The daughter of a commercial real estate lawyer, Ali Denson went to the University of Texas in 2008 to study kinesiology — the scientific study of body movement.
“I realized the healthcare profession wasn’t for me, and I kept coming back to how much I enjoyed hearing my dad talk about his work growing up,” Denson said. “As a listener, my main takeaway was the passion I heard when he talked about projects he had worked on. No matter where we drove in Austin, there was some shopping center he had a story about.”
Eighteen years later, Denson is a lawyer, but she is still focused on movement — water movement for oil and gas exploration in the Midland Basin.
Last year, she played a leading role in Deep Blue’s $750 million acquisition of Environmental Disposal System from Diamondback Energy, spearheading the $950 million term loan and structuring the key commercial agreements needed to finance the acquisition by The Woodlands-based sustainable water management company.
“The deal positions Deep Blue for sustained growth and reinforces its leadership in sustainable water management solutions within the Permian Basin,” said O’Melveny & Myers counsel Brandon Duke. “Ali’s role required not only legal excellence, but also strategic business judgment, cross-functional leadership and the ability to navigate a highly technical and evolving regulatory and operational landscape.”
“For her transformative impact on Deep Blue’s growth, her leadership on a landmark transaction and her excellence within a small legal department, Ali Denson is exceptionally deserving of recognition as Senior Counsel of the Year by The Texas Lawbook,” Duke wrote in nominating Denson for the honor.
The Association of Corporate Counsel’s Houston Chapter and The Lawbook agree, and are awarding Denson with the 2026 Houston Corporate Counsel Award for Senior Counsel of the Year for a Small Legal Department (two to five lawyers).
Premium Subscriber Q&A: Ali Denson discusses the traits she seeks in outside counsel, what outside counsel need to know when working with her and more.
“What sets Ali apart is her judgment and presence. She leads without seeking the spotlight,” Duke said. “She shows up, delivers at the highest level, supports those around her, and earns the respect and trust of everyone she works with. She is someone people turn to not just for answers, but for guidance.”
In an interview with The Lawbook, Denson said her best day at Blue Water was the closing day for the EDS acquisition.
“Leading up to closing, everyone had been deeply engaged in their respective roles, often moving quickly and juggling competing priorities to keep the deal moving successfully,” she said. “Closing day provided time to collectively pause and recognize what we had accomplished together. What made that day especially meaningful was the opportunity to bring the office together and genuinely appreciate the contributions of each individual.”
“So much of the work that goes into a transaction like that happens behind the scenes, and it’s easy to move from one deadline to the next without fully acknowledging the effort involved,” she said. “Taking the time to slow down, even briefly, and celebrate together made the experience stand out as not just a professional milestone, but a genuinely rewarding moment. It also reinforced for me what I value most about working at Deep Blue — the collaborative environment and the people.”
Denson was born and raised in Austin. While her father, Ken Mills, practiced commercial real estate law, her mom worked several jobs, including high school dance teacher and event coordinator.
“I always considered myself as more of a math and science person,” Denson said. “I assumed my career would follow a more traditional path in those fields.”
“It was the problem-solving itself and not the subject areas I enjoyed,” she said. “Then when it was time to figure out what to do with my life my senior year of college, I thought more and more about the conversations I’d had with my dad about his work, and he helped me realize that practicing law was, at its core, an exercise in structured problem-solving.”
“My parents also emphasized the importance of service to others growing up, and while I won’t begin to pretend lawyers are saving the world, it is a profession of service — which was appealing to me — and I try to approach work every day with that mindset,” she said.
Denson said another factor was that her older sister started law school while she was in college.
“As with most things growing up, I followed in her footsteps since that had always worked for me up to that point,” she said.
After three years practicing corporate transactional work at Hendershot, Cannon & Hisey in Houston and then Greer Herz & Adams in Galveston, Denson moved to Big Law, where she spent 15 months at Mayer Brown and 15 months at Winston & Strawn before deciding to go in-house.
During her time at Winston, she worked with partner Isaac Griesbaum, who was part of the transactional team that helped establish Blue Water, which is a joint venture formed in 2023 between Diamondback and the energy investment firm Five Point Infrastructure. Griesbaum joined the new company as its general counsel.
“When the company reached a point where it made sense to expand the legal team, he reached out to see if I would be interested in joining,” Denson said. “A move in-house was something I’d always been interested in, and this was a meaningful opportunity to move in-house into a small, high-impact legal team where I could take on a broader range of responsibilities and work more directly with the business. Given my prior exposure to Deep Blue and my working relationship with Isaac, joining felt like a natural next step rather than a leap into something unfamiliar.”
