Market Innovation
Our Focus
The Market Innovation team catalyzes, strengthens, and scales global markets for sustainable solutions across hard-to-abate sectors. We accelerate the transition to a more resilient future by igniting demand, mobilizing collective action, dismantling market barriers, and engaging policymakers and stakeholders to identify policy pathways that enable innovative ideas to become reality.
What We Do
We serve as the go-to partner for organizations seeking to turn promising ideas and emerging innovations into real-world change. Our north star is measurable impact; we specialize in moving efforts from concept to commercialization. By identifying the critical stakeholders, market mechanisms, and strategic partnerships required to unlock progress, we bridge the gap between innovation and scale.
Market Innovation in Action
Catalyzing Maritime’s Clean Energy Transition
On September 1, 2026, after three years of incubation at the Aspen Institute, the Zero Emission Maritime Buyers Alliance (ZEMBA) transitioned to become a program of the Center for Green Market Activation (GMA). Our Market Innovation team served as the secretariat of ZEMBA through its time at the Institute.
This first-of-its-kind maritime buyers group accelerates the deployment of the most sustainable, scalable, and economically viable solutions for the maritime sector. Through collective procurement and demand aggregation, ZEMBA has completed two tenders that deliver three new ultra-low-carbon fuel pathways into the maritime market, with close to 40 multi-year contracts in place to date.
Today, ZEMBA brings together nearly 50 major companies and is helping translate corporate climate ambition into real market demand for cleaner shipping. It is now focused on its next phase of scaling impact and expanding opportunities for companies to address Scope 3 transportation emissions.
For more than 50 years, the Aspen Institute Energy and Environment Program (EEP) has served as an incubator for bold ideas. ZEMBA began as an ambitious idea to harness the collective purchasing power of major cargo owners to accelerate the transition to zero-emission shipping.
That journey from idea to global impact reached an exciting milestone in September 2026, when ZEMBA was named a 2026 Earthshot Prize Finalist in the Revive Our Oceans category, recognizing its innovative approach and potential to help transform one of the world’s most difficult-to-decarbonize sectors.
Expanding Workstreams
Building on ZEMBA’s success, we are exploring new opportunities to dismantle market barriers and ignite demand in other sectors such as critical materials (e.g., plastics, metals) and sustainable, decarbonized natural resources (e.g., fisheries). We continuously scan for critical market failures and demand gaps where market innovation can most effectively drive a more sustainable and resilient world.
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