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Jonathan Phillips

Area Director, Nicholas Institute for En
Nicholas Institute for Energy, Environment & Sustainability
2117 Campus Dr, Durham, NC 27708

Selected Publications


Resilience Monetization and Credits Initiative: A Background Paper

Report · May 23, 2024 Addressing climate change requires urgent and innovative action aimed at both mitigating its effects and addressing its most severe impacts. However, current investment levels are insufficient to match the escalating climate risks and damages. Despite the ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Can Time-of-Use Tariffs Increase the Financial Viability of Mini-Grids?

Report · October 26, 2022 Declining solar and battery costs and increased operational efficiency have helped expand community-scale mini-grids, especially in sub-Saharan Africa and South Asia, where they now meet the power needs of over 47 million people. However, mini-grid system ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Climate Finance for Just Transitions: Building Low-Carbon Development Pathways in an Age of US-China Rivalry

Report · September 14, 2022 This paper investigates challenges throughout the international climate finance landscape and recommends pathways for how investments into low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) can more effectively drive low-carbon development. The paper focuses on thre ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Improving Rural Livelihoods, Energy Access, and Resilience Where It’s Needed Most: The Case for Solar Mini-Grid Irrigation in Ethiopia

Report · July 18, 2022 Ethiopia’s levels of agricultural productivity and energy access are among the lowest in the world. Now Ethiopia is moving forward with the new Distributed Renewable Energy-Agriculture Modalities (DREAM) project to test distributed solar mini-grids as a so ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Lessons for Modernizing Energy Access Finance, Part 2—Balancing Competition and Subsidy: Assessing Mini-Grid Incentive Programs in Sub-Saharan Africa

Report · December 15, 2020 Rapid technology development and falling hardware costs have made mini-grids a potentially game-changing platform for enabling universal electrification. With the capacity to power commercial and industrial loads and provide 24/7 service, mini-grids can br ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Lessons for Modernizing Energy Access Finance, Part 1: What the Electrification Experiences of Seven Countries Tell Us about the Future of Connection Costs, Subsidies, and Integrated Planning

Report · May 1, 2020 Countries facing electricity access challenges today have more options and potential electrification pathways than ever before. Technology developments in distributed renewable electricity systems, monitoring and payment systems, and end-use equipment effi ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Profits and Productivity: Stimulating Electricity Demand in Low-Income Settings

Report · June 3, 2019 As electricity companies in low- and middle-income countries move deeper into rural regions, the cost of new connections generally increases while the electricity demanded by these new customers remains lower than urban and peri-urban customers. This is a ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Research Agenda on Electricity Access and Productive Use

Report · April 4, 2019 On February 21, 2019, Duke University’s Energy Access Project and Oxfam cohosted a meeting of approximately 60 energy practitioners and researchers to discuss the role of electricity access in spurring productive use. A motivation for this convening was a ... Open Access Link to item Cite

The True Cost of Solar Tariffs in East Africa

Report · February 5, 2019 Over a billion people around the world continue to lack access to basic electricity, many of them unlikely to be connected to the grid for years or decades. Pay-as-you-go solar home systems (SHS)—kits that consumers can frequently purchase on credit that i ... Open Access Link to item Cite

Can a Modernized U.S. Development Finance Institution Help Close the Energy Financing Gap?

Report · June 5, 2018 Government-sponsored development finance institutions (DFIs) have become key delivery mechanisms for poverty alleviation and the exercise of soft power. Energy, and the power sector in particular, represents both a leading sector of bilateral DFI investmen ... Open Access Link to item Cite