The Washington Redskins played with enough energy to send Sunday's game against the Dallas Cowboys into overtime, but by the time the 'Skins fell to their sixth consecutive loss, my host at Redskins Park -- David Crane, the chief executive of NRG Energy -- had left. Actually, he exited before halftime . . . to attend another NFC East showdown, the Giants-Eagles prime time game in New Jersey.

No, Crane is not a football fanatic. But the affable 52-year-old CEO is fanatic about promoting solar power, which is why he's been spending time lately with NFL owners. NRG installed solar panels last summer at Redskins Park [See my blogpost, An NFL rivalry...over solar], and he would like the company, which is based in Princeton, N.J., to deliver solar energy to the stadiums where the Giants and Jets, Philadelphia Eagles and New England Patriots play.

Why? To show people -- particularly the influential, well-to-do types who attend NFL games -- that solar energy makes sense, today.

"This is about demonstrating to the public the potential of solar," David told me, as Dallas jumped to an early lead. and we made our way up to the front of the suite. "I just want to make sure I see at least one play before I go," he said, ruefully.

Most utility company CEOs are, frankly, dull. Not Crane. He's straightforward and occasionally outspoken, friendly and open, and ready to think in new ways about an industry that hasn't changed all that much since Edison's day. He is passionate about the climate crisis–he was active in USCAP, the failed big biz/big green coalition that lobbied for federal regulation of greenhouse gases, and he pushed hard to build a low-carbon nuclear plant in Texas until the risks grew too high post-Fukushima. He's a friend of the Clintons, which is one reason why NRG made a $1 million contribution through the Clinton Global Initiative to deliver solar power to Haiti.

Now he is pushing hard for rooftop solar, smart meters and electric cars–a set of technologies that has the potential to transform the way utilities operate.

He believes that distributed energy -- that is, energy generated at the place where it's used -- is gradually going to replace some centralized power plants built by regulated utilities over the last century.

"To me, this is the next big thing in the industry," Crane said. "It's disruptive in the way that the cell phone was disruptive to telephony. It was severely disruptive over a 20 to 30 year period, not overnight."

"When we can offer you solar power from your roof, at the same price or lower than grid power, the whole nature of what it means to be retail electricity provider is going to change, and we want to be on the front end of that," he said.

Rooftop solar photovoltaics don't have to be cheaper than the wholesale cost of burning coal or natural gas to tip the market. They only have to beat the retail price of electricity to a business or home owner.

Now, before we get ahead of ourselves, a few caveats. NRG is not the Sierra Club. With $8.8 billion in revenues last year, NRG made most of its money by burning coal, natural gas and oil. Unless and until the cost of solar power drops further, that's unlikely to change.