Interview with Ryan Park Lessons from the Past, Powering What’s Next 

Before I ever sat down to interview Ryan Park, I knew him as “the solar bachelor.” Yes—that solar bachelor. Reality TV may have introduced him to a wider audience, but what most people don’t know is that behind the screen-time charisma is one of the sharpest, fastest minds in solar. Ryan lives just down the hill from me—so while we’re not next-door neighbors, we’re definitely in each other’s orbit. We worked together on launching Powur in Hawaii and even sold a few systems side by side. Since then, we’ve built trust, swapped stories, and tackled some tough installs together. Over time, he’s become a friend. But even more than that, he’s become one of the people I turn to when I need clarity on the hardest questions in solar. His depth of engineering knowledge is unmatched, and his ability to problem-solve in real time—especially around system design, expansion, and grid limitations—is nothing short of surgical. He sees around corners. He finds solutions when others throw in the towel. And he’s lived through nearly every phase of the solar coaster: the startup hustle, the Costco wins, the rise of REC, the Sunrun acquisition, and the tough lessons from Duke. This book isn’t just a case study. It’s a conversation with someone who’s been there, built it, and is now shaping what comes next.

Anna: Ryan, where does your solar journey begin?

Ryan: I grew up in Fresno, California—track housing, smoggy summers where your lungs would burn from playing sports outside. I went to Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo, for college and studied business. It was then that I started reading about solar and knew I wanted to be part of something that didn’t just make money but, if successful, could improve our world too. One night, Paul Orfalea—who had donated earlier that day to the Cal Poly College of Business, resulting in its renaming to the Orfalea College of Business—had dinner with a few student leaders and me. I sat next to him. He asked, “What business do you want to start?” I said, “Solar.” He looked at me and said, “You’re serious, huh? What are you doing Tuesday?” He connected me with two business leaders in Santa Barbara—Tim Ball and Christine (Christy) Holz. Tim Ball and Christine (Christy) Holz were early solar pioneers who successfully built and sold a solar engineering, procurement, and construction (EPC) business that specialized in off-grid solar solutions for unique government applications. At that time solar was too costly for mainstream adoption, but they believed the industry would grow exponentially as costs dropped and the technology advanced. When I met Tim and Christy, I didn’t know they had recently become board members for a company in San Luis Obispo that had been founded by two Cal Poly graduates, Fred Sisson and Judy Ledford. In exchange for a stake in the company, Tim and Christy provided advice with the aim of fostering its growth into something significant. When Paul Orfalea introduced me to Tim and Christy because I said I wanted to start a solar company, I didn’t know where it would lead. I was ready to run wherever that path led. For several months they gave me the usual “prove-yourself” assignments. If there was capital to start a solar company, what would I do?  So I did what young college business students would do: I sent sales strategy ideas, conducted competitive analysis of existing solar companies in the area, outlined hypothetical team structures, and drafted a sample budget. Eventually, I presented it all to them, and that’s when Tim looked at me and said, “Ryan, do you want to get your feet wet?” My response was a resounding, yes! Tim then explained their role as Board of Directors for a small residential solar installation company run by Fred and Judy that needed help on the sales side. “They’re engineers,” he said. “We’ve been helping them, but they need someone to drive revenue. Why don’t you meet them, and if they like you, you can lead the sales.” Well, I met them, along with another recent Cal Poly graduate, Ethan Miller, who was responsible for managing the operations: design engineering, procurement of equipment, and the installation crew. Yep, only one crew. I still remember that first meeting with the four of us in an office not more than 500 square feet with a tiny warehouse in the back. It was apparent the four of us had a connection, and I was ready to jump in!

The only challenge was… the Company was tiny and needed immediate sales to stay in business. I remember Fred saying to me, “We can start you at minimum wage, but we can’t do healthcare to start. However, if you can grow our sales, we’ll share 20% of the profit with you at year-end. I said yes on the spot without any hesitation. However, when I shared the news with my parents, there was nothing but hesitation and concern. Why would I choose to work with a startup solar company, working for minimum wage, instead of taking a solid salary with healthcare and retirement benefits from one of the usual consulting firms that snatched up Cal Poly business graduates? I was undeterred.

When I started, the Company was doing about $25,000 a month in revenue. Within six months we were doing over $250K/month. I was obsessed with solar and learning how to be a better sales professional. That was the launchpad. Scrappy, fast-paced, and foundational. And it changed everything.

