NRECA Regions 7&9 Meeting

The conference covers public power accounting and finance, human resources, rates and pricing, and risk management. Attendees may also attend concurrent summit sessions focused on public power cybersecurity and technology, including current practices, AI tools, utility resources, trends, and threats. The 2027 agenda is expected in early 2027.

The regional meeting brings electric cooperative leaders together to discuss regional priorities, emerging trends, innovative strategies, and energy policy through NRECA’s member resolutions process. The meeting’s general format includes regional business and resolutions meetings, along with targeted pre-conference education. Regional meetings are open to NRECA members, including employees, directors, and consultants.

NRECA Regional Meetings bring cooperative leaders together to discuss regional priorities, emerging trends, innovative strategies, and energy policy. The meeting contributes to NRECA’s member resolutions process: voting delegates elect representatives to member standing committees and vote on proposed resolutions. The event is open to NRECA members, including employees, directors, and consultants.

The gathering focuses on cooperative leadership and the changing energy landscape, including emerging technologies, rising demand, and shifting consumer expectations. Programming includes general sessions, education sessions on emerging issues, innovations, and strategies, an Expo featuring industry technologies and services, and the annual member business meeting. Voting members consider proposed resolutions and amendments to NRECA bylaws through the member resolutions process, which includes a Proposed Resolutions Forum.

PowerXchange is an annual meeting of cooperative leadership focused on emerging technologies, rising demand, shifting consumer expectations, and the changing energy landscape. The program includes general sessions with nationally renowned speakers, education sessions on emerging issues, innovations and strategies, peer collaboration, and an expo featuring technologies and services for electric cooperatives. The event also includes NRECA's Annual Business Meeting, where voting delegates participate in the member resolutions process and consider proposed resolutions and amendments to the NRECA Bylaws.

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.

NARUC’s capstone meeting includes a year-end summary from NARUC President Ann Rendahl, topics across utility sectors, and installation of the organization’s new president and officers. The program covers utility affordability, customer assistance, ratemaking, large-load growth, data centers, demand response, and flexible load; transmission capacity, advanced transmission technologies, permitting reform, and infrastructure investment; coal-plant options, nuclear energy, natural gas, and pipeline safety; and grid resilience, distributed energy resources, virtual power plants, battery storage, and community microgrids. Other sessions address AI-enabled extreme-weather preparedness, cybersecurity in water and wastewater systems, operational technology for gas and water leak detection, telecommunications network transitions, utility data and customer service infrastructure, water infrastructure investment, federal-state energy regulation, and regulatory impacts of proposed permitting legislation. A workshop examines methods for evaluating advanced transmission technologies, including dynamic line ratings, advanced power flow controls, and advanced conductors. The agenda also includes committee business meetings and general sessions on utility infrastructure resilience and community-based resilience investments. Some meetings are closed to nonmembers or restricted to invitees.

Attendance is open to NEPOOL Participants and their authorized representatives; consumer advocates, federal and state officials, and guests cleared with the Committee Chair may attend, except as otherwise limited for executive sessions. Attendees must identify themselves and their affiliation. Official records and minutes are posted publicly, but statements made at NEPOOL meetings are not to be quoted or published publicly.

The conference brings together key state policymakers, critical decision-makers, leading utility executives, financiers, and renewable energy players to explore the next steps to power the Southeast. It surveys North Carolina, South Carolina, Virginia, Georgia, Louisiana, and Mississippi, providing updates on regional energy opportunities and issues.

Discussion focuses on delivering new nuclear projects on private and federal sites across the United States. The forum brings together local government and community leaders with federal agencies and industry, including data center companies, host communities, DOE, NRC, and state and Tribal governments. Topics include nuclear energy advancements, business opportunities, project implementation plans, challenges, partnerships, and economic development.