About Karin Burns

Karin Burns has worked across finance, technology, and organizational leadership for more than 20 years. Her career includes three chief executive roles and experience as an investor and operator in energy and climate-related businesses. She has helped organizations become financially stronger, develop programs, and adjust their structures as responsibilities expanded. Her experience with both private markets and public institutions informs a practical approach to planning, working with teams, and making decisions that affect long-term performance.

Public Service Through Community Energy

As CEO of San Diego Community Power from April 2022 through September 2026, Karin led an organization serving almost one million customer accounts in the San Diego area. She currently serves as Executive Advisor of San Diego Community Power and supports its leadership transition. The provider is a public agency organized as a Joint Powers Authority and community choice aggregator. Its position required an understanding of electricity procurement, public accountability, governance, and customer priorities. She worked with elected officials, utilities, regulators, energy developers, and local stakeholders on decisions affecting its service and future direction.

The organization grew considerably during her tenure as CEO. Revenue rose from about $385 million in fiscal 2022 to more than $1 billion, and reserves grew from approximately $42 million (June 2022) to more than $500 million. Its workforce increased from fewer than 20 employees to nearly 100 while turnover remained low. She focused on improving financial processes, governance, operations, and management capacity to support a larger organization. Her responsibilities went beyond expanding the agency; they included ensuring its structure could manage new commitments.

Building Resources for the Energy Transition

She supported the goal of reaching 100% clean and renewable electricity by 2035. Work toward that objective included building a power portfolio supported by more than 1 gigawatt of renewable purchase agreements and 1.5 gigawatts of battery storage agreements. These were long-range commitments with implications for financing, electricity markets, and customer service. Karin helped translate a public clean-energy objective into procurement and planning activities, working through the practical considerations associated with each step.

She also supported distributed energy programs. These included residential battery incentives, demand response, flexible load management, distributed energy resources, and virtual power plant development. These initiatives complemented larger procurement arrangements by considering how resources located closer to customers could be used. Her work recognized that energy systems change through multiple connected activities, from contracts for utility-scale power to technologies used at homes and other facilities. That required listening to differing views across the energy industry and the communities the provider serves.

A Record of Operational Turnarounds

Earlier, she became CEO of Build It Green and oversaw a turnaround of the organization focused on residential buildings. It returned to profitability for four straight years, doubled revenue to $22 million, and reduced employee turnover by 30%. Operating costs also declined by roughly 20%. After these changes, Karin negotiated the sale of most of its assets to Franklin Energy. She then joined the purchasing company and took on broader program responsibilities involving energy use and building systems.

At Franklin Energy, she managed a regional budget of more than $30 million, more than 60 employees, and over 20 programs and contracts spread across six states. Her portfolio covered energy efficiency, electrification, grid optimization, and demand response. She later took on national corporate development and mergers and acquisitions work. She also served as Executive Director and Board Member of Code REDD. In that position, she directed forest conservation strategy and partnerships and introduced Stand for Trees, an online initiative supporting sales of voluntary REDD+ credits.

Understanding Capital and Market Conditions

Her finance career included work with JPMorgan Chase, GE Equity, i2i Capital, Gulf Capital, and Ambata Capital Partners. She handled investment banking, strategic advisory, and private equity responsibilities in established industries and new climate technologies. She played a key execution role in a $1.1 billion cross-border sell-side transaction at JPMorgan Chase. Other transactions included selling an electric vehicle company to a Fortune 500 buyer and investments in Asia that delivered 3.5x and 2.5x cash-on-cash returns.

Karin has worked with investments involving renewable energy, electric vehicles, green buildings, efficiency, and carbon markets. Her investment evaluation experience helped her develop a disciplined view of risk, partnerships, and capital allocation. She has also spoken to industry, business, community, and policy audiences about leadership and energy-system change. Her experience with organizational technology includes guiding an AI committee, shaping AI policy, and deploying Microsoft 365 Copilot, as well as using ChatGPT and Claude in her own work.

Education and a Life Across Borders

She earned a Master in Public Administration in International Development from Harvard Kennedy School and an MBA in International Finance from Edinburgh Business School. She earned her undergraduate degree in International Affairs and History from Duke University and was a Fulbright Fellow in India. She also completed executive and certificate studies at Stanford University, UC Berkeley, and the University of Washington. These academic experiences complement years of managing investment and energy-related programs.

She has lived and worked in the United States, Europe, Asia, the Middle East, and Latin America. She speaks Spanish and Portuguese and brings an understanding of different markets to her professional activities. Karin Burns lives in California with her husband and two sons. She enjoys swimming, skiing, and traveling with her family, particularly when they can explore local food and culture.