Power Resilience Forum 2026

Wednesday, January 21

1.00-4.00pm – Pre-Conference EPRI Workshop

As a part of the Power Resilience Forum, this Climate READi© half-day workshop will equip attendees with the tools and strategies needed to assess and manage physical climate risk to the power system and identify adaptation strategies. As extreme weather events increasingly challenge grid resilience, the Climate READi Framework — developed with input from over 40 power companies and 100 global stakeholders — offers a rigorous, standardized approach for evaluating risk and guiding investment decisions. While the Framework provides technical guidance for defensible assessments, enabling proactive resilience investments will require coordinated planning and stakeholder engagement. Through this workshop session, participants will gain practical insights to support forward-looking risk management and help shape a climate-resilient power system for the future. The EPRI workshop requires separate registration. Register for the workshop here.

5.30-7.00pm – Opening Reception

Thursday, January 22

8.30-9.00am – Welcome and Opening Remarks
Kicking off PRF with an overview of our coverage of the space, key themes in the market and the plan for the conference

Julia Hamm: Partner, The Ad Hoc Group & PRF Host

Stephen Lacey: Executive Editor & Co-Founder, Latitude Media & PRF Host

Jason Ryan: EVP, Regulatory Services & Government Affairs, CenterPoint Energy & PRF Advisory Board Co-Chair

Morgan Scott: VP, Sustainability & Global Outreach, EPRI & PRF Advisory Board Co-Chair

9.00-9.30am - Opening Keynote: From Stability to Surprise: How Shifting Weather Patterns Are Rewriting the Rules for Grid Resilience
Traditional weather patterns are shifting in ways that defy historical norms. Once-reliable seasonal cues are becoming erratic, extremes are becoming more common, and the past is no longer a trustworthy guide for future grid planning. As the boundaries between short-term weather and long-term climate trends blur along the weather-climate continuum, the power sector needs to rethink decision making in an increasingly uncertain climate. This keynote will explore why and how grid planners and operators must adapt to this new reality.

Sunny Wescott: Chief Metereologist, Federal Government

9.30-10.10am - Building the Nation’s Most Resilient Coastal Grid: Strategies from Texas Utilities on Hurricanes, Floods, and Superstorms
Texas utilities are on the front lines of extreme weather, from hurricanes to "100-year" floods that strike every few years. In 2024, both CenterPoint and Entergy filed ambitious resilience plans with their regulator to harden the grid, cut storm outages, and protect millions of customers across Greater Houston and Southeast Texas. How did these utilities embed resilience into long-term planning? How are their customers and regulator evaluating resilience technologies and their ROI? How are CenterPoint and Entergy collaborating with key stakeholders and each other to make the entire community more resilient?

Judge Edward Emmett: Former Judge, Harris County; Fellow, Baker Institute, Rice University (Moderator)

Chairman Thomas Gleeson: Chairman, Public Utility Commission of Texas

Julie Caruthers Parsley: CEO, Pedernales Electric Cooperative

Eliecer Viamontes: President & CEO, Entergy Texas

Jason Wells: President & CEO, CenterPoint Energy

10.10-10.30am - Designing for the Storm: Florida Power & Light’s Grid Resilience Playbook

Florida Power & Light has spent more than a decade shifting from “prepare and restore” to “predict and prevent.” In one of the most hurricane-exposed regions in the country, FPL has embedded resilience into capital planning, system design, and field operations — and the results are showing up in reliability gains and avoided outage costs. This session examines what’s worked: large-scale undergrounding, hardened transmission structures, automated switching, and advanced fault detection and analytics — and the organizational and regulatory alignment that enabled it.

Kamran Ali: SVP, Transmission Grid Planning & Engineering, AEP

Manny Miranda: President, Next Level Energy; Retired EVP, Power Delivery, Florida Power & Light Company

10.30-11:00am - Networking Break

11.00-11.30am - Built to Solve: Strengthening Reliability Under Pressur

When extreme weather strikes, rapid response is only the beginning. Across North America, utilities and their partners are rethinking how restoration can double as resilience — turning emergency mobilizations into opportunities to rebuild stronger systems. With the largest craft-skilled workforce and private fleet in the industry, Quanta is helping utilities move from recovery to readiness. In this session, Quanta and its utility partners share how a construction-led approach is delivering safer, faster, and more resilient outcomes.

Earl C. "Duke" Austin, Jr.: President & CEO, Quanta Services

11.30-11:50pm - Utility Leaders Pitch Their Toughest Technology Gaps
Extreme weather is testing the grid like never before. In this fast-paced session, three utility executives will each have five minutes to pitch their most urgent resilience challenge. From storm response to wildfire risk to grid hardening, they'll spotlight the gaps where innovation is needed most.

