the pooling of demand from interested airlines, shippers, and others for sustainable aviation fuel certificates (SAFc); in turn, vendors compete on price to deliver these pooled orders, leading to lower prices and greater volume. In April 2024, the largest-ever collection of deals to purchase high-integrity SAFc went through: 20 corporations committing to approximately $200 million worth of SAFc over five years — equal to about 50 million gallons of high-integrity SAF or 500,000 tons of abated CO2 equivalent (CO2e). This is roughly equivalent to the emissions of 3,000 fully loaded passenger flights from New York City to London. With that milestone deal on the books, more are expected soon.
The Zero Emissions Maritime Buyers Alliance: ZEMBA is a first-of-its-kind buyers’ group within the maritime sector with the mission to accelerate commercial deployment of zero-emission (ZE) shipping fuel and technologies, enable economies of scale for freight buyers and suppliers, and help cargo owners maximize emissions reduction potential beyond what any single buyer could accomplish alone. In April 2024, ZEMBA, in collaboration with RMI and the Mærsk Mc-Kinney Møller Center for Zero Carbon Shipping, announced that it successfully completed its deal with global container line Hapag-Lloyd as part of a collective tender process. Under the agreement, over a dozen companies committed to purchase the emissions reduction credits that will avoid 82,000 metric tons of CO2 equivalent over two years through Hapag-Lloyd’s independently certified and exclusively waste-based biomethane service.
Sustainable Steel Buyers Platform: SSBP is a first-of-its-kind buyers’ group working to accelerate the path to net-zero steel by driving investment in deeply decarbonized ironmaking technologies, stimulating the initial supply of near-zero emissions ore-based steel, and supporting end-users of steel in achieving their supply chain emissions targets. In September 2024, RMI launched a Request for Proposal to steel producers on behalf of SSBP membership for near-zero emissions steel for delivery into North America before 2030. This inaugural procurement process aims to provide clean steelmakers with the bankable agreements they need to spur project investment and accelerate the energy transition across this sector.
Activating demand for low-Emissions cement and concrete: RMI is working with the Center for Green Market Activation (GMA) to strengthen demand for low-carbon concrete. The first phase consists of the design of a standardized “book and claim” system, a well-established market mechanism that nurtures the growth of clean supplies (see sidebar below). In the second phase, RMI and GMA will aggregate demand for direct and indirect procurement of low-carbon concrete.
These market signals are just the beginning for these ambitious buyers’ platforms, and more offtake agreements are planned in the coming months. These organizations will continue to facilitate demand aggregation as markets mature, scaling the demand signal needed to catalyze supply growth of lower-carbon products, and driving the lower-carbon product markets toward cost-parity. At RMI, we know that change can’t happen alone, but even the heaviest lift can be achieved when we band together.
Spotlight: Catalyzing Growth in the Global South
This year, RMI launched the Catalytic Climate Capital (C3) team to coordinate RMI’s efforts to mobilize, scale up, and catalyze climate finance globally. Led by RMI energy investment expert Ije Ikoku Okeke, C3 focuses on helping the climate finance community in the Global South move from small kilowatt-scale, grant-funded clean energy pilots to gigawatt, commercial-scale projects funded through a mix of private, public, and philanthropic partnerships.
RMI is scaling financial impact through Project Preparation and Development Facilities (PPDFs), which support utilities and project developers in securing commercial financing and bringing projects online — while building their capacity to scale this work independently in the future. A relatively small PPDF investment of support can de-risk a project and create a significant multiplier effect. In Saint Lucia, for example, RMI’s $400,000 PPDF generated a $7.4 million final project investment; in the Bahamas, $200,000 led to $2.7 million; in Monserrat, $600,000 created $9.2 million. But this is only the start, by leveraging RMI’s unique expertise, C3’s goal is to mobilize 10 GW of bankable projects over the next three years.
