Michael Earnest

Background

About Michael Earnest

Mr. Earnest founded Summit Utilities Inc, a national natural gas distribution company, in 1997. As President and CEO, he grew the company from a two-person startup to a national utility serving more than families and businesses. In 2014, Summit was recognized by the Denver Business Journal as the fastest growing private company of its size in Colorado. Mr. Earnest retired from Summit Utilities in 2015 as their President, CEO and Chairman of the Board. Before founding Summit, Mr. Earnest was vice-president of MAVCO for fifteen years, a manufacturer representative and distributor of equipment used in the natural gas industry. Mr. Earnest and business associates, identified the opportunity to build the infrastructure to deliver natural gas to underserved rural communities – something large distribution firms at the time thought impossible. This led to his first infrastructure project serving the tiny town of Pinedale, Wyoming, which would go on to serve 1,200 rural customers. Motivated by this success, Mr. Earnest partnered with engineer Tim Johnston to found Colorado Natural Gas (Summit Utilities) and go on to provide great service and significant savings to customers throughout Colorado, Missouri, and Maine. The company’s commitment to serving rural communities by building relationships with state and local official’s, has helped it achieve an unprecedented penetration rate of more than 90 percent in several of the markets it serves. Mr. Earnest currently serves on the Advisory Board of Ridgewood Infrastructure LLC.