Why the Energy Transition Won’t Succeed Without Small and Mid-Sized Businesses

By: Jodi Susman, CMO at Budderfly

For years, the energy transition has focused on the world's largest enterprises. That makes sense. Large organizations have the capital, scale, and sustainability mandates to drive meaningful, measurable impact.

But in order to accelerate the scale of clean tech adoption we need, we have to expand participation beyond the largest companies. To do that, accessibility, even more than innovation, needs to be the top priority.

Clean energy accessibility means removing the upfront costs and complexity that often act as barriers to entry. Small and mid-sized businesses make up 99.9% of U.S. companies, according to the SBA. Yet they remain significantly underserved by traditional clean energy models.

If solutions aren’t designed to work for them, the full potential of energy efficiency and renewable adoption will remain out of reach.

The Untapped Opportunity in the Commercial Midmarket

Consider the commercial midmarket: restaurants, quick-service restaurant (QSR) franchises, gyms, family-owned manufacturers, bowling alleys, convenience stores, hotels, and more.

Collectively, these businesses spend an estimated $55 billion annually on electricity.

They are the backbone of local economies, creating jobs, serving communities, and driving regional growth. But most operate on razor-thin margins, where even modest upfront investments can be prohibitive. Typical small business profit margins fall in the range of 7–10%, leaving little room for upfront investments in infrastructure upgrades. For many of these businesses, the cost of upgrading energy infrastructure ends the conversation before it even begins. It also means that the businesses that need energy upgrades the most are the least able to afford them.

As a result, they get stuck overpaying for energy, as aging equipment wastes money and breaks. They also miss out on many of the benefits of the energy transition: lower energy costs, more resilient systems, cleaner air, reduced carbon emissions, and the opportunity to strengthen the communities they serve.

Why are small and mid-sized businesses critical to the energy transition?

Small and mid-sized businesses are critical to the energy transition because they represent nearly all U.S. companies and account for a significant share of commercial energy use. Without clean energy and energy efficiency solutions designed for their financial and operational realities, the energy transition cannot scale fast enough to reduce costs, emissions, or improve grid resilience nationwide.

The Hidden Cost of Inaccessibility

Without viable pathways to clean energy adoption, small and medium businesses are left in a difficult position:

• Overpaying for energy due to inefficiencies
• Relying on aging, failure-prone equipment
• Missing out on cost savings and operational resilience
• Lagging behind on sustainability goals
• Limited capital to fund energy infrastructure upgrades
• Limited time to evaluate, implement, and manage complex projects
• Limited in-house expertise to navigate energy systems and financing options

This represents a significant missed opportunity. Energy efficiency remains one of the most cost-effective tools available for helping reduce energy costs, lower emissions, and improve system reliability simultaneously. In fact, efficiency investments have already saved U.S. households and businesses hundreds of billions of dollars in energy costs over time.

But more importantly, when small and mid-sized businesses can’t access these benefits, the impact extends beyond individual balance sheets to entire communities. Inaccessibility works against the goals of the energy transition.

Building for Accessibility at Scale

To truly scale clean energy adoption, solutions must be built around the operational realities these businesses face every day:

New models must remove upfront costs, simplify implementation, and manage complexity to ensure SMBs can contribute to the energy transition and access the benefits.

Solely focusing on large enterprises stalls progress. Enabling millions of smaller operators to participate accelerates it.

The Path Forward

The next phase of the energy transition won’t be won on innovation alone.

While breakthrough technologies continue to reshape what’s possible, scaling clean energy in the U.S. hinges on something just as critical: accessibility.

At Budderfly, helping solve this challenge is central to our mission. We’re focused on building solutions that make cleantech more accessible, affordable, and scalable for the often-overlooked businesses that power our local economies.

Because the energy transition won’t succeed until it works for everyone.