2025 IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) Summit:
Achieving a More Reliable and Resilient Energy Future
19 – 21 May 2025 · San Jose, California, USA
Summary of Event
The inaugural IEEE Power & Energy (PES) Summit on Achieving a More Reliable and Resilient Energy Future will focus on practical experiences by the power and energy industry to achieve a more reliable and resilient electric power grid. The summit will focus on efforts to drive for reliability performance through outage reduction and quicker response. The summit will also include system level thinking to mitigate against high impact low probability or resilience events. Since the summit will be hosted in the west coast a specific topic of reliability and wildfire mitigation will also be covered. The event will include one track technical track (super session format) and not include breakout sessions. The presenters invited are practitioners who will discuss their organizations’ approaches to a more reliable and resilient grid.
Event Program
MONDAY, 19 MAY
MONDAY, 19 MAY
Registration
4:00PM – 7:00PM
Welcome Reception
5:00PM – 7:00PM
TUESDAY, 20 MAY
TUESDAY, 20 MAY
Registration
7:00AM – 6:00PM
Safety Message
8:30AM – 8:40AM
Quinn Nakayama – Senior Director, Grid Research Innovation & Development, PG&E
Welcome
8:40AM – 8:55AM
Shay Bahramirad – President, IEEE Power & Energy Society
Daily Agenda Review
8:55AM – 9:00AM
Quinn Nakayama – Senior Director, Grid Research Innovation & Development, PG&E
Fireside Chat – Mayor, City of San Jose
9:00AM – 9:30AM
Mayor Matt Mahan, City of San Jose
Topic 1: Key Success Factors for Reliable Energy Delivery
9:30AM – 10:30AM
Damir Novosel (Moderator) – President and Founder, Quanta Technology
Terry Donnelly – Past President & COO, ComEd
Mark Carpenter – Senior Vice President, T&D Operations, Oncor
Shay Bahramirad – Vice President of Transmission and Distribution Engineering, PG&E
Break & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
10:30AM – 11:00AM
Topic 2: Preventing Catastrophic Outages for Transmission & Substations
11:00AM – 12:00PM
Raj Beasla (Moderator) – Senior Director, Transmission and Substation Engineering, PG&E
Cheryl Maletich – Senior Vice President Transmission & Substations, ComEd
Sarah Lacey – Director Transmission and Substations, Pepco Holdings
James Hanson – Manager Operations Analysis, WECC
Billy Raley – Senior Vice President Engineering and Operations, Long Island Lighting
Lunch & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
12:00PM – 1:30PM
Topic 3: Data Centers and their Impact on the Grid
1:30PM – 2:30PM
Bryon Winget (Moderator) – Vice President Electric System Planning, PG&E
Josh Stallings – Vice President, Strategy and Support, Georgia Power
Selver Corhodzic – Global Director Data Center Electrical Systems, META
Florent Xavier, Director of R&D Partnerships, Valorization, and Transformation, RTE
Mandy Ulrich – Senior Manager AMER West/Latam Energy, Water, CFE, AWS
1:00PM - 2:00PM
(Focus on best practices regarding protection, substation asset health condition and preventive assessments, transmission line physical assessment, hardening, etc.)
Break & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
2:30PM – 3:00PM
Topic 4: Reliability Improvement – Recent Utility Experiences: Challenges, Success Stories, and Lessons Learned
3:00PM – 4:00PM
Julio Romero (moderator) – Senior Vice President Strategy & Business Innovation, Quanta Technology
Brett Stockton – Reliability Engineering Manager, Duke Energy
Julio Aguilar – Vice President Distribution and Reliability, LUMA Energy
Rod Robinson – Vice President Electric System Operations, PG&E
Gerald Ramsey – Reliability and Automation Manager, Southern Company
Topic 5: Innovations in System Reliability , Outage Prevention, Forensics and Failure Analytics
4:00PM – 5:00PM
Carl Segneri (moderator) – Vice President Grid Asset Solutions, Quanta Technology
Jamie Ortega – Director Grid Analytics, ComEd
Shinichi Imai – VP, Renewable Energy, Power & Energy Solutions – INPEX Corp.
Farnoosh Rahmatian – President, NuGrid Power Corporation
Marianna Vaiman – CEO, V&R Energy
Sponsored Evening Event
6:00PM – 9:00PM
WEDNESDAY, 21 MAY
WEDNESDAY, 21 MAY
Registration
7:00AM – 3:00PM
Daily Agenda Review & Safety Message
8:15AM – 8:30AM
Quinn Nakayama Senior Director, Grid Research Innovation & Development, PG&E
Topic 6: Reliability, Resilience, and Optimization of Capital Investments
8:30AM – 9:30AM
Moderator – TBD
Joe Bentley – Senior Vice President Electric Engineering, PG&E
Sarah Wambles – GM Distribution Asset Management Governance, Duke Energy
Howard Gugel – Senior Vice President of Regulatory Oversight, NERC
Joe Svachula – Senior Vice President Transmission & Compliance, Exelon
Break & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
9:30AM – 10:00AM
Topic 7: Reliability, Resilience & Wildfire Mitigation
10:00AM – 11:00AM
Matt Pender (moderator) – Vice President Undergrounding & System Hardening, PG&E
Heide Casswell – Oregon PUC
Kristie Cocco – Sr Director, T&D Engineering & Construction, APS
Brian Pierre – Manager, Electric Power Systems Research Dept, Sandia National Labs
Break & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
11:30AM – 11:00AM
Topic 8: Technology Panel on Reliability
11:00AM – 12:00PM
Quinn Nakayana (Moderator) – Senior Director, Grid Research Innovation & Development, PG&E
Aleksi Paaso – Vice President Distribution, Quanta Technology
Ernst Scholtz – Chief Technology Officer, S&C Electric
Calvin Zhang – Global Technology Director, Eaton
Hamed Khalilinia – Power Systems Lead, Tapestry
Tim Barat – Co-Founder & CEO, Gridware
Lunch & Reliability Innovation Exhibits
12:00PM – 1:30PM
Topic 9: Climate Resiliency & Major Event Response (focus on solutions to address and prevent impacts of summer and winter storms, flooding, high-speed winds, atmospheric rivers, temperature increase, etc.)
