The Rockefeller Foundation launches Global Commission to End Energy Poverty

To address one of the greatest challenges of the 21^st century: the lack of access to electricity for almost a billion people across the world, particularly in sub-Saharan Africa, the Rockefeller Foundation launched  Global Commission to End Energy Poverty (GCEEP), driving a new agenda to provide electricity to hundreds of millions in pursuit of the UN’s 2030 Sustainable Development Goal 7. The GCEEP is an acceleration of The Rockefeller Foundation’s work on energy poverty and will fast-track sustainable power solutions, investments, and partnerships that will deploy globally over the next decade.

The Commission is co-chaired by Ernest J. Moniz, Professor of Physics & Engineering Systems Emeritus MIT, and former U.S. Secretary of Energy; President of the Rockefeller Foundation and former USAID Administrator Dr. Rajiv J. Shah; and Africa Development Bank President Akinwumi Adesina.

To make this effort possible, the Foundation has given a grant to The MIT Energy Initiative (MITEI). MITEI’s research team has developed an inception report, released this week that frames salient issues in the sector and serves as a starting point for the Commission’s work. The research team will be led by GCEEP Secretary and MIT Energy Initiative Deputy Director Robert Stoner and Ignacio Perez-Arriaga, Part-time Professor and Director of Energy Training at the Florence School of Regulation and MIT visiting professor. The research team is focused on identifying and addressing the barriers to achieving universal, economically impactful electrification.

The GCEEP launch event also featured the release of an inception report developed by the MITEI research team to frame the salient issues in the sector today and serve as a starting point for the Commission’s work. During the course of its grant, MITEI will identify an implementable roadmap to end energy poverty with solutions that would provide affordable, sustainable, and reliable energy for all.

This week, on September 25, the co-chairs will meet at a panel event during the United Nations General Assembly in New York at The Rockefeller Foundation’s offices.

For more information on the Global Commission to End Energy Poverty and its work, as well as a full list of commissioners, please visit endenergypoverty.org.