From Sustainable Transportation to Beneficial Electrification: John-Michael Cross Reminisces on 12 Years with EESI

John-Michael Cross worked at EESI for 12 years, starting as a transportation policy associate and transitioning into the on-bill financing (OBF) project manager role. Now, he works for the Minnesota Department of Commerce as the community solar garden program administrator. We sat down with John-Michael to discuss his introduction to EESI and the critical role he played in the organization.

How did you hear about EESI, and what ultimately made you decide to join the organization?

I moved to D.C. in June 2009. I had just finished grad school, and I was excited to be part of a climate movement that seemed to be growing with a big push for national policy. 

I started with an organization called the Climate Institute. EESI and the Climate Institute had a lot of mutual connections and found ways to work together. The chief scientist of the Climate Institute at the time was Michael MacCracken, who is currently on EESI’s advisory board. Also, Director Emerita and Senior Policy Fellow Carol Werner's husband, Jack Werner, was involved with the Climate Institute. Carol was EESI’s executive director at the time. When I was looking for a new job, EESI was the first place I thought of because I respected the work that was done there and wanted to be a part of it, if possible.

What were some of your first projects at EESI?

I was initially hired by EESI to be the transportation policy associate, which is how I got started learning about Capitol Hill engagement and outreach, as well as all the ins and outs of the federal policymaking process.

I also needed to learn what a rural electric cooperative was. I had never heard of electric co-ops, and, at the time, EESI was just starting to work with South Carolina co-ops. As the transportation policy associate, clean transportation also meant having walkable, livable, clean energy communities. Because of the connection between clean transportation and electric co-ops, I had to learn all about the co-op world.

A big project you took on as EESI’s OBF project manager is the Beneficial Electrification Toolkit. How did that come to fruition, and how does it benefit utilities today?

Utilities need a one-stop shop to learn all about beneficial electrification, its different forms, and what they can do to go about helping their customers or members realize the potential savings of electrification.

The toolkit was the brainchild of Keith Dennis of the Beneficial Electrification League. When Keith and I were at a conference together in late 2019, he pitched the idea to me, and I said that it sounded like something that EESI would like to work on. 

We set up interviews with rural electric cooperative leaders from around the country to ask them what they would need in a resource. We thought we were going to receive clear guidance on what co-ops needed, but we actually got very different answers back from everyone. Around this time, the pandemic hit. 

But we continued the work on the toolkit. It grew and evolved as we were planning it—going from an offline form to a public, accessible website. 

It has been a labor of love, and I’m happy with what we’ve published to date. But it’s still not done. We have a really great team working on it, and we have been able to put it in front of utilities that are putting it to use. We are hoping to get it into the hands of many more utilities to help programs around the country spring up.

What would you pinpoint as some of your greatest achievements with EESI?

I think the coolest thing that we’ve done has been helping the U.S. Department of Agriculture establish the Rural Energy Savings Program (RESP), getting the program through some tough years, and now seeing it flourish. It is possible that RESP would not have survived past the 2018 Farm Bill reauthorization if EESI hadn’t advocated for it. At EESI, we made sure that co-ops were applying to the program and that funds were being used. Now, the program is approaching $500 million loaned to utilities to support behind-the-meter renewable energy and energy efficiency projects in homes and communities. There is still a lot of work to do on RESP, but it is definitely one of our best results during my time at EESI.

During your 12 years at EESI, what were the biggest breakthroughs in climate and energy legislation?

Getting RESP approved in the 2014 Farm Bill—as well as getting it reauthorized and modified in the 2018 Farm Bill—were certainly big deals.