1:30PM – 2:30PM
Wayne Bishop (Moderator) – Vice President Industry Outreach & Strategy, Quanta Technology
Shikhar Pandey – Chair, IEEE Distribution Resiliency Task Force
Teresa Alvarado – Vice President, South Bay and Central Coast Region, PG&E
Dan Smith – Vice President of Research & Innovation, LCRA
Rob Brook – GM and Senior Vice President Americas, NEARA
Topic 10: Western US Experiences
2:30PM – 3:30PM
Jon Eric Thalman (Moderator) – Sr. Director Reliability, PG&E
Audrey Lee – Senior Director Energy, Microsoft
Wendy al Mukdad, Senior Utilities Engineer – California PUC
Yanfeng Gong- Fellow Engineer, Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories (SEL)
Sahar Hendabad – Vice President, Grid Modernization Strategy, AECOM
1:00PM - 2:00PM
(focus on solutions to address and prevent impacts of summer and winter storms, flooding, high-speed winds, atmospheric rivers, temperature increase, etc.)
Registration
Early bird registration will end on 5 May 2025 and the event pricing is as follows.
Hotel & Venue
Signia By Hilton San Jose
170 S. Market St
San Jose, California 95113 USA
Parking Information
Hotel offers valet parking for $50.00 per day + tax
IEEE PES has negotiated a special group rate of US$289 per night for attendees. This group rate is exclusive of taxes. Reservations must be made by 5:00 pm Pacific Time by 25 April 2025 to get the group rate. Once the room block is sold out, the hotel will offer rooms/rates based upon availability.
To book your room online at the group rate please click here: https://book.passkey.com/e/50995839
Travel Information
Local Airport and Transportation Options- San Jose Mineta International Airport (SJC): Located in the heart of Silicon Valley, this airport is 3.9 miles from downtown San Jose. It offers free shuttle transport to Light Rail and train stations.
- Southwest Airlines and American Airlines both fly to San Jose Mineta International Airport (SJC).
- San Francisco International Airport (SFO): Located within a 30-45 minute drive from San Jose.
- Oakland International Airport (OAK): Located within a 30-45 minute drive from San Jose.
- The Valley Transportation Authority (VTA) light rail, Caltrain, andAltamont Corridor Express (ACE) are all nearby public transportation options that connect Santa Clara to Silicon Valley.
- Caltrain also links Santa Clara to San Francisco and major tech hubs along the Peninsula.
Sponsorship Opportunities
The event will provide practical experiences that are being implemented in order to achieve a more reliable and resilient electric power grid. This is an opportunity for utility professionals, solution providers, and industry leaders to discuss the efforts & solutions that are driving reliability performance through outage reduction and quicker response time. Industry experts will share their best practices, which will result in an excellent customer experience in electric reliability. Proven methods that can be adopted industry-wide.
By providing support, your organization can raise your company’s profile among the individuals who are actively involved in creating a more reliable and resilient power grid.
Please email Carl Segneri at to secure a sponsorship or for any questions. Thank you.
Pinnacle Sponsor
(limit 2)
Features
-
Six (6) Full Conference Registrations
-
Opportunity to provide lanyards with your logo (lanyards to be provided by you)
-
Company Logo Placement
On event web page supporter web page & applicable venue signage
Included in ‘Thank You To Our Sponsors’ Email -
Opening Session acknowledgement
-
Complimentary Meet and Greet Display table
-
Opportunity to have an organizational representative be a participant as a panelist
Diamond Sponsor
Features
-
Four (4) Full Conference Registrations
-
Company Logo Placement
On event web page supporter web page & applicable venue signage
Included in ‘Thank You To Our Sponsors’ Email -
Opening Session acknowledgement
-
Complimentary Meet and Greet Display table
-
Opportunity to have an organizational representative be a participant as a panelist
Platinum Sponsor
Features
-
Three (3) Conference Registrations
-
Company Logo Placement
On event web page supporter web page & applicable venue signage
Included in ‘Thank You To Our Sponsors’ Email -
Opening Session acknowledgement
GOld Sponsor
Features
-
Two (2) Conference Registrations
-
Company Logo Placement
On event website supporter web page & applicable venue signage
Included in ‘Thank You To Our Sponsors’ Email -
Opening Session acknowledgement
À La Carte Options
- $25,000 – Exclusive Evening Reception Sponsorship, (1) Sponsoring company
- Tuesday, 20 April
- $12,000 – Morning Coffee, (1) Sponsoring company for each morning
- Tuesday, 20 April
- Wednesday, 21 April
- $3,000 – Sponsored Meet & Greet Display Tables
Companies and organizations that have innovative solutions to address industry reliability are invited to participate in the summit to share their ideas and/or showcase their products.- Includes the following:
- 1 – Full event registration
- 1 – 6’ Table with ID sign
- 1 – Trash Can
- 1 – 2 Chairs
- Complimentary WiFi
- Includes the following:
Email Carl Segneri at to secure a sponsorship or for any inquiries. Thank you.