Clean Energy Buyers Association (CEBA) – pronounced SEE-BAH – is a 501c6 business association that activates a community of energy customers and partners to deploy market and policy solutions for a carbon-free energy system.

The Clean Energy Buyers Association focuses on unlocking markets for energy customers, catalyzing communities of customers for deployment, and decarbonizing the grid for all.

The strength of our organization has been – and always will be – rooted in our team of people and our efforts to develop solutions and advocate for a decarbonized energy system. We will continue to catalyze our community to be greater than the sum of its parts through education, programming, collaboration, innovation, and activation.

The Clean Energy Buyers Institute (CEBI) – pronounced Seh-BEE – is a 501c3 public good charity that works to solve the toughest market and policy barriers to achieve a carbon-free energy system.

Like CEBA, CEBI will double down on the three transformations, unlocking markets for energy customers, catalyzing communities of customers for deployment, and decarbonizing the grid for all, but through the lens and work of a public charity and advocacy organization.

Together, the Clean Energy Buyers Association and the Clean Energy Buyers Institute will form the Clean Energy Buyers Alliance and will share a collective vision of customer-driven clean energy for all.

The Alliance is an inclusive community of energy customers, clean energy providers, service providers, leading NGOs, philanthropies, and thought- leaders. Any organization or individual with a commitment to accelerating the clean energy transition and decarbonizing the global energy system can find a home in CEBA or CEBI. Join us!

Our overarching theory of change is that clean energy customers have a critical role to play in positively influencing energy providers and policymakers and have proven their capability by driving the evolution of the energy market for the last decade.

The Clean Energy Buyers Association and Clean Energy Buyers Institute will achieve our bold ambition through three key transformations:

1. Unlock markets for energy customers to use demand and market-influence to accelerate electricity decarbonization
2. Catalyze communities of customers to more rapidly deploy and to do more than they could on their own
3. Decarbonize the grid for all, including those who can’t/won’t participate in markets

These transformations are made possible by accelerating and growing clean energy transactions; solving the toughest market barriers; and activating our communities to be greater than the sum of our parts.

Despite great progress over the last decade, the U.S. is at risk of falling short of meeting both the market need and demand for clean energy. Only 40% of U.S. power generation comes from carbon-free energy sources today. To ensure we unlock markets for energy customers we need well-designed energy markets that allow customers to optimize for decarbonization, reliability, and cost AND we need utilities and retail providers to offer carbon-free energy options to customers.

Energy customers are essential to accelerating a just and carbon-free energy future, however, there is a gap in awareness and education for companies that want to reduce carbon emissions. Commercial and industrial sector multinational companies and supply chains are responsible for 58% of global electricity. Catalyzing communities of energy customers will require exponential growth in energy customers prioritizing carbon-free energy and a global community of energy customers optimizing impact through collective climate action.

Public policies and utility programs are fragmented and hinder progress toward achieving the 45% reduction in CO2 emissions necessary by 2030 to limit climate impacts. To decarbonize the grid for all we need effective government policies through local, state and federal governments, congressional leadership, and support from the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that prioritize expansion and improvement of organized wholesale markets. We must also foster collaborative relationships with utilities to ensure progress and partnership toward decarbonization goals.

Experts and policymakers are aligning around the potential for the U.S. electricity to be 80% decarbonized by 2030 and some say 90% is possible. By aiming for 90%, we are putting forth a stretch, but critically necessary aspiration.

Do we know precisely how we will get there? Nope—if we did it would be a plan, not an aspiration! But the experience of the companies in the Clean Energy Buyers Association and Clean Energy Buyers Institute community have found that big transformations can happen when we align around the kind of vision and impact that’s needed in the market.

Our community includes ambitious, market-leading organizations that are increasing their own aspirations to support climate action, which includes an expanded focus on supply chains and international clean energy projects. An aspiration to grow a global community of energy customers will allow our organizations to contribute to decarbonization of worldwide electricity by 60% by 2030 as established by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

The entire global economy must fully decarbonize by mid-century. To get there, electricity systems must move faster. While the U.S. must lead, as the second largest emitter globally, we must also catalyze energy customers around the world to work with governments, NGOs, and communities to decarbonize every grid, while leveraging clean, reliable electricity to lift developing nations out of poverty like dirty power has afforded rich nations.

