The authors evaluated the effects of a large-scale ethanol cooking fuel promotion program in Dar es Salaam, Tanzania, and found substantial uptake of ethanol cooking. However, alternative fuels were not fully replaced under this scheme. The report concludes that improving the relative convenience of ethanol as a cooking fuel is needed to achieve broader positive impacts. 

Increasing plastic waste pollution has led to a rising prevalence of the open burning of plastic waste, especially in locations lacking formal waste-management systems. Poor, urban communities in the Global South face particularly acute challenges in accessing both organized waste-collection services and low-cost traditional energy sources, and clean cooking fuel alternatives tend to be unaffordable for their low-income residents.

Can low- and middle-income countries meet human development imperatives while decommissioning fossil fuel infrastructure or avoiding further fossil fuel development? A high-level panel at Climate Week NYC 2024—moderated by Jackson Ewing and featuring executive in residence Alix Peterson Zwane alongside global investment leaders—attempted to address just that.

This study develops a unique and comprehensive household and plot-level dataset covering ten districts of Ethiopia complemented with remotely sensed data and qualitative information collected from the study sites. The econometric results show that compared to open-access plots equipped with pump irrigation, other irrigated configurations—especially private groundwater-based systems—have higher vegetation cover and show less susceptibility to the most common environmental concerns mentioned in the survey regions: water logging, soil salinity, and erosion externalities.

Addressing climate change requires urgent and innovative action aimed at both mitigating its effects and addressing its most severe impacts. However, current investment levels are insufficient to match the escalating climate risks and damages. Despite the annual target of $100 billion established at the 2009 United Nations Climate Change Conference/Conference of Parties, climate finance directed to low- and middle-income countries continues to lag behind stated goals.

This year’s edition of the State of Blended Finance published by Convergence once again focuses on climate. Climate change continues to be central to the blended finance market and to sustainable development more broadly. Jackson Ewing, director of energy and climate policy at the Nicholas Institute, and Jonathan Phillips, director of the James E. Rogers Energy Access Project at Duke, were among the experts and stakeholders interviewed for the report. Ewing and Phillips offered insights on Just Energy Transition Partnerships as a partnership model for mobilizing climate blended finance.

Climate change will have significant long-term impacts on people, ecosystems and the global economy. To avoid catastrophic impacts, the world must mobilize finance at scale to deliver rapid and substantial low-carbon transitions across sectors and regions. Improving sustainable finance approaches and enhancing market alignment with this transition is crucial. Evidence shows that climate finance is not reaching those who need it most. Despite the significant climate risks faced by women and girls, only 2.3% of climate finance intends to principally support gender equality. Low-carbon transitions must be designed with proper understanding of contextual gender inequalities.

In light of recent growth and falling costs of solar photovoltaic technology, this paper examines the barriers and opportunities facing off-grid development in Ethiopia, Kenya, Tanzania, and Uganda, four countries whose off-grid sectors vary in maturity.

Access to reliable renewable energy and energy efficiency can provide significant climate, development, and equity benefits. Transitions to clean energy are compatible with sustainable and equitable development and women’s economic empowerment. However, in the absence of adequate policies, they may reinforce existing inequalities. This policy brief summarizes the evidence that supports and knowledge gaps that hinder clean and inclusive energy transitions.

In 2022, the world remained unequally divided among those with resources and power and those without, such as the energy rich and poor, and men with more power and better pay than women. Cognizant of these inequities, the international community has pledged to close the gaps. This review examines theoretical frameworks on women’s empowerment, takes stock of the empirical literature on the connections between women’s empowerment and energy access, and places empirical results in the context of the theoretical literature.