Powering Progress: How a Leader's Focus on Sustainability and Resilient Energy Drives Innovation and Business Success

On May 1st, the Irving Institute hosted the Honorable Miranda Ballentine, a distinguished energy and sustainability leader and recipient of many accolades, including being named one of TIME Magazine's 100 Most Influential Climate Leaders in Business 2023. The event featured a comprehensive and insightful conversation facilitated by Derek Walker, the Executive Director of the Irving Institute, titled "Career Paths in Energy and Sustainability." This discussion delved into the essential elements needed to advance progress, both individually and across sectors. The event was part of a speaker series generously supported by Dartmouth's Class of 1972.

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Rosi Kerr, Dartmouth's Director of Sustainability, introduces Miranda Ballentine and Derek Walker.

Rosi Kerr, Dartmouth's Director of Sustainability, introduced Ballentine, highlighting her unique career trajectory—from Walmart to the Pentagon—and her leadership roles at the Clean Energy Buyers Association (CEBA) and the Foundation for Energy, Security, and Innovation (FESI). Drawing on nearly two decades of experience leading energy initiatives at the Environmental Defense Fund, facilitator Derek Walker skillfully guided the conversation to elicit valuable insights.

Breaking Boundaries: A Cross-Sector Career

The conversation opened with Walker inquiring about Ballentine's career navigation across an array of sectors – private, public, and nonprofit. Ballentine stressed the importance of experimentation for those early in their careers, encouraging young professionals to seek out diverse roles within organizations of all sizes, exploring both entrepreneurial and intrapreneurial positions.

What Is Intrapreneurship?

Ballentine explained that intrapreneurship involves driving change from within a large, established institution. Unlike entrepreneurship, which prioritizes rapid iteration and disruption, intrapreneurship demands a unique skillset focused on persuasion, influence, and the ability to navigate complex organizational structures. It's about "moving big ships," requiring patience and a different approach to innovation. Ballentine emphasized that both entrepreneurial and intrapreneurial skills are crucial for driving meaningful innovation and achieving a sustainable future.

Can Bipartisan Efforts Succeed in a Polarized World?

Walker then pivoted to Ballentine's current role as Chair of the Board of Directors for the Foundation for Energy, Security, and Innovation (FESI), affiliated with the Department of Energy (DOE). Ballentine detailed FESI's lengthy and remarkably bipartisan history. Conceived during the Obama administration, the idea gained momentum throughout the first Trump administration, during which the DOE developed its first Chief Commercialization Officer, a development that further informed the vision for FESI. The Foundation was finally authorized and appropriated during the Biden administration under the CHIPS and Science Act. This consistent bipartisan support over more than a decade culminated in FESI's establishment in 2024. Today, FESI occupies a unique position in the energy landscape due to its focus on security.

Are Energy Security and Clean Energy Conflicting Goals?

The discussion then shifted to the critical intersection of energy security and resilience. Ballentine drew upon her experiences at Walmart, where ensuring the integrity of the fresh and frozen food supply during storms and outages was paramount. She observed that while most people take energy security for granted, vulnerabilities ranging from extreme weather events to increasingly sophisticated cyberattacks on energy infrastructure represent tangible and growing threats.

Addressing a student's pointed question about whether energy security concerns should justify delaying the energy transition, Ballentine recounted a formative experience from her time at the Department of Defense. There, she had to demonstrate the existing, often hidden, price already being paid for energy security. She further illustrated how investments in distributed resources, such as solar and storage, could provide both enhanced security and advance the transition to cleaner energy sources. She also noted that local fuel sources like geothermal, wind, and solar can be more resilient than the electricity grid or transported fuels when disruptions happen.

How Unconventional Collaborations Unlocked Corporate Clean Energy

Walker transitioned the conversation to Ballentine's significant role in attracting investment to clean energy, acknowledging her as a "market maker and market shaper." Ballentine then shared the origin story of the Clean Energy Buyers Association (CEBA). The seed was planted in 2013 when Walmart, along with a small group of multinational corporations interested in making the procurement of clean energy more efficient convened at a "Renewable Energy Buyers Day." Participating company representatives explored strategies and best practices. Fundamental questions arose: "How do you get your CFO to sign off on this?" Given that Walmart typically buys commodities on a one-year basis, how could the company justify committing to a 20-year power purchase agreement (PPA)? It took Walmart five years to execute its first major PPA. The challenge then became: "How can we normalize what is not normal behavior?" This made the need for an organization like CEBA apparent.

The solution involved an unconventional collaboration: four non-profits – WWF, WRI, RMI, and BSR – joined forces to create the Business Renewables Center, which was subsequently spun out in 2020 as an independent nonprofit, ultimately becoming CEBA. The organization amplifies its members' impact by creating a strong market signal for clean energy. This innovative structure exemplifies the power of combining the agility and mission-driven focus of NGOs with the scale and resources of the corporate sector.

Disagreements that Drive Progress

The conversation then touched on a critical and often contentious debate within the corporate sustainability world: the best approach to decarbonizing the power system. Ballentine contrasted the "24/7 carbon-free electricity" approach with the "emissions-match" approach. The former emphasizes ensuring that all electricity consumed by a business is sourced from carbon-free sources, matching consumption on an hourly basis. The latter prioritizes investments in clean energy projects on grids with the highest emissions, effectively offsetting the impact of a company's overall energy consumption. While seemingly at odds, these competing approaches are driving all participants to critically examine and refine their decarbonization strategies. "These are great arguments to be having," Ballentine noted.

The Sustainability Imperative: Beyond Short-Term Thinking

Responding to a student's inquiry about how to instill sustainability as an institutional goal, Ballentine offered a compelling definition: sustainability is, fundamentally, the ability to operate in perpetuity. In the context of an organization that aspires to long-term success, embracing sustainability becomes not just ethically desirable but strategically imperative. Ballentine cited Walmart's experience: an internal analysis revealed that while the top ten consumer product companies had remained largely unchanged for over 50 years, the top ten retailers had experienced near-complete turnover. To avoid this fate and perpetuate its success, Walmart recognized the need to prioritize sustainability.

Navigating Risk on the Career Journey

In closing, Ballentine shared her personal journey of navigating career transitions, emphasizing the critical importance of self-awareness and aligning career choices with deeply held personal motivations and values. She emphasized her desire to make a positive impact on the world. Every job choice involved risk. One of her first professional roles was with a solar company that aimed to solve poverty issues in the developing world. It meant taking less money when she needed money. That helped her move into energy and sustainability. She was rather shocked when she received a call from the White House to work for the Department of Defense. She'd never considered working for the military. But she saw an opportunity to expand upon what she had learned at Walmart to make an impact in an entirely different sector. Each risk was evaluated through deep introspection and when she found alignment with her core values, she took the leap.

Walker skillfully connected these diverse insights to the interdisciplinary competencies needed to advance the clean energy transition, aligning with the core objectives of Dartmouth's new Master of Energy Transition degree. In sum, the conversation offered valuable perspectives on the diverse career paths available in the energy and sustainability sectors, underscoring the importance of experimentation, unconventional collaboration, and an unwavering commitment to creating a positive impact on both business and the planet.

Watch the full conversation!