11.50am-12.30pm - Someone Else’s Problem. Until It Isn’t. Do All Utilities Need Wildfire Mitigation Plans?
Hawaii is green and lush. And surrounded by water. So why should utilities and regulators in the state have been planning for potential wildfires? What about utilities in the East, utilities that are primarily urban, utilities with service territories that are grasslands rather than forests? What’s at stake if you have a low likelihood but high consequence wildfire? What actions should utilities and regulators in states with low wildfire risk be taking, and why?

Robert Kenney: President, Xcel Energy - Colorado

Ann Rendahl: Commissioner, Washington Utilities & Transportation Commission

Bryan Spear: CEO, Technosylva

12.30-1.30pm - Lunch

1.30-2.30pm - Podcast + Structured Networking

2.30-3.05pm - Outage-Proof: Measuring the True Value of Grid Resilience

As extreme weather events intensify utilities are investing more in grid resilience measures to prevent, withstand, and recover from disruptions. This session explores how utilities and regulators can assess individual investments in the context of affordability, ensuring they align with system risk, balance other priorities, and account for lifecycle costs. Is there a common framework we can develop to quantify the benefits of resilience projects—such as avoided outages, faster restoration, and reduced customer harm—and how can planning tools help target high-risk areas and guide strategic grid hardening decisions?

Dan Nuñez: Senior Director Wildfire Mitigation Risk Management, Filsinger Energy Partners

Mish Thadani: CEO, Rhizome

3.15-3.50pm - Rethinking Reliability: Metrics for Today's Extreme Events

Traditional grid reliability metrics fall short in today's era of extreme weather events. This session explores how utilities and regulators are redefining metrics and aligning incentives with real-world performance, ensuring investments reward faster restoration, reduced customer impact, and a more resilient grid.

Michael Levy: Partner & U.S. Utilities Lead, Baringa

Dan Scripps: Chair, Michigan Public Service Commission

4.20-4.40pm - From Hurdle to Strength: Workforce at the Heart of Resilience

Resilience isn’t just about technology—it’s about people. Worker safety, training and workforce development are often seen as hurdles, but they can be powerful drivers of grid strength. This panel will highlight how utilities and regulators can treat safety culture, engagement and skills development as strategic tools, ensuring reliable operations, accelerating modernization, and building a resilient workforce for the future.

Matt Crye: President, Urbint

Dana Small: VP, Safety, Training, & Environmental, Exelon Corporation

Friday, January 23

8.30-8.45am – Welcome Back

Julia Hamm: Partner, The Ad Hoc Group & PRF Host

Stephen Lacey: Executive Editor & Co-Founder, Latitude Media & PRF Host

8.45-9.15am: Keynote: Embedding Resilience in Innovation — SCE's Vision for a Safer, Smarter Grid

At the forefront of utility innovation, SCE, together with EIX, is embedding resilience technology into every layer of its innovation process to meet California’s evolving climate and grid challenges. Building on insights from SCE's latest R&D and Grid Modernization Strategy, this keynote will explore how the company is leveraging its enterprise-wide perspective to advance technology and partner with innovators and communities to co-create real-world solutions that deliver a safer and more reliable energy future.

Jennifer Hiller: Reporter, Wall Street Journal (Moderator)

Pedro Pizarro: President & CEO, Edison International

9.15-9.45am: Turning Framework into Action: How Utilities Are Putting Climate Resilience to the Test
As climate risks intensify, utilities are under growing pressure to move from planning to doing. This conversation will explore how forward-thinking utilities are turning climate resilience frameworks — like EPRI’s Climate READi Power Framework, launched in 2025 — into concrete action. Hear firsthand how companies are assessing physical climate risks, prioritizing investments, and implementing adaptation strategies on the ground. What’s working well? Where are the pain points? And what early lessons can help others accelerate their own resilience journeys?

Morgan Scott: VP, Sustainability & Global Outreach, EPRI

9.45-10.15am: Smarter, Stronger, Faster: AI for Grid Resilience
As extreme weather, aging infrastructure, and rising demand strain the power grid, artificial intelligence is emerging as a critical tool for resilience. From predictive maintenance and outage forecasting to real-time situational awareness and adaptive grid control, AI is enabling faster, smarter responses to evolving threats. But with growing reliance on opaque algorithms, data quality issues, and cybersecurity concerns, AI also introduces new risks that utilities must confront head-on. Is AI the breakthrough the grid needs — or just another layer of complexity and risk?

