EEI Financial Conference

The conference examines market and technology trends in bulk, rare, and specialty gases used in electronics, for executives, buyers, product managers, and strategic planners across the electronic-gases value chain. Sessions address U.S. semiconductor public policy, CHIPS metrology, gas-system challenges as Moore’s Law advances, vapor-phase materials, large-grain molybdenum deposition, solid precursor delivery, and tungsten powder supply-chain issues. A low-GWP adoption session discusses fab direct emissions, coordinated gas substitution, and industry-wide collaboration. Other technical topics include contamination control and yield, hydrogen-halide contamination, deuterium supply and purity, isotropic dry-cleaning technology, zero-nuclear-spin isotopes for semiconductor fabs and quantum computing, and new etch gases. The program also covers gas-delivery sealing, contamination and reliability tradeoffs; AI applications in automated gas handling; EUV tool gas purification; High NA EUV lithography infrastructure; sub-fab roadmaps and collaboration; precursor delivery and control; abatement; and emissions monitoring. Metrology sessions address MoCl5 stability and impurity measurements in electronic-grade rare gases and ultra-high-purity gases. Market sessions examine the global economy and semiconductors, fab capacity and equipment, helium, and specialty gases.

Annual conference and thought leadership forum with keynote discussions and breakouts focused on forces shaping the electric power industry. The intended audience includes electric company executives, government leaders, technology partners and innovators, policymakers, regulators, and industry stakeholders.

Sessions address electric cooperative governance, strategic planning, and emerging industry issues. A discussion covers challenges, opportunities, and successes for electric cooperatives; other sessions examine the U.S. economy, financial markets, and electric industry outlook and their effects on cooperatives. General-session themes include planning for goals, assessing risk, preparing for adversity, and the role of heroism and service. Breakouts cover questions directors should ask about data centers, preventing electrical accidents, communicating with consumer-members, and artificial intelligence and the future of energy. Electrical-safety demonstrations illustrate the risks of high-voltage electricity and the equipment and practices used to protect cooperative employees and the public. The closing session includes an update from NRECA’s board of directors.

The conference is for public power professionals who design, develop, and maintain the electric system. Program themes include Environmental, Generation & Fuels; Grid Modernization; Transmission & Distribution; Reliability & Resilience; and Safety. The audience includes vice presidents, superintendents, directors, managers, engineers, safety and training specialists, electric utility directors, city managers, and emerging leaders.

The conference brings together public power leaders, policymakers, vendors, and partners to exchange strategies and discover solutions for long-term utility success. Its program addresses how changing policy, technology, and lifestyles are reshaping the energy industry and communities, with multiple tracks and sessions. The Industry Innovations Expo focuses on solutions and tools for utility decision-makers, and the conference also includes a public-power community service component.

WEI’s largest event includes general sessions with industry leaders and keynote speakers, plus breakout programming across Asset Management, Damage Prevention, Electric Distribution, Electric Substation, Electric Transmission, Grid of the Future, Grid Resilience, Low Carbon Fuels, Natural Gas Emergency Response + Restoration, Natural Gas Integrity Management, Natural Gas Operational Excellence, Operational Leadership, Safety + Health, Safety Management Systems, and Workforce Development. The program is open to anyone in the energy industry.

Sessions cover Environmental, Generation & Fuels; Grid Modernization; Transmission & Distribution; and Reliability & Resilience. Conference attendees can also attend sessions in the concurrent Safety Summit. The conference focuses on practices for building and maintaining safe, reliable electric systems, and includes the Public Power NextTech Expo. The 2027 agenda has not been published.

Public power utility leaders meet with experts in technology, energy, and policy. Attendance is limited to facilitate productive dialogue. Sessions address shifts in the global energy landscape, including the energy transition, energy security, geopolitical and economic competition, and investment in energy infrastructure, renewable technologies, nuclear power, and fossil fuels. Other discussions examine reliability and affordability amid growing demand, rising costs, regulatory pressures, and customer expectations; resource adequacy, infrastructure investment, workforce challenges, supply-chain constraints, and emerging technologies; and leadership through outages, cyber incidents, severe weather, safety emergencies, and public scrutiny. The program also explores AI and other emerging technologies, including their utility applications and questions around governance, cybersecurity, workforce impacts, and risk management. Additional topics include evaluating and integrating significant new loads, generation and infrastructure investments, contracts and rate protections, aligning economic development with the public power mission, and workforce development, succession planning, leadership training, and knowledge transfer.

The program examines North American energy tradeoffs, grid reliability, clean-energy integration, affordability, and cross-border coordination. Opening keynote speaker Ernest J. Moniz is Founder & CEO of EFI Institute and Former U.S. Secretary of Energy; Nova Scotia Premier Tim Houston joins a leadership fireside chat, and Charles Dickerson, President & CEO of the Northeast Power Coordinating Council, gives keynote remarks on the power grid’s current state and future outlook. Day 1 sessions address electricity-demand growth, reliability and the cost curve; U.S. and Canadian energy policy, prices and cross-border coordination; investment opportunities in Canadian critical minerals, clean electricity, renewables, hydrogen, new nuclear and infrastructure; nuclear affordability, small modular reactors, supply chains and regulatory timelines; infrastructure costs related to permitting, litigation, supply chains and community engagement; and grid-operator perspectives on reliability, cost control, planning and interregional cooperation. The program also includes a lunch program and table dialogues. Day 2 sessions cover regulatory and policy approaches to affordable reliability; energy-sector financing and investment; which generation technologies are likely to be built and how cost, deployment speed and scalability shape investment; demand flexibility, distributed energy resources, storage and digital grid tools; and firm-power options including nuclear and advanced geothermal. The Steve Leahy Energy & Innovation Collaboration Award recognizes a U.S.-Canada energy partnership demonstrating innovation, collaboration, and affordability and reliability benefits.

The conference combines superintendent and engineer meetings for presentations on new technology, standards, and industry regulations, alongside a joint product show featuring solutions from digital tools to bucket trucks. Agenda topics include automation, leadership, field testing for metering accuracy and hidden losses, AI tools for engineering and operations, advanced distribution operations and faster restoration, and relay testing. A group-led roundtable covers artificial intelligence in electric cooperatives, contractor requirements, dispatching, employee retention, right-of-way and line-extension policies, pole loading and guying, BESS, data center loads, electronic breakers, safety, equipment, and automation. Additional listed issues include ODOT projects, ground-grid and relay advancements, vegetation and asset management using LiDAR and drone mapping, protection engineering, utility construction coordination and constructability, and independent construction oversight and QA/QC. The business meeting includes the election of 2027 officers and new business.