The power and utilities sector keeps the lights on for the world’s populations and industries. As the global energy landscape evolves, so must the tools it relies on.
To advance the next generation of electricity generation and distribution, many of the industry’s members are joining forces through the creation of the Open Power AI Consortium. The consortium includes energy companies, technology companies and researchers developing AI applications to tackle domain-specific challenges, such as adapting to an increased deployment of distributed energy resources and significant load growth on electric grids.
Led by independent, nonprofit energy R&D organization EPRI, the consortium aims to spur AI adoption in the power sector through a collaborative effort to build open models using curated, industry-specific data. The initiative was launched today at NVIDIA GTC, a global AI conference taking place through Friday, March 21, in San Jose, California.
“Over the next decade, AI has the great potential to revolutionize the power sector by delivering the capability to enhance grid reliability, optimize asset performance, and enable more efficient energy management,” said Arshad Mansoor, EPRI’s president and CEO. “With the Open Power AI Consortium, EPRI and its collaborators will lead this transformation, driving innovation toward a more resilient and affordable energy future.”
As part of the consortium, EPRI, NVIDIA and Articul8, a member of the