Spotlight: Cleaner Energy Through Smart Accounting
A book and claim system separates a product’s environmental attributes from its physical form, allowing the two to be sold separately. These systems are helpful when direct access to a physical product is limited. So a kilowatt hour of electricity produced from a windmill can be divided into the electricity plus the value of the emissions reductions it delivers relative to the grid average. The producer (say, an Illinois wind farm) can sell the power to its local market and separately “book” and sell the emissions savings to a different buyer — even one far away. The buyer (say, a big Florida supermarket that can’t buy renewable power from its local utility) can “claim” the emissions benefit from the Illinois wind power. Pioneered for renewable power markets, book-and-claim systems have since expanded to shipping and aviation fuel, along with the production of plastics, cement, steel, and other materials.
Spotlight: RMI Takes First-Ever Sustainable Commercial Flight
This past year marked a turning point for sustainable aviation. In November 2023, a Virgin Atlantic passenger jet flew from London to New York using 100 percent sustainable aviation fuel (SAF), a historic first. The fuel — made from organic waste products and farming residues — when combusted in a jet engine, can cut carbon emissions by up to 70 percent.
RMI’s Joey Cathcart and Thomas Koch Blank were aboard that historic flight where they also helped trial new technologies to track and characterize contrails — those wispy clouds of condensation that follow aircraft — which can increase the planet-warming impact of flying. Developed with Virgin Atlantic, this innovative in-flight contrail observation reporting process is quickly proving to be easily applied, helping to enhance contrail prediction modeling accuracy and improving prevention.
For Cathcart, a lifelong flying fanatic, the SAF-powered flight is a step toward normalizing this game-changing fuel. “For me, it’s incredibly exciting. It’s about demonstrating that this shouldn’t be outside the norm,” Cathcart says. “Success is, more than anything, just showing that this can be done.”
With these and other collaborative approaches on the horizon, the huge opportunity to address the climate impact of aviation is becoming less cloudy.
Spotlight: Groundbreaking Corporate Partnership to Transform the Grid
Akamai, Apple, General Motors, HASI, Meta, Microsoft, Prologis, Salesforce, Walmart, and other leading companies have joined with RMI to launch the Zero-Emissions | Reliability Optimized Grid Initiative, or ZEROgrid — a comprehensive roadmap to accelerate the transition to a zero-emissions grid.
This is a first-of-a-kind corporate effort to ensure rising electricity demand driven by industrial electrification and the rise of electric vehicles and artificial intelligence is met with clean, reliable energy.
To do this, the focus and the incentives for companies must expand beyond the traditional practice of buying more renewables on the grid where it is convenient. Businesses can play a leading role by working across systems, with grid operators and policymakers, to drive decarbonization alongside reliability and affordability.
Already, ZEROgrid has assessed best practices to define how corporations can play a key role in clean policy advocacy, cleantech investment, research and development, piloting new technologies, and operational changes. Now, they are turning their attention to pilot projects that incorporate grid enhancing technologies, virtual power plants (energy resources like solar panels and batteries that can serve an electricity grid during high demand), and more.
Spotlight: A Toolkit to Finance Green Aviation
In April 2024, RMI announced the launch of the Pegasus Guidelines, the first voluntary climate-aligned finance framework for the aviation sector, designed to help banks independently measure and disclose the emissions intensity and/or climate alignment of their aviation lending portfolios compared to a 1.5°C scenario. Five leading global banks — BNP Paribas, Citi, Crédit Agricole CIB, Société Générale, and Standard Chartered — supported the guidelines’ development.
Underpinning the Pegasus Guidelines is an understanding that financial institutions and airlines — together with policymakers, customers, airports, fuel producers, and NGOs — must collaborate to help the industry decarbonize. Cooperation between banks, investors, and policymakers will be particularly important to accelerate the production of sustainable aviation fuel (SAF) — the airline sector’s best solution to cut climate pollution.
Fiscal Year 2024 Financials and More
FY24 Financial Statement
RMI's revenue grew significantly in fiscal year 2024.
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