Responding to the influences of climate change, on the one hand, and selected benefits of
digital technology, on the other hand, an energy transition of global scale appears to be underway.
Many observers project that a significant element of the energy transition will be a growing depen-
dence on electricity, a dependence possibly doubling by 2050. Such a transformation, however, would
likely require re-configuring the architecture of complex, centralized electricity grids, an artifact of a
context of more than a century ago. In concert with the energy transition, we argue to modify the
objective of the electricity grid to enable efficient, pervasive optimization in local service areas that
provides incentives for users to be efficient in their energy use. At the core of our argument is the
presentation of economic incentives denominated in an electricity-backed commodity currency such
that incumbent electricity generators could augment their economic purpose of electricity production
and electricity distribution to include financial intermediation. A direct consequence of this institu-
tional transformation is the opportunity for all users to generate wealth. There are others who have
been inspired to conjure ways that energy could be a candidate currency. Our argument is distinctive,
though, in exploiting how an institution (the power grid system) could be repositioned and how all
agents in the system could benefit by the institutionalization of electricity as money.