Every institutional energy customer, large and small, and every household deserves access to affordable, reliable, resilient, clean energy. We believe that large energy customers have the power to influence markets and policy in ways that will catalyze a clean energy system for all energy customers.

Likewise, for too long, marginalized communities across the U.S. and across the world, have born the brunt of the negative impacts of dirty power plants. By imbedding “for all” in our vision statement, the Clean Energy Buyers Alliance ensures that both CEBA and CEBI consider energy equity, environmental justice, and other human rights into all programs and priorities.

Every member company is essential to achieving our new vision of customer-driven clean energy for all. Your memberships will transition with all associated benefits included in individual member agreements to the Clean Energy Buyers Association. Our membership team – which will continue to be led by staff you engaged previously – will support you during renewal periods with updated invoices that will reflect our new organization name with minimal disruption. CEBA will continue to help members accelerate deployment of carbon-free energy projects, advocate for clean energy policies, and break down the barriers preventing energy customers from doing more to achieve clean energy goals.

Renewable energy is, and will remain, an integral piece of the decarbonization puzzle and will continue to be a priority for CEBA. Our organization will maintain its focus on supporting energy customers of all types, sizes, and sectors by accelerating procurement and policy solutions to improve access to clean energy options.

We recognize that every company has different needs and that many are at different stages in their journey. CEBA will continue to respect that its members are best positioned to determine what carbon-free technologies and emissions reductions strategies are best to achieve organizational goals.

The CEBA and CEBI Alliance remain technology agnostic and laser-focused on achieving our aspiration of a 90% carbon-free U.S. electricity system by 2030. We believe that a broad suite of technologies will be needed to achieve a decarbonized grid, including (but not limited to) expanded renewable energy and other carbon-free generation technologies, storage technologies, software and data systems to manage a rapidly changing network of generation and consumption, expanded transmission, etc.

Yes! Nearly every model, including the IPCC’s, shows that renewable energy of all types—wind, solar, geothermal, hydropower, some bio-based renewables—will be essential components of achieving a carbon-free, customer-focused, affordable power system. Helping our members achieve renewable energy goals and commitments remains a top priority for CEBA.

The energy industry has reached a new milestone as energy customers move to evaluate the true impact of renewable energy with an intensified focus on optimizing carbon reductions. In 2020, science-based greenhouse gas targets through the Science-Based Targets Initiative grew more than 165% signaling the importance of science and carbon-based goal setting. In addition, a greater emphasis on lifecycle issues beyond carbon impact has emerged with companies prioritizing resilience and energy security, social equity and labor rights, environmental sustainability, and supply chain greenhouse gas emissions.

We have always been more than just renewables, and we have embraced a technology-inclusive approach. The clarity that has been defined in our updated vision, mission and 2030 impact aspiration afford us this timely opportunity to better align our work and articulate who we are. We see it as an evolutionary change, not a revolutionary one. And it will help us drive deeper connections and realize the desired impact we seek to have among all our stakeholders.

We acknowledge that industry experts, including the IPCC, have modeled that carbon-free generation sources such as nuclear and fossil fuels with CCUS in concert with the full suite of renewable energy technologies may constitute a significant portion of a carbon-free energy system. The Clean Energy Buyers Association and Clean Energy Buyers Institute aim to create the largest collective of energy customers and partners to achieve our vision of customer-driven clean energy for all, and neither organization advises on inclusion or exclusion of technologies or strategies toward individual company solution sets.

Energy can't be truly clean if it is not carbon-free. It’s inclusion in the vision and missions for the Clean Energy Buyers Association and the Clean Energy Buyers Institute connects the reference to clean energy for all in our vision to carbon-free energy system in our respective missions.