2026
Champion of Energy Equity:
Anand Natarajan currently serves as the Assistant Director for the Mayor’s Office of Sustainability in the City of Cleveland Ohio, leading subject matter experts and program managers in the built environment, circular economy, nature-based solutions, grants management and education and outreach.
Anand served as the city’s Energy Program Manager for 13 years since 2010 and has led community-oriented energy programs such as the City’s Community Choice Electricity Aggregation Program for an average of 55K customers, the most recent iteration of which has resulted in $20M in cumulative program savings for residents and small businesses, while being backed by 100% green-e certified RECs. As energy burden is quite high in Cleveland, these cost savings to tax paying residents are vital. Anand also recently spearheaded a Low to Moderate Income (LMI) Home Solar Pilot project that brought 7 families in Cleveland free home solar as well as an 60% average annual electricity cost savings.
Anand is dedicated to ensuring quality utility and energy efficiency related programs continue to benefit all Clevelanders through both cost savings and climate emissions avoidance such as the prior Cleveland Energy$aver Program that was expanded to include LMI customers, the more recent commercial Building Performance Standard (BPS) pilot for Cleveland, revisions to the city’s Sustainable Municipal Building Policy, and the tax-abatement incentivized residential Green Building Standards.