Anna: What was it like in those early days?

Ryan: Back then, the Company was named Renewable Energy Concepts. It was all hustle—guerrilla marketing, 1099 reps out pounding pavement, passing out flyers to attend free solar learning workshops at the local public library, standing in 10×10 booths at home shows, talking about the greater vision, and allowing our passion to pave the way. There was no easy script, no playbook—just belief that solar energy was a better source of energy. Our early customers weren’t chasing ROI. They weren’t doing it because it penciled out as a no-brainer investment for their home. They were doing it because they believed in solar. They believed in a cleaner future and wanted to be part of something bigger.

As we grew into small commercial installations, we picked up early adopters like small family-owned wineries in Paso Robles. Owners did not require solar energy to be 20% cheaper than the electricity prices they were currently paying to their utility, which sourced power from fossil fuels generated at a plant hundreds of miles away. They wanted to know a portion of their energy was coming from the sun. The sun was the energy source that nurtured their wine grapes without contributing to smog and water pollution.

Everything was growing rapidly, but I needed someone who was more sales operational, meticulous, and shared that “X factor” with energizing people around a vision. It was time to convince my lifelong best friend from early childhood, Matthew Woods. He had also been my college roommate. Somehow I convinced Matthew to join the company and expand into our Central Valley, California, hometown. This transaction will go down as the greatest sale I’ve ever made to-date.

At that time, Matthew was enjoying a comfortable life as a young sales professional for ADP, offering payroll services to small businesses in Newport Beach, CA. He excelled in productivity, demonstrated genuine persuasion, and possessed an unmeasurable charisma. He was making great money for that time in our early career, and his days ended early with ample time to enjoy the beach and nights out on the town. However, he left it behind and moved back to San Luis Obispo for a few months to learn alongside me before heading to Fresno to set up shop.

He brought structure to the chaos and helped us translate our solar sales process into something scalable. Together, we created the “7 Steps” sales model—borrowed from ADP’s payroll sales training system—and applied it to solar. It gave us a framework, a rhythm, and a way to turn belief into real results. We were building the plane while flying it, and somehow it worked. We scaled fast, learned on the go, and made it happen with whatever tools we had and without an advertising budget. What set us apart was culture. That was our X factor. Our entire team cared—deeply. Our team deeply cared about the mission, about the customers, and about doing the right thing even when it was difficult. It wasn’t polished, but it was real. And it built the foundation for everything that came next.

As we gained momentum around 2006, we hit our first real hiccup—solar panel shortages and new competitors were flooding the market, and the California solar rebate program was running out of funding. We needed a strategic advantage, and we also needed a new CEO who had experience taking a company beyond $100M. That’s when Tim and Christy introduced us to Angiolo Laviziano. He was the CFO of the largest solar installation company in Europe. He had helped Conergy go public, and they were looking for a USA company to acquire and grow into the states.

Angiolo spent about a week in San Luis Obispo interviewing and working with us before they made an offer to purchase us. We opted to pass on the offer. However, Angiolo decided that he would leave Conergy to join us as CEO and invest his own money into our company. Yes, we relinquished control, but the move was a key inflection point. We recognized that we had reached our limits of what youth and passion could achieve and needed an executive that had walked the path before.

Soon after Angiolo joined, he created the strategy for the next phase. We shortened our name from Renewable Energy Concepts to REC Solar. We also formed a parent company, Mainstream Energy, that wholly owned REC Solar. We then bought an existing solar equipment distribution company, AEE Solar, so we could scale equipment purchase volume and achieve cost advantage. However, it was critical that each company continue operations independently. There was no cross-communication. Small local installers would not want to purchase equipment from AEE Solar if they knew they were also strengthening their competitor too. We also started a third company owned by Mainstream Energy, SnapNRack. SnapNRack invented new racking solutions to speed up the installation process. We used the products directly at REC Solar and sold the equipment to other installers through AEE distribution channels. Business continued to grow rapidly and profitably because we were frugal and achieving outsized productivity from our team. However, we still needed a strategic advantage with solar panels.

That’s when another serendipitous opportunity emerged. As mentioned, solar in Europe was booming. There was a solar panel manufacturer from Norway called REC Solar. Yep, the same name we had shortened our, Renewable Energy Concepts, name to become. But…we owned the name in the USA. We trademarked it because we knew about REC Solar Europe and protected our name back home.

