The winners of Fast Company’s 2024 World Changing Ideas Awards were announced today, highlighting fresh sustainability initiatives, cutting-edge developments, and other creative projects that are helping mold the world.
Range Energy (Range), the hardware company bringing powered trailers to the commercial trucking market, was honored for its electric-powered trailer platform in the Energy category. Range’s trailers are built to ease the transition to electrification and help fleets meet emerging emissions mandates. The technology is compatible with existing diesel trucks and can immediately improve fuel efficiency up to 40 percent, as well as extend the range of electric semi trucks when they scale in the market.
Range recognizes the urgency to reduce emissions and that trailers are a key technology to accelerate decarbonization for the heavy transport sector. Range’s trailer-based approach enables fleets to add electrification technology to their trucks in the near-term, at lower cost, and with minimal infrastructural disruption or requirements. Range trailers also enhance the utility of existing electrified tractors by extending their shorter-than-normal range to cover a wider variety of routes.
This year’s World Changing Ideas Awards showcase 50 winners, 127 finalists, and 172 honorable mentions—with health, education, energy, and AI among the most popular categories. A panel of Fast Company editors and reporters selected winners from a pool of more than 1,300 entries across climate, social justice, wellness, politics, technology, corporate social responsibility, and more. Several new categories were added this year, including beauty and fashion, health products, health services, materials, and science and technology. The 2024 awards feature entries from across the globe, including the Republic of Korea, Brazil, and Madagascar.
Fast Company’s Spring 2024 issue (on newsstands May 21, 2024) will unveil some of the world’s most creative minds and pioneering organizations that are seeking to disrupt the status quo. The solutions cover everything from renewable energy storage and waste in the fashion industry to a building made entirely from recycled concrete and a fridge that’s solar-powered and designed to run off the grid.
“We’re honored that our breakthrough trailer technology is being recognized as a ‘world changing idea’ by Fast Company and among an esteemed group of other technologies, products, and initiatives,” said Ali Javidan, CEO and founder, Range Energy. “We are bringing a state-of-the-art electric propulsion platform to commercial trailers, and by doing so, ensuring our trailer platform is a durable, long-term solution for the heavy transportation industry. Our mission is to make towing cleaner, safer, and more efficient, and our team has made tremendous progress thus far.”
“I was struck this year by the global sweep of the honorees,” says Fast Company editor-in-chief Brendan Vaughan. “It’s endlessly inspiring to see how the world is coming together to devise inventive solutions to our most challenging problems. We need ideas from everywhere, and this year’s World Changing Ideas Awards are an extraordinary encapsulation of the innovation and creativity that is so abundant around the globe.”
