Damilola Ogunbiyi, CEO and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy for All, and Co-Chair of UN-Energy

Damilola Ogunbiyi is one of the most influential figures in the global energy transition and a tireless advocate for the developing world’s right to clean, affordable power. As CEO of Sustainable Energy for All and Special Representative of the UN Secretary-General for Sustainable Energy, she has built an organisation that has supported over one hundred countries and secured commitments of more than 1.6 trillion dollars in energy finance. Named to the TIME100 Climate list as one of twenty titans in climate in 2024, and to the TIME Earth Awards in 2026, she has consistently argued that the clean energy transition must be just and equitable, leaving no one behind, particularly in the Global South. She has been a co-chair of the Mission 300 initiative targeting electricity access for three hundred million Africans by 2030, and has championed the UN Energy Compacts that hold governments and corporations to concrete action on SDG7. She received the First Class Order of Zayed II from the UAE President for her contributions to COP28. Her work makes the fundamental case that energy poverty and climate change are two sides of the same crisis, and that solving one without addressing the other is neither just nor possible