The official meeting between REC Solar Norway and REC Solar USA happened at the largest annual solar tradeshow in 2007. The CEO of REC Norway approached me to ask what we will do about our name conflict because they wanted to export their panels to the USA market because of the panel shortage opportunity. When they realized we weren’t just an installation company, but our silent parent company also owned a robust distribution company with AEE Solar, the partnership was made. REC Solar Norway invested $40M into Mainstream Energy in exchange for 20% of the company ($200M total valuation). With that investment, we also received exclusive rights to REC Solar panels for the USA. Now we had a true strategic advantage with quality solar panels at the best price.

Anna: And then came Costco?

Ryan: It was massive. We didn’t just land a contract to sell solar in Costco’s—we also secured the opportunity to install solar on top of Costco stores. The first installations on Costco warehouses started in Hawaii, where we completed the first four rooftop installs, each just under 600 kW. That alone was huge at that time, but what really shifted the game was the second part of the deal. Costco gave us a trial pilot to sell solar inside several of their retail stores of our choice. At that time we were only in California, but New Jersey was a burgeoning market we wanted to enter. So we opted to begin our Costco in-store sales there. Costco gave us three stores and one opportunity to sell a minimum amount through their stores in several weeks time, or the program was over. No one in Solar had done retail before, but failure wasn’t an option. The New Jersey Solar Renewable Energy Credit (SREC) program offered lucrative incentives that made solar a no-brainer financial decision. And we made it easy with the Costco program to simply buy pre-packaged 3, 6, or 9 kW kits with their Costco credit card.

I moved to New Jersey and personally ran the first wave of in-store roadshows—40 days straight, from Costco opening till closing, standing solo at a Costco solar kiosk. No breaks. No team. Just me, a Costco table, and customers lining up. Every morning, the roll-up doors would come up and people would flood in. I had to be sharp, fast, and dialed. We were offering pre-bundled 3, 6, and 9 kW systems—$9,000 for the 9 kW on a Costco card, with installation handled separately after a site survey. People were blown away. That first day alone, I had 53 qualified leads in several hours. It was nonstop. We shattered sales records for every vendor Costco had worked with. And this was the pre-solar lease era—people were paying out-of-pocket or using HELOCs. These were serious, committed buyers. I remember calling Angiolo and saying, “You’ve got to get someone out here now.” It was absolute chaos—in the best way possible.

Anna: Then came SolarCity and the invention of the residential lease.

Ryan: Yeah, that was wild. We actually met Lyndon Rive before SolarCity officially launched. Apparently, he and his brother Peter Rive—cousins of Elon Musk—first came up with the idea for SolarCity at Burning Man, of all places. They were dreaming big from the start. When Lyndon came through our office applying for a job to lead our northern California sales, we didn’t realize he was going undercover. He sat down with us, asked smart questions about how we structure and pay our sales team, and was highly educated on the industry. He was overqualified, and obviously we offered him the job. However, he declined. Not only that, but then he disclosed he was to be CEO of his own solar company, Solar City, that would eat our lunch. And honestly? They kind of did because they had the first-ever residential lease financing product at prices that were so low it didn’t make economic sense on paper how they could do it.

Apparently Lyndon’s brother, Peter, was doing the same interview process at a competitor, Borrego Solar, to be their COO. He too gained valuable internal insights about operational processes and scaling strategies but never intended to accept the job offer that followed.

When SolarCity arrived, they didn’t just enter the market; they flooded it. With their zero-down and immediate 20-40% monthly savings off utility electricity prices, they flipped the industry on its head—and rewrote the rules of residential solar.
They didn’t just show up. They came to dominate. Meanwhile, we were still selling systems through cash deals or HELOCs, saving 5-20% a month. It wasn’t that our systems weren’t better—it’s just that their pitch was simpler, faster, and psychologically easier to say yes to. They made solar feel like cable TV: just sign here and save. But what most people didn’t see was what was happening behind the curtain.

