Ellen Morris
Managing Director and Co-founder

Dr. Ellen Morris is a Managing Director and Co-founder of Arc Finance. Prior to joining Arc, Ellen founded Sustainable Energy Solutions (SES) in 1996. SES is a company that focuses on international development, policy analysis, and research on energy issues for national governments, development agencies, foundations, and the private sector.

Since 1996, Ellen has been a senior consultant for the United Nations Development Programme in the sustainable energy program. Her work at UNDP focuses on technical and programmatic support for countries seeking to advance energy as a means for poverty reduction. She has served on UNDP's External Advisory Group on Environment and Energy since 2007. Ellen has done pioneering work in energy and microfinance since 2004 by studying how to link the two sectors to meet the needs of the poor.

Most recently, she was the lead for the design and implementation of the Citi Foundation/USAID/SEEP Energy and Microfinance Research Initiative, and the findings were published in 2007. (Using Microfinance to Expand Access to Energy Services: Summary of Findings and Using Microfinance to Expand Access to Energy Services (Spanish)).

As an adjunct professor at Columbia University's School of International and Public Affairs, Ellen teaches graduate-level energy and development courses. Ellen started her career in clean energy working for the National Renewable Energy Laboratory. In the early part of her career, she worked as a Science Advisor to the U.S. Congress and as an exploration geophysicist for Texaco. She holds a Bachelor of Science degree in geophysical engineering from the Colorado School of Mines and a doctoral degree in marine geophysics from the University of Rhode Island.

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Ellen Morris Managing Director and Co-founder

Ellen Morris
Managing Director and Co-founder