PES Conferences a valuable service to the industry

PES Conferences: A valuable service to the industryWayne BishopDear IEEE Power & Energy Society members,It has been a great honor and privilege to serve as the IEEE Power & Energy Society (PES) vice president of Conferences & Meetings from 1 January until 31 December 2023. Under IEEE PES by-laws, my term of office ends this year. The past five years have been one of the highlights of my career and I want to express my heartfelt gratitude and appreciation for the incredible opportunity to serve in this role. One of the most fulfilling parts of this job has been working alongside an incredible group of volunteers who have organized and led the IEEE PES meetings and conferences. I am extremely grateful for their dedication, passion, and collaboration.IEEE PES conferences are doing extremely well.

This year there were 18 PES Financially Sponsored Conferences and 38 Technically Cosponsored Conferences.

The average number of technically cosponsored meetings have grown by approximately 89% overall, with seven new ones in 2023.

In the last five years, approximately 100,000 people have attended PES conferences.

From March 2020 until April 2022, we had to pivot our in-person conferences to mostly virtual because of the COVID-19 pandemic. This was a very challenging time for conferences and meeting with huge headwinds. Nevertheless, we were able to maintain member engagement, education, and overall financial health despite the challenges of the pandemic.PES conferences provide a valuable service to the industry, including opportunities for thousands of participants to network, learn, and share the latest technological developments in the power industry. Industry researchers and practitioners gather to share ideas and visions in technical presentations, tutorials, workshops, keynotes, demonstrations, and multidisciplinary panels.I’m incredibly proud of our accomplishments:

Industry engagement at all PES conferences: We focused on increasing utility executive participation for industry panels and utility attendees at conferences. To increase utility attendees at conferences, we launched a new “Utility Attendee Bundled Discounted Pricing Program” whereby utilities could bring 10 or more people for a registration fee of only $100 per person. We launched this for the Transmission & Distribution (T&D) Conference and Exposition last year in New Orleans, with more than 100 different utilities taking advantage of this new discounted program. We also revamped T&D to attract more industry participants by adding a smart cities pavilion and innovation stages to the exposition floor. Also, as part of our focus on industry, we now have an “Industry Chair” as part of each PES Conference Organizing Committee.

Launch of new IEEE PES Grid Edge Technologies Conference and Exposition: We held the very first event this past April 2023, hosted by San Diego Gas and Electric. This first of its kind grid edge technologies event in San Diego was built by the industry and for the industry. Special thanks to Ahad Esmaeilian, conference chair; Calvin Zhang, conference vice chair; Kaveh Aflaki, technical chair; and Chang Wong, panel chair. The planning and launch of Grid Edge was one of my proudest moments as vice president of Conferences & Meetings. Starting an event from scratch was a tremendous undertaking, but the team was up to the challenge, and we surpassed all goals. This was the first time in decades that an event of this size was started in North America by PES.

There were several “firsts” at this event, including a Ph.D. dissertation contest, a startup alley, and technology stages on the expo floor. There were 11 Super Session Panels, with dozens of “C-Level” executives and industry thought leaders. In the years to come, Grid Edge will be held on non-T&D years (odd years). We had 1,964 registrations for the event, beating our goal by 30%, and attendees arrived from 35 different countries. Plans are underway for the next Grid Edge on 21–23 January 2025.

Increase diversity at PES conferences: Diversity was one of my key goals when I was appointed as vice president of Conferences & Meetings in 2019. Several women have been appointed to key conference leadership positions and we did our best to ensure that there is gender, cultural, and age diversity on conference panels, organizing committees, and conference leadership positions. There is also a nice mix of attendees and speakers from both academics and industry.

Together as a PES community, we have made tremendous progress in accomplishing these goals and the execution of all our conferences and meetings. We have strengthened the IEEE PES community, expanded its reach, and elevated the standards of our conferences and meetings.Our flagship event, held every two years, is the IEEE T&D Conference and Exposition. Last year’s 2022 T&D has been recognized as an honoree by the Trade Show Executive’s Gold 100. It is a great honor to receive this award and PES T&D is the only IEEE conference that made the list for 2022 events. I want to thank Joe Svachula and Carl Segneri for their continued leadership roles in the IEEE T&D Conference and Exposition. Thank you, as well, to the 2022 Local Organizing Committee chair, Michelle Bourg, and the host utility, Entergy. We look forward to seeing you at the next IEEE T&D Conference and Exposition on 6 to 9 May 2024 in Anaheim, CA, hosted by Southern California Edison.I also want to take this opportunity to thank the other Steering Committee chairs, including:

Aaron St. Leger, General Meeting

Daniel Diaz, Technically Cosponsored Conferences and Conference Advisory Committee chair

Carl Segneri, T&D Conference and Exposition

Ron Melton, Innovative Smart Grid Technologies North America

Gianfranco Chicco, Innovative Smart Grid Technologies, Europe

Dean Sharafi, Region 10 Conferences.

Last, but certainly not least, I want to thank and recognize our dedicated PES office staff under the direction of Executive Director Tim Licitra. I would like to extend a special thank you to Dan Toland (director of Society Operations), Kathy Heilman (senior administrator of PES Meeting Services), and Roseanne Jones (senior administrator of PES Meeting Services) for their unwavering support and tireless dedication to IEEE PES conferences.I will always cherish the friendships made through IEEE PES and sincerely thank you for your support and guidance. I look forward to seeing you at a future IEEE PES conference.Kind Regards,Wayne Bishop Jr.Digital Object Identifier 10.1109/MPE.2023.3308257Date of current version: 19 October 20231540-7977/23©2023IEEE21mpe06-t&d_reg-3320368-figCoverSKM Power ToursMastheadDigsilentMaking electric vehicles and the grid work together a necessity for sustainable mobilityS&C Electric CompanyPS CADPES Conferences a valuable service to the industryNew demand, new challenges, and new opportunities making EVs and the grid work togetherLearning From the Norwegian Electric Vehicle SuccessA Grid-Friendly Electric Vehicle InfrastructureCustomer-Centric Electric Vehicle Orchestration in New ZealandUtility Planning for Distribution- Optimized Electric Vehicle ChargingOpen Data to Accelerate the Electric Mobility RevolutionGrid Planning for Electrification Using Highly Granular AnalyticsThe Bigger PictureI Charge, Therefore I DriveNew Tool Evaluates the Financial Viability of Pumped Storage Hydropowershare your thoughts2023 IEEE PES AwardsPES meetingsIn my viewadvertisers indexAspen