They’d sell a system at the installer contract level for around $5 a watt, then resell it to their own holding company at a valuation of $10 to $15 per watt. Why? To inflate the paper value of the project and claim massive tax credits based on those internal transfer prices. At that time solar financial engineering was brand new without clear IRS guidelines.  It was a tax gray area, and it gave them fuel no one else had. We were all scratching our heads—how are they offering systems this cheap? The truth was, they weren’t playing by the same rules. They were playing the big picture. The margins weren’t in the installs—they were buried in the finance stack. It distorted the entire market. Companies striving to meet these expectations were unable to do so. It compelled us to swiftly adjust or risk extinction. Eventually, the tax rules changed and were updated, and stricter guidelines were introduced to close that loophole and prevent inflated related-party valuations from skewing tax credit claims. However, the damage had already occurred. The situation had already distorted investor expectations. The bar had been set by smoke and mirrors—and honest operators were left to compete with the illusion. That’s when Lynn Jurich stepped in. A financial mastermind out of Stanford, she was one of the co-founders of what would become Sunrun. She already had the fund structured and ready to deploy. What she needed was a partner with real field operations—someone who could scale fast and execute cleanly. We raised our hand and became Sunrun’s first channel partner. That flipped the script. We finally had access to third-party ownership. We could offer the same zero-down simplicity, but with cleaner execution, ethical financing, and better tech behind it. It wasn’t just about catching up—we were back in the fight, but this time doing it the right way. And while SolarCity grabbed headlines, they’re no longer around. Their model burned hot and fast, but it wasn’t sustainable. They were top-heavy, burning cash, and not profitable—ever. In the end, Tesla acquired SolarCity, burdened with billions in debt, through a controversial bailout. These days Tesla is the #1 battery storage provider in the USA, and they are no longer in the business of installation, only equipment sales to installation companies, like Sunrun. Sunrun, on the other hand, evolved and endured—and we were right there in those early days, helping lay that foundation.

Anna: What about your exit to Sunrun?

Ryan: In 2012, Sunrun acquired REC’s residential division. Technically, they bought the REC Solar residential installation division, AEE Solar, and SnapNRack from Mainstream Energy, while REC Solar’s commercial division remained. It was obviously a major milestone. Most of my close friends and executives went to Sunrun, including Matthew Woods and Ethan Miller, but I didn’t. After I supported the New Jersey expansion with Costco, my heart was in commercial solar.  I thrived on always learning more, pushing limits, and deploying larger and larger solar projects.

Looking back before that deal with Sunrun happened, we were at a crossroads. Inside the leadership circle, there was a serious debate. Some of us were pushing hard to create our own fund—to raise capital, own the financing, and truly control our growth. We knew that if we wanted to compete at scale, we couldn’t keep relying on someone else’s money. That was the move. But Tim Ball, who added incredible value to our company with his wisdom over the years, didn’t agree. I’ll never forget what he said: “Money is just a commodity. Our real value is in our execution and precision.” And he meant it. He believed in craft, in delivering consistent quality, and in staying lean and focused. While he wasn’t wrong on the importance of execution, he was totally wrong on where the true value would be recognized by the markets at that stage of the industry. Looking back, that was the multi-billion dollar mistake. That was our moment to step up and own the capital stack. If we had trusted ourselves—if we’d taken that leap—we might’ve been the ones making acquisitions instead of being acquired. Instead, we sold the residential business to Sunrun and spun off REC Commercial as its own company. I stayed on the commercial side—it was where I could keep building. As for the Sunrun IPO? I was still a shareholder but locked up when they went public. My investment team advised me to diversify when the lock-up expired, so I sold early as the stock tanked when President Trump was in his first term and bringing back coal… In my gut I knew the stock was undervalued, but I didn’t listen to my own advice, and then several years later, after I sold most of my stock, it soared. Sure, that stung—but honestly, the real regret wasn’t the IPO timing. The real regret was not betting on ourselves sooner. Execution matters. But in solar, capital is leverage—and we gave it away.

Anna: Where did things go from there?

