Ending Energy Poverty by 2030
This Arabella report provides a broad assessment of the clean energy access landscape and identifies key existing initiatives, critical gaps in the field, and preliminary near-term investment opportunities.
Achieving the UN’s Sustainable Development Goals and meeting climate targets set by the Paris Agreement is a vital—and ambitious—endeavor. Delivering clean, affordable, renewable energy to 1.1 billion people around the world would pave the way for staggering economic and social growth opportunities, in addition to saving the health of the planet. Unfortunately, current investment momentum is leading in the direction of large-scale, centralized fossil fuel-based ventures that will exclude vast swaths of the rural poor.
The main barriers to solving energy poverty are: 1) a dearth of policies that support the development of distributed energy sources, 2) adequate financing of such projects at scale, and 3) the lack of a local, trained workforce to build and maintain these systems. This report maps out today’s clean energy access landscape and identifies promising renewable initiatives as well as glaring gaps in the field. Arabella also recommends near-term investment opportunities for civil society organizations and mission investors interested in advancing the cause of historically marginalized people.