Scott Clavenna: Co-Founder & CEO, Latitude Media

Bonnie Titone: EVP & Chief Administrative Officer, Duke Energy

10.15-10.45am: Coffee Break

10.45-11.10am: Public Sector Leadership in Grid Resilience: Lessons from CPS Energy and San Antonio

As extreme weather and shifting federal priorities reshape the resilience landscape, public sector leadership has become more critical than ever. This session spotlights how CPS Energy and the City of San Antonio are charting a path forward in the ERCOT market — deploying microgrids, leveraging federal funding, and forging local partnerships to strengthen community resilience. What can other cities and public power utilities learn from San Antonio’s approach? How can public sector innovation complement private investment to accelerate scalable resilience solutions nationwide?

Rudy Garza: President & CEO, CPS Energy

Hon. Gina Ortiz Jones: Mayor, City of San Antonio

11.10-11.30am: Early Stage Technology Companies Pitch Utilities

Three early-stage tech companies have five minutes each to pitch bold ideas that could help utilities boost resilience — storm-proof the grid, speed recovery, and spark innovation.

11.30am-12.00pm: Driving Innovation: Investing in Tech Solutions for a More Resilient Grid
The past two decades have seen a wave of investment in clean energy technologies to reduce carbon emissions. But investment in adaptation technologies has lagged behind. Is the balance now shifting? What grid resilience technologies are most attractive to investors? What market signals do investors need to see from utilities, regulators, and other stakeholders to have the confidence in this market segment?

Jim Kapsis: Founder & CEO, The Ad Hoc Group (Moderator)

Nancy Pfund: Founder & Managing Partner, DBL Partners

Sanjay Wagle: Founder & Managing Partner, The Lightsmith Group

12.00-12.30pm: Credit in the Line of Fire: Financing Utilities in a Shifting Risk Landscape
As extreme weather events become more frequent and severe, utilities face mounting operational and financial risks. In response, insurers are reassessing their risk, resulting in higher premiums and reduced coverage. Credit rating agencies and municipal bond investors are similarly closely scrutinizing utility risk mitigation and response strategies thus impacting utilities' access to capital and overall liquidity. In this evolving threat landscape, what proactive steps can utilities take to maintain financial resilience?

Shalini Mahajan: Managing Director & Deputy Head, North American Corporate Ratings Group, Fitch Ratings

Richard McMahon: Managing Director, Energy Insight Consulting; Former SVP, Energy Supply & Finance & Chief ESG Officer, Edison Electric Institute

12.30-1.30pm: Lunch Break

1.30-2.00pm: Resilient, Reliable...and Affordable? Confronting the Power Sector’s Impossible Equation
Can we truly have it all — resilience, affordability, and grid capacity to meet surging demand? As the grid strains under the weight of climate extremes, electrification, and aging infrastructure, regulators and utilities are facing a stark reality: the cost of resilience is rising, and so are expectations. How do we harden the grid, prepare for black swan events, and support decarbonization — without triggering rate shock or deepening energy inequity? How do we quantify resilience benefits and provide the highest value at the lowest cost possible?

Chris Ayers: Executive Director, North Carolina Utilities Commission Public Staff

Tammy Cordova: Commissioner, Public Utilities Commission of Nevada

Matt Green: SVP, Integrated Planning & Advisory, TRC Companies (Moderator)

2.00-2.30pm: Grid on the Edge: Surviving Polar Vortexes and Heat Domes

From polar vortexes to record heat domes, the grid is being stress-tested year-round. Utilities and regulators are rethinking resilience — winterizing assets, hardening lines, and ensuring resource adequacy to keep power flowing through wild swings. This panel dives into lessons from recent blackouts and breakthroughs, and what it takes to keep the lights on when the weather won’t play fair.

Camilo Serna: SVP, Strategy and External Engagement, North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC)

2.30-3.00pm: Microgrids to VPPs: Distributed Energy as a Resilience Tool
Distributed energy resources — rooftop solar, batteries, EVs, microgrids — are emerging as frontline tools for resilience. They keep critical facilities powered during outages and ease stress on the bulk grid during extreme events. But they only succeed when customers become true partners, from enrolling in demand response to joining virtual power plants. This panel explores how utilities and co-ops are harnessing customer-owned assets, turning neighborhoods into resilience hubs, and reimagining reliability in an age of climate extremes.

Mari McClure: President & CEO, Green Mountain Power

Angela Strickland: Chief Experience Officer, Smart Electric Power Alliance (SEPA) (Moderator)

3.00-3.30pm: Closing Session

AGENDA