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Founder / Operator·Clean Energy

Mary Powell

CEO at Sunrun

San Francisco, CA

MP
LinkedIn
Why they matter

One of very few executives who has run both a forward-thinking utility and a distributed-energy public company. Sees the grid from both sides.

Background

CEO of Sunrun (NASDAQ: RUN) since 2021. Previously CEO and President of Green Mountain Power (GMP), Vermont's largest utility, from 2008 to 2019. Under her leadership GMP became the world's first utility B Corp and a pioneer in microgrids, residential battery programs, and customer-centric utility design. Joined Sunrun's board in 2018 and was elevated to CEO in 2021 when Lynn Jurich transitioned to Co-Chair.

Notable deals

  • 2014
    Led GMP's transformation into the world's first B Corp utility, with deep microgrid and residential-battery programs.
  • 2021
    Appointed CEO of Sunrun, succeeding co-founder Lynn Jurich.
  • 2024
    Drove Sunrun's pivot toward storage-attached and grid-services-monetized installs amid post-NEM-3.0 California reset.

Call-prep brief

Background

Mary's tenure at GMP (2008–2019) made her the leading utility-executive voice for distributed energy. As Sunrun CEO since 2021, she has driven the company toward storage-heavy, grid-services-monetized installs in the post-NEM-3.0 California market.

What she cares about

  • Utility-customer reframing. The regulator dynamic that determines whether VPPs scale.
  • Storage attach rates as the leading indicator of residential-solar profitability.
  • Operational rigor. She's run a multi-state utility, not just a Silicon Valley growth co.

Recent moves

  • Public commentary on utility-DER tension (Canary Media interviews).
  • Heavily focused on California NEM-3.0 economics and on grid-services revenue per customer.

Sensitivities

  • Don't pitch her on "solar is back"; she's managing through a still-painful market reset.
  • Treat utility operators with respect. She came from that world and bristles at lazy IOU caricatures.

Questions to ask

  1. Which state regulators are most likely to follow California into NEM 3.0–style reform: and which are likely to push back?
  2. What's Sunrun's actual ARPU lift when grid-services revenue is included, and where does it stabilize?
  3. Where does she see the next breakout DER software vendor: VPP, DERMS, or load-flex?

Outreach draft

Subject
Post-NEM-3.0 thesis: your view
Hi Mary, I lead clean-energy investing at [Firm]. We're building a view on what the post-NEM-3.0 distributed-energy market actually looks like in steady state, and your perspective from both the GMP and Sunrun seats is the rarest one in the industry. Would you have 20 minutes in the next two weeks? I'd come prepared with our specific questions on storage attach economics and state-regulator dynamics. Best regards, [Your name] [Your firm]

Linked companies

Sources