Introduction to the North American Forecasting Weather, Outage, Load and Damage Initiative

Virtual Event

Tune in on Tuesday, February 2nd from 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM EST

This Exclusive WISER IUCRC Webinar led by our Industry Advisory Board co-chairs, Kyle Bentley (National Grid) and Adam Helman (Avangrid) welcomes North American WISER Energy & Electric Power Industry prospective members, to learn about the WISER Program and the 2026 launch of the WISER Center’s North American Forecasting Weather, Outage, Load and Damage Initiative.

During the webinar, the WISER IUCRC Industry Advisory Board co-chairs will share WISER’s impactful Member Benefits package, how WISER has impacted their respective organizations, and will discuss the high-impact ROI and market shaping opportunity the WISER Center is set to launch in 2026, the North American Forecasting Weather, Outage, Load and Damage Initiative, which will leverage a collaborative technical approach and research capabilities powered by WISER’s two University R&D Centers located at the University of Connecticut and the University at Albany, which will deliver modular and scalable Weather, Outage, Load Forecasting and Damage models with a central goal of growing Return on Investment and Business Impact for WISER membership.

This opportunity will be offered exclusively to WISER Industry Members starting in 2026.

What you will learn

WISER Member Benefits

• Pooled Resources: Individual memberships are pooled and support nearly $1 Million in annual funding resources with minimal overhead expenses.

• Industry-Led: You sit on the Industry Advisory Board (IAB). You—not the university—decide which research projects are funded.

• Massive ROI & Unmatched Research Leverage: Your single $50k investment grants your organization access to millions of dollars of research.

• IP & Technology Access: Members receive non-exclusive, royalty-free licenses to all center-produced Intellectual Property and software tools.

• Early-Stage Innovation: Gain a 2- to 3-year head start on emerging technologies and predictive models before they hit the open market.

• The Talent Pipeline: Work directly with the PhD students and researchers performing the work. WISER acts as a “long-term interview” for your future high-level hires.

• Cost Avoidance: Access world-class university labs and supercomputing clusters without the overhead of building them in-house.

The North American Forecasting Weather, Outage, Load and Damage Initiative

• The Challenge, the Vision and Industry Relevance

• Project Goals & Multi-Year Scope

• Phases of Development

• Approach & the Business & Research Impact Opportunity

MEET THE EXPERT SPEAKERS