After the IPO, I stayed focused on commercial. We had momentum—solid projects and great teams, and we were finally getting traction at scale. One of the biggest early wins was landing a spot on the GSA Schedule, which let government agencies buy from us directly with prepackaged system sizes similar to what we did with Costco. That opened the door to major installs, like VA hospitals off the 405 in Santa Monica, CA. We were well-suited for this type of work. But then came another painful lesson: those who control the finance stack control the deals. We landed a contract to solarize an entire school district in San Luis Obispo, where we remained headquartered. We partnered with SunEdison to fund the solar projects, which they would own and run after installation.  We brought it in, did all the legwork, and after the ink was dry on the contract, SunEdison rewrote the specs and swapped us out of the installation for an out-of-town installer willing to build the projects for pennies of profit, or most likely a loss. The deal collapsed. It felt like we got hustled. They played it like gangsters in suits—smiling through the handshake, then cutting us out. That moment was another clear signal: if you don’t control the capital and the client, you’re just a middleman. And middlemen don’t get to make the rules. That experience was a wake-up call—another reminder that without a steady funding partner and aligned execution, even the best projects can fall apart. We needed more control, more capital, and the ability to carry projects across the finish line without getting boxed out by shortsighted procurement games. Not long after, Duke Energy came in and acquired REC Commercial. On paper, it looked like the right move. They had deep pockets, billions on the balance sheet, and access to cheap capital. But in practice? It was a constant internal grind. Duke is a traditional utility company. They were so risk-averse it was paralyzing. If a potential client didn’t have a Moody’s rating or an investment-grade offtaker, it didn’t move forward. Farmers? Small businesses? School districts? Community co-ops? Not “bankable.” Never mind that they were ready, willing, and in desperate need of clean power. We were trying to do it right—building real, bankable infrastructure that would last. But when your parent company won’t fund anything without an investment-rated credit, even your best projects feel like you’re running with a parachute strapped to your back. Eventually, the joy was gone. The mission got buried under risk reports and red tape. So in 2016, I stepped away—not from solar, but from a version of it that no longer made sense. And honestly, that decision may have saved my love for the industry. Because now, I get to build again—with the lessons in hand and a better view of where we need to go next.

Anna: You’ve lived through SolarCity, Sunrun, and the rise of REC. What’s your take on where solar is heading?

Ryan: Big picture, the future for solar has never been brighter. For decades the biggest knock on solar was intermittency. That solar only produces energy when the sun is shining. However, all of that changes with cost-effective battery storage. With energy storage, you can have true energy independence for your home and business. Innovation in storage is rapidly advancing, just like the first phase of advancement in solar panel efficiencies and installation speed acceleration.  Because of storage, the future is bright. However, for the short term, residential solar is in a rough spot. And as mentioned, it’s not because the technology doesn’t work. It’s not because people don’t want it. It’s because we’ve allowed short-term politics and outdated regulatory structures to sabotage and slow down long-term progress. The Inflation Reduction Act was a game-changer. Finally, the U.S. was putting real money behind clean energy for a predictable amount of time. Between Section 48E for commercial investment tax credits and Section 45U for production incentives, we had a clear runway. Developers ramped up. Manufacturing started to come home to the USA. Projects moved forward. For every $1 of tax revenues the government invested through the IRA with tax credits to projects, the long-term return to the US Treasury in future tax revenues is exponentially higher. If our government operated their budget like a CFO, they would think about the budget like a financial performance with future cashflows for investment today and what Net Present Value (NPV) comes from various programs. That’s from real economic data. Where does that great economic return to the US treasury come from? It’s tax paid back from wages for electricians and project managers. It’s payroll taxes. It’s supply chain spending, equipment procurement, and local small business growth. It’s the workers who now have stable jobs, healthcare, and money to spend in their communities—on childcare, restaurants, and car repairs. That dollar gets recycled into the economy in a way that fossil fuel subsidies never could. It’s savings that homeowners with solar enjoy every month, and then they have extra money to spend in their local economy. And yet Trump’s new Big Beautiful Bill will derail this progress. Not immediately, but unfortunately the USA will not reap the immense financial benefits over the coming decades as a result of this moment. The residential solar tax credit ends this year with a carve-out to allow third-party financed projects to continue for a few more years. However, the Trump administration has also implemented massive tariffs on raw inputs from other countries that will hurt our fragile up-and-coming domestic manufacturers. They’ve gone further with draconian rules that will limit the ability to use the tax credits if equipment is purchased from Foreign Entities of Concern (FEOC). There are hundreds of gigawatts (GWs) of solar lined up for construction in the coming years as they wait for interconnection approvals, but this targeted attack puts much of that clean and cost-competitive energy at risk of ever happening. Not because the projects are unviable. Not because they don’t have customers. But because a mounting bracket, transformer, or inverter component traces back to a flagged country. That means no tax credit. No funding. And in commercial? That can trigger liquidated damages, lawsuits, and financial collapse for developers acting in good faith. All we’re asking for is practical guidance. A phased transition. A chance to comply without shutting everything down.

