Sacramento Municipal Utility District

The Sacramento Municipal Utility District (SMUD) provides electricity to Sacramento County, California, and a small portion of adjacent Placer County. It is one of the ten largest publicly owned utilities in the United States, generating the bulk of its power through natural gas (estimated 56% of production total in 2009) and large hydroelectric generation plants (22% in 2009), and SMUD's green power (renewable) energy output was estimated as 19% in 2009.

SMUD owned the Rancho Seco Nuclear Generating Station nuclear power plant, shut down by a vote of the utility's rate-payers in the late 1980s. Although the nuclear plant is now decommissioned, its now-empty iconic towers remain on the site. Solar arrays and the 500-megawatt Cosumnes gas-fired plant have risen in proximity to the towers.

SMUD's headquarters building, built in the late 1950s on the edge of the East Sacramento neighborhood, is notable for its mural by Sacramento artist Wayne Thiebaud. The mural wraps around the ground floor of the building and is accessible to the public. It is one of the earliest major works by the artist, and remains his largest installation to date.