Get to know us

Who we are

Founded in 1982 as Rocky Mountain Institute, RMI is an independent, nonpartisan, nonprofit that transforms global energy systems through market-driven solutions to align with a 1.5°C future and secure a clean, prosperous, zero-carbon future for all. We work in the world’s most critical geographies and engage businesses, policymakers, communities, and nongovernmental organizations to identify and scale energy system interventions that will cut greenhouse gas emissions at least 50 percent by 2030. Since our co-founding by Amory Lovins, RMI’s chairman emeritus, we have grown to over 600 experts working on four continents.

Our Mission: Transforming the global energy system to secure a clean, prosperous, zero-carbon future for all.

What we do

RMI decarbonizes energy systems through rapid, market-based change in the world’s most critical geographies to align with a 1.5°C future and address the climate crisis. We work with businesses, policymakers, communities and other organizations to identify and scale energy system interventions that will cut greenhouse gas emissions at least 50% by 2030.

For over 40 years, RMI has utilized our unique techno-economic expertise and whole-systems thinking to publish groundbreaking research and analysis. We bring together collaborations of rare reach, range and expertise—creating unconventional partnerships and mobilizing action to drive change on the massive scale needed to combat the climate crisis.

Our values

Applied Hope
We believe systemic change is possible. We are bold and visionary in our aspirations. We are solutions-oriented, practical, and inclined to action.

Intentional Partnership
We work with others to create equitable change for all. We focus our actions on where our unique strengths are best applied. We are responsible stewards of our resources and partnerships.

Active Learning
We take time to listen, knowing that only through our collective wisdom can we be successful. We use data to inform our work and adapt based on what we learn. We invest in our learning and growth.

Inclusive Collaboration
We seek out diversity and foster inclusion. We prioritize balance and wellness for ourselves and our teams. We are transparent and treat each other with respect.

How we do it

We stand at an unprecedented time in human history. We have until 2030 to avoid the worst effects of the climate crisis, and we must do so while growing global economies and bringing modern services to those who still lack them. And while we have technologies that can replace fossil fuels and bring clean power to all, they aren’t being deployed as fast as this crisis demands.

To meet the challenge of confronting the climate crisis while improving lives, business-as-usual approaches aren’t enough. RMI’s approach is to THINK bigger, DO boldly, and SCALE globally. We apply rigorous research and analysis to unlock market-based solutions that can be replicated and implemented now. We then work with partners to activate the market catalysts—new technologies and business model innovations, finance and capital flows, big data and capacity building, all sped by effective policy—that can drive rapid, systemic change and economy-wide transformation.

Learn more about our five year vision.

Abundance by Design®
We provide services that help businesses, communities, and institutions save energy and natural resources, prevent pollution, and strengthen communities. Abundance is the opposite of scarcity. It substitutes sufficiency for privation, contentment for envy, tranquility for conflict, synergy for trade-offs. Just as waste spawns scarcity, elegant frugality fosters abundance. RMI creates abundance through advancing solutions that wring far more benefit from energy, materials, and other resources, and showing people how to do more and better with less for longer. We reveal how to meet the needs of a clean, prosperous, and secure world not by felling the last tree and catching the last fish, but by innovative design, rigorously applied and vigorously promoted.

Natural Capitalism
We apply the framework of natural capitalism to all of our work. “Natural capital” refers to the earth’s natural resources and the ecological systems that provide vital life-support services to society and all living things. These services are of immense economic value; some are literally priceless, since they have no known substitutes. Yet current business practices typically fail to take into account the value of these assets—which is rising with their scarcity. As a result, natural capital is being degraded and liquidated by the very wasteful use of resources such as energy, materials, water, fiber, and topsoil.

Sustainability Initiatives
At RMI we want our programs to have a big impact on the world. And we want to do it with a minimal environmental footprint. That’s why we try to “walk the talk” every day. Read about the sustainability initiatives that help us minimize our carbon impact. Learn More.