This kind of policy failure with this administration isn’t unique to solar. Look at the National Park Service. We spend around $4 billion a year operating it. That $4 billion generates over $40 billion in direct economic activity. Campgrounds, hotels, restaurants, and tour operators—entire rural economies depend on it. Yet Congress continues to cut that budget, lay off rangers, close trails, and defer maintenance. It’s the same pattern: a refusal to invest in things that actually pay us back. Now zoom out. Think about the energy demand growth we’re facing. AI, data centers, electric vehicles (EVs), and electrified heating systems are all being implemented rapidly. The DOE has already warned we’ll be 100 gigawatts short by 2030. So what’s the solution? Some say natural gas. But here’s the catch: you can’t just flip a switch and build a gas plant. A natural gas combined cycle facility takes at minimum 3 years to permit, site, finance, and build—if everything goes smoothly. More realistically, you’re looking at 4 to 5 years because there is already a 2-4 year backlog to even receive a natural gas-burning generator. And even then, that power’s not clean like solar, and it’s not decentralized. And the pipelines? Most are already at capacity. So now we’re talking about new gas pipeline infrastructure too—billions in costs, years of construction, and regulatory/not-in-my-backyard hurdles that make solar permitting look easy. Meanwhile, we have 100s of GWs of solar and storage projects that are working through the utility interconnection approval process. When approved, deployment can be swift. But they’re being stalled or killed because of vague compliance rules and utility red tape. It’s madness. These aren’t hypothetical projects—I’m talking about  late-stage development of utility-scale power plants. Unfortunately, the tariff war with China is needlessly raising project prices. Higher project prices will raise the long-term price for the electricity generated. Americans will pay for the added cost from the tariffs far longer than any short-term financial pain caused to China by refusing to buy their subsidized equipment. Why not use that low-cost equipment now AND scale our local manufacturing? When our domestic supply chain is ready, then we can turn our back on China. But this administration doesn’t care about what is right for America. They are solely focused on benefiting the entrenched oil and gas and coal companies that invested in Trump to get him elected. It’s a sad fact, but it is what it is.

The Big Beautiful Bill will end residential tax credits at the end of this year, 2025. For Commercial and Utility scale, the credits remain until 2027, or until 2030 if construction started in 2026. This will result in a mad dash to complete projects in the next few years, but there’s no doubt growth will slow after the credits end. There will be consolidation, but the overall thesis remains sound. Solar and storage are here to stay, and the future remains bright.

It’s a shame that Solar has become a political dividing line. There used to be bipartisan support, but now that Solar is the most new energy added to the utility grid every year. Big oil and gas are pushing back. They’ve invested heavily into Trump and other Republicans to get them into power, and they’re paying back their donors with legislation.

What’s sad is that if we simply kept the tax credits in place for the length of time the IRA laid out (2033), it would have provided a clear, actionable path forward, bringing many hundreds of GWs of clean energy online. That’s not just energy—that’s good-paying local jobs. That’s electricians, engineers, procurement teams, transport, service, sales, and local businesses. It’s economic growth at every layer. Killing these projects isn’t just a climate mistake—it’s a massive missed opportunity for American industry. We need leadership. We need clarity. And we need to stop dismantling the only energy strategy that’s proven to deliver economic, environmental, and social returns in our local communities today. We’re not just making a policy mistake. I believe we are making a historic failure for America.

Anna: What happened next?

Ryan: After I left REC, I joined another startup to develop some new racking technology to install solar groundmounts without concrete piles, steel, and underground work to deploy projects quickly. We ballasted the racking with water. It was quite innovative and has a good niche. We also figured out how to make solar panels a watertight roof for raised canopy structures. That solution was picked up by a large steel company, Nucor, and they market the product as Powershingle. That was a lot of fun. Looking back, we should have raised capital and expanded vs. handing the technology over. When COVID hit, everything slowed down—but I didn’t. I teamed up again with my longtime friend, Ethan Miller, who ran operations for REC Solar when everything started. Ethan had moved over to Sunrun when they acquired REC, and he ran national operations for Sunrun for many years. Ethan and I started Solar Shine. It was one of those “let’s fix something overlooked” ideas. Everyone tells homeowners to clean their panels, but most of the cleaning products out there either damage the panels or the plants around them. Filthy solar panels don’t let all the sunlight through, so electricity production can drop by 50% or even more.