Denson said her biggest challenge since joining Deep Blue two years ago has been “developing a deep understanding of the complexity of the business and how all of its moving parts fit together.”
“Coming from a law firm environment, I was used to learning my clients’ businesses in a more targeted way, typically focusing on the specific matter at hand,” she said. “While there is certainly exposure to broader commercial context at a firm, the role is ultimately centered on delivering advice or executing a discrete project, and you don’t always get full visibility into the operational, strategic and financial considerations that sit behind it.”
“Transitioning in-house has been both a rewarding shift and a significant learning curve,” she said. “I’ve had to fully immerse myself in the business and understand not just the legal issues, but also how different functions operate, how decisions are made, and how various priorities interact across the organization. That has required me to develop a more holistic view of the business and to think beyond purely legal considerations when providing advice.”
Griesbaum, who hired Denson as his deputy GC in May 2024, said she has earned the respect of senior leadership through her “sound judgment, responsiveness and ability to move complex matters forward efficiently without sacrificing rigor.”
“She consistently delivers enterprise-level legal leadership within a lean team, providing practical, actionable advice and ensuring that legal strategy is fully aligned with business objectives,” Griesbaum said as part of the nomination.
No bigger example of Denson’s achievements than the complex purchase of EDS, which required sophisticated coordination across financing, operational and strategic dimensions.
As part of the transaction, Deep Blue secured a 15-year water dedication agreement across a 12-county area, ensuring long-term demand stability while integrating a substantial infrastructure platform that includes approximately 1.2 million barrels per day of treatment and recycling capacity, 3.4 million barrels per day of disposal capacity and nearly 1,900 miles of pipeline.
Deep Blue states that the transaction expands its customer base, enhances operational efficiencies through system integration and unlocks significant commercial synergies.
Denson’s role in the EDS acquisition was to coordinate all business areas to ensure the transaction progressed smoothly and that each team had the information, timelines and tools needed to execute their respective responsibilities.
“This involved acting as a key point of communication between internal stakeholders, including finance, operations and executive leadership, so that priorities were aligned and objectives were clearly understood throughout the deal lifecycle,” she said. “I was also actively involved in the drafting and negotiation of the commercial agreements associated with the transaction. And on top of that I oversaw the diligence process, supported the negotiation and execution of the new credit agreement entered into in connection with the acquisition, and helped manage outside counsel throughout the transaction.”
Duke said that Denson “brings a rare combination of sophistication and practicality to her work.”
“Ali combines strong Texas roots with a deep understanding of the regional business landscape,” he said. “Her ability to translate complex legal issues into actionable business solutions has made her indispensable in a fast-scaling environment.”
Fun Facts: Ali Denson
- Favorite book: Any detective novel. I enjoy trying to solve the mystery alongside the author. It’s fun to follow the clues and test my own theories as the story unfolds.
- Favorite movie: I am more of a TV show person. I tend to fall asleep in any movie over one hour, which they all are. I love early-mid 2000s sitcoms — The Office, Parks and Recreation, New Girl, Brooklyn 99, Scrubs. They were great when they originally aired, and now they are my comfort shows are just as funny, if not more, on repeat viewings.
- Favorite drink: A good lemonade. There is nothing better than when a place gets the mix of sweet and tart just right. It is the ultimate refreshing drink for the nine months of summer we get in Texas.
- Favorite restaurant: My favorite cuisines are Tex-Mex and Asian, and my favorite of each of those are Teotihuacan and Hughie’s — they are always delicious and feel like true neighborhood restaurants.
- Favorite all-time vacation: I don’t have a singular favorite vacation, but do have a favorite vacation spot — Estes Park, Colorado, specifically the YMCA of the Rockies. My family started going when I was 5 years old, and we haven’t stopped. I have now been able to take my children.
- Hero in life: My parents. I didn’t fully appreciate them growing up, but looking back as an adult, I realize just how much they shaped me by giving me a childhood filled with love, guidance, lots of fun and the foundational tools to build my own successful life. That appreciation has grown even deeper, especially now that I’m a working parent myself. Being in their position now, balancing this job while raising two young girls, I realize how much energy it takes to juggle work and family while trying to do both well. They set an example of perseverance, responsibility and love that I now try to live up to in my own life.