Direct Relief

This humanitarian aid organization delivers medical aid and other support after natural disasters, both in the U.S. and around the world. In 2018, it completed a new 155,000-square-foot headquarters to make it easier to store and quickly ship out medical aid. It also pioneered using Facebook data to help track the movements of people after a disaster, to better know where to send supplies, and began to develop a system to use drones to complete that delivery. Besides medical aid, the organization also helped transition Puerto Rico’s health centers to a solar-powered smart grid, as part of an effort to use renewable energy to keep vulnerable healthcare facilities running during storms.