Budderfly commits $500 million to city energy systems it will own and run

Budderfly, a Connecticut company that built its business upgrading energy systems at commercial sites, said on Oct. 20 it will make $500 million available to small- and medium-sized US cities. The structure is the point. Budderfly does not sell municipalities new equipment; it pays for, installs, owns, operates and maintains it, and the cities pay over time out of the energy savings.

The program, called Modernizing American Cities, will target about 100 municipalities, Budderfly and Schneider Electric said, according to Bloomberg Law. Budderfly will fund it from existing capital, Bloomberg Law reported. Schneider is supplying the energy management and automation technology that ties the systems together. The announcement was timed to the International City/County Management Association's annual conference in Long Beach, California.

The commitment is large relative to Budderfly's history. The company says it has invested more than $378 million in facility upgrades to date across a 10-year track record serving more than 9,000 commercial customer locations. The municipal pledge exceeds that cumulative figure, and it points a company built on private commercial sites toward a customer base with public budgets and public scrutiny.

The template already exists in Cadillac, Michigan. There, Budderfly is investing about $4.4 million across seven municipal facilities, including city hall and the wastewater treatment plant, according to the company's announcement. The work covers solar, battery storage, new HVAC and lighting, EV charging and microgrid capability meant to keep essential services running during grid outages. Schneider's electrical hardware and controls handle monitoring and optimization across the sites. The arrangement runs under a 15-year energy-as-a-service agreement in which the investment is recovered through shared savings, according to a post by energy consultancy Kurrant.

Fifteen years is a long tenancy inside a city's most essential buildings. For that period, the systems intended to keep essential services running during grid outages belong to a private vendor, and that vendor is responsible for running and maintaining them. Cadillac's city manager, Marcus Peccia, framed the trade in budget terms, saying the city can modernize "all without requiring upfront taxpayer investment."

That budget pressure underpins the pitch. Average commercial electricity prices rose about 6% nationally in the first seven months of 2026 from a year earlier, with increases of 20% or more in Ohio, Virginia and Maryland, according to US Energy Information Administration data cited in the release. The company also cited a National League of Cities finding that 90% of surveyed cities with growing infrastructure needs reported a negative impact on their budgets.

Under the broader program, cities would not depend on grants or capital spending, Budderfly said. Budderfly and Schneider would work with local leaders to identify and prioritize projects depending on local needs.

Budderfly is also joining Schneider's Accelerating Resilient Infrastructure Initiative, which the companies say brings together nearly 50 industry partners to help US communities finance and deploy resilient energy infrastructure. The program is open now; municipal leaders are being directed to Budderfly's website to propose projects.