So we got to work—testing formulas, building prototypes, and designing something environmentally safe, effective, and scalable. It wasn’t flashy, but it was real. And it felt good to be hands-on again. Why have solar panels on your roof if they aren’t producing optimally? That product is available for sale on Amazon, and we plan to scale it. However, those plans to scale have been stalled because Ethan was pulled back into operations as COO of a new residential solar platform for fulfilment. The name of the company is Powur.  It couples direct-to-consumer sales with distributed installation, all managed by a software platform. Similar to how Amazon fulfills product sales and shipments around the world, they are doing that for home services like roofing, solar and storage, air conditioning, and eventually more. But shipping a package and installing solar and dealing with local regulatory challenges is exponentially more challenging. He was brought in to untangle their operations and bring structure to their rapid growth. I took notice. I started paying closer attention to what they were building—and when the opportunity came up to help expand Powur into Hawaii, I jumped in. As a side note, my wife and I moved to Honolulu over a decade ago because she too is in solar. She’s a utility-scale solar developer, and yes, we met at a solar conference. She has successfully developed and deployed hundreds of MWs of built solar and storage powering Hawaii’s utility grid. More on that in a moment.

When Powur expanded to Hawaii as their 24th state, I supported the rollout and ramp-up. I jumped in with the local subcontract builder in Hawaii to help build and train the sales team. Making sales wasn’t difficult, but the typical challenges of scaling engineering and execution remained. However, the key with Powur is they purchase equipment nationally, and in Hawaii they have a strategic cost advantage over local installers buying from middleman distributors. I remain involved with the team, providing mentorship, and occasionally will personally sell some projects for friends and family to make sure they get a great system at a fair price. I believe they’ve gone from nothing to number 2 or 3 in all of Hawaii in two years. However, my passion for big impact remained, and an opportunity came up to lead business development for the largest utility-scale Engineering, Procurement, and Construction contractor in the USA, Moss and Associates.

Moss has built nearly 70% of all utility-scale solar and storage in Hawaii, including all the projects my wife developed in her role with Clearway Energy. Nationally, Moss is building many GWs of solar each year. It’s exciting to be part of a team that is making such a massive impact.

Anna: Knowing what you know now about solar—after riding the ups and downs, watching giants rise and fall—what do you think is coming next? And what advice would you give to solar business owners trying to survive what’s ahead?

Ryan: First off, buckle up. This industry is not for the faint of heart. The volatility? It’s not going anywhere. There will be political and regulatory volatility. We’re rebuilding the energy system in real time while fighting for-profit utilities that are defending the status quo, navigating policy shifts, and wrestling with supply chain chaos. So if you’re in it just to ride a trend or flip a business, it’s going to be brutal. But if you’re here to build something lasting—there’s still enormous upside. Here’s my advice: be smarter than we were the first time. Don’t over-extend. I’ve lived through the gold rush, the hype, the consolidation, and the implosions. And what I’ve learned is that smart execution beats fast growth every time. Build slow if you have to—but build right. If possible, own your financing. Or partner with someone who will let you grow without pulling the rug out from under you. That was the billion-dollar mistake we made—we didn’t create the fund when we should have. If you don’t own the paper, you’re just another sales org. You’re expendable. Get on the capital side of the table. Operationally, you have to be tighter than ever. Permitting, inspections, engineering—it’s not optional to get this stuff right. Don’t scale until your fulfillment machine is dialed. Trust me. I’ve seen what happens when it’s not. Stay ahead of tech. The landscape is changing fast. Microgrids and complete energy independence are now here!

The opportunity is still massive. But this next chapter isn’t about who can move the fastest—it’s about who can move the smartest.

Wrap-Up: What Solar Business Owners Can Learn from Ryan Park Ryan Park’s journey through the highs, lows, and hard lessons of the solar industry is more than just a case study—it’s a blueprint for resilience. His story is a reminder that building a lasting business in solar isn’t about chasing hype or scaling at all costs. It’s about making smart, grounded decisions rooted in experience. If there’s one thing Ryan makes clear, it’s this: own your future. That means owning your financing or partnering with people who truly align with your long-term vision. Control the capital, and you control the outcome. He’s also proof that growth without solid operations is dangerous. Scale only when your systems are strong, your fulfillment is clean, and your customer experience is airtight. Looking ahead, the companies that win will be the ones embracing innovation—like energy storage and energy use optimization. Ryan reminds us that policy is not background noise. It’s front and center. If you’re not tracking FEOC, NEM changes, and tax credit enforcement, you’re building blind. The solar coaster will always be in motion—but the people who succeed aren’t just holding on. They’re learning, adapting, and shaping the ride. Ryan’s lived it, and his path is a powerful reminder: play the long game, think like an owner, and never stop building smarter.