The climate crisis is a health crisis. Extreme heat and indoor air pollution cause hundreds of thousands of preventable deaths each year and worsening chronic illnesses—and the health risks are growing exponentially. Reliance on traditional cooking fuels produces greenhouse gasses (GHGs) equivalent to the global aviation sector, while demand for cooling is set to triple by 2050—potentially doubling emissions unless new clean cooling solutions are developed. These thermal-intensive challenges disproportionately affect vulnerable populations, making equitable, scalable solutions essential in emerging economies.
There is a transformative opportunity to tackle the dual threats of climate change and its impact on health in emerging economies by scaling clean cooling and clean cooking solutions. The cooling market in emerging economies is expected to double in size to $600 billion by 2050. Investing in energy-efficient technologies saves lives, reduces GHG emissions, and builds climate resilience for the most vulnerable. To scale businesses and impact, we need the right technological and business model innovations, financing mechanisms and stakeholder alignment across the value chain to improve accessibility and affordability of the solutions.
At WDI, we’re accelerating the transition to climate-health solutions focusing initially on clean, energy-efficient cooking and cooling technologies. By generating insights, supporting enterprises, catalyzing innovations where needed, and forging robust partnerships, we strengthen local ecosystems and turn evidence into action—linking climate resilience with better health outcomes.
We generate market intelligence and tools that guide investments, business model innovations, and policy decisions.
We power entrepreneurs to develop and scale transformative technologies through targeted acceleration support.
We bring together diverse stakeholders to align strategies, catalyze financing, strengthen local value chains and ecosystems, and scale equitable climate-health solutions
