Mike Skelly

Michael Skelly is the founder and CEO of Grid United, a transmission development company dedicated to strengthening the US transmission grid and adapting it for the evolving generation mix. Prior to starting Grid United, he was the founder and president of Clean Line Energy, a company that successfully permitted some of the longest transmission lines in the U.S. Skelly also led the growth of Horizon Wind Energy, now part of EDPR, as one of the largest U.S. renewable energy providers.

Other entrepreneurial ventures include his role as a founding partner and general manager of Rain Forest Aerial Tram, where he led the development, construction and operations of the first large-scale canopy tourism project in the Americas, and his advocacy for local green spaces through the “Parks By You” campaign in 2012, which secured $150 million to fund trails along bayous in his adopted hometown of Houston. Skelly sits on the boards of Form Energy and Greentown Labs in Houston, and has experience in public service, including his time as a Peace Corps Volunteer in Central America and a run for U.S. Congress in 2008, where he was the Democratic nominee for the 7th Congressional District of Texas. He remains deeply involved in local politics today.

Skelly is the protagonist in Superpower, a book by Wall Street Journal reporter and Pulitzer Prize finalist Russell Gold, which chronicles the growth and development of renewable energy in the 21st century. He holds a bachelor’s in economics from the University of Notre Dame and an MBA from Harvard Business School. Named one of the 29 Most Influential Couples in town by the Houston Chronicle in 2021, Skelly and his wife Anne Whitlock currently reside in a 110-year-old fire station and regularly host nonprofit events throughout the year.