Allan Marks was appointed to the Board of Water and Power Commissioners by Mayor Karen Bass on November 26, 2025, and was confirmed by the Los Angeles City Council on December 10, 2025. His term ends on June 30, 2030. As a lawyer and strategic advisor, Marks has a lengthy career in international project finance, energy and infrastructure.
Marks advises boards of directors, senior executives, investors, fund managers and other organizations on corporate strategy, risk management, market and regulatory changes, and capital formation, particularly in connection with the energy transition, renewable energy, innovative clean technologies, geopolitics, financial innovation, climate risks, resilience, and sustainability. As a lawyer, he has handled complex energy and infrastructure transactions in the United States, Canada, Latin America, Asia, and Europe with an aggregate value of over $100 Billion, finding innovative ways to create value and reduce risk.
In addition, Marks teaches at both the University of California, Berkeley School of Law and the UCLA School of Law, where he is Affiliated Faculty at the Emmett Institute on Climate Change and the Environment and the Lowell Milken Institute for Business Law and Policy. He also is a Senior Fellow at the Columbia Center on Sustainable Investment, a center of Columbia University’s Climate School; a Non-Resident Visiting Senior Fellow at NYU’s SPS Center for Global Affairs; and a Distinguished Scholar in Energy Law and Sustainability and Professorial Lecturer in Law at the George Washington University Law School. He previously taught Energy and Infrastructure Project Finance at the University of California, Berkeley for 12 years at both the Law School and the Haas School of Business.
Marks is a Contributor to Forbes. He speaks and publishes frequently on energy, infrastructure, business strategy, financial markets, climate change, public policy, regulatory trends, and international transactions. For 11 years, Marks was the founding co-chair of the State Bar of California’s Subsection on Public-Private Infrastructure. He is a member of the Pacific Council on International Policy and served on Law360’s Project Finance Editorial Board. He also serves as a board director of the Colburn School and other civic organizations.
Marks received his Bachelor of Arts in International Studies from The Johns Hopkins University and his Juris Doctor from the University of California, Berkeley School of Law.
