Inevitable Ep 66: Marilyn Waite, Program Officer, Climate & Clean Energy Finance at William & Flora Hewlett Foundation
Today’s guest is Marilyn Waite, Program Officer, Climate & Clean Energy Finance at William & Flora Hewlett Foundation.
Marilyn manages the foundation’s grantmaking on climate and clean energy finance with the ambitious goal of addressing climate change by accelerating the transition to a climate-friendly economy. Her grantmaking mobilizes private capital investments in low-carbon and climate-friendly energy infrastructure and systems, seeking to redirect finance from high- to low-carbon activities and encourage wiser energy investments. A key component to this work includes assessing climate finance flows, identifying ways to lower the cost and risk of investment, and supporting innovations in capital markets to address investor requirements for clean energy and climate-aligned projects.
Marilyn has worked across four continents in venture investment, startups, and low-carbon energy. She previously led the clean energy practice at Village Capital, where she sourced and performed due diligence for early-stage startups solving energy challenges and built a network of 1,000-plus clean tech entrepreneurs, investors, corporations, and government stakeholders. As a senior research fellow at Project Drawdown, she modeled and forecasted energy solutions to climate change. Marilyn led several operational and research and development projects at AREVA in France, including performing technical and economic studies in the energy-water nexus and the nuclear energy cycle.
Author of Sustainability at Work, Marilyn serves on the board of directors for the Biomimicry Institute and lectures on sustainable business at the University of International Business and Economics in Beijing. She is an E2 1 Hotels Fellow, and as such, her work and writing highlights opportunities in women-led, green economy startups throughout the country.
She holds a bachelor’s of science degree in civil and environmental engineering, magna cum laude, from Princeton University and a master’s degree with distinction in engineering for sustainable development from the University of Cambridge.
In today’s episode, we cover:
- Overview of the Hewlett Foundation
- Marilyn’s professional history, leading her up to her current role
- When she started caring about climate change, and why
- Her current role, focus areas, how they determine how grants are allocated, and some example projects
- How they measure success, and how this work ties into broader climate fight
- What else can be high impact in climate fight
- How Marilyn would allocate a big pot of money to maximize its impact in the climate fight
- Marilyn’s advice for you and I for how we can help
Links to topics discussed in this episode:
- William and Flora Hewlett Foundation: https://hewlett.org/
- New Energy Nexus: https://www.newenergynexus.com/
- Project Drawdown: https://www.drawdown.org/
- Village Capital: https://vilcap.com/
- PCAF: https://carbonaccountingfinancials.com/
- Multilateral development banks: https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/R41170.pdf
- Clean Energy Federal Credit Union: https://www.cleanenergycu.org/home/home
- Winners Take All book: https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/539747/winners-take-all-by-anand-giridharadas/
- Just Giving book: https://www.barnesandnoble.com/w/just-giving-rob-reich/1128553898
- Decolonizing Wealth book: https://www.amazon.com/Decolonizing-Wealth-Indigenous-Divides-Restore/dp/1523097892
- Global Alliance for Banking on Values: http://www.gabv.org/
You can find me on twitter @jjacobs22 or @mcjpod and email at info@myclimatejourney.co, where I encourage you to share your feedback on episodes and suggestions for future topics or guests.
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*Editing and post-production work for this episode was provided by The Podcast Consultant