Kris Mayes serves as co-director of the Just Energy Transition Center at ASU, where she is also a professor of utility law and energy policy at the Global Futures Laboratory and the School for the Future of Innovation in Society. Professor Mayes is also the director of the Energy Policy Innovation Council and Utility of Future Center, which focus on assisting governments, non-profits, and utilities in developing the regulatory frameworks and policies needed to achieve deep decarbonization of the economy.

Prior to coming to ASU, Mayes served as a member of the Arizona Corporation Commission from 2003 to 2010, where she helped co-author the Arizona Renewable Energy Standard, which requires that by 2025, utilities must generate 15 percent of their overall energy portfolio from renewable sources, like wind solar, biomass, biogas, geothermal and other technologies. The Standard contains one of the most aggressive distributed generation requirements in the country, requiring utilities to acquire 30 percent of their renewable energy from residential or non-utility owned installations, such as rooftop solar panels. Mayes also helped establish one of the most ambitious energy efficiency standards in the nation, requiring utilities to sell 22 percent less energy by 2020 than they would have under current forecasts, and helped craft the state’s solar net metering standard.  She also pushed for a dramatic expansion of conservation programs at the state’s water utilities.

Mayes is frequently asked to speak across the country on topics ranging from the utility of the future, to the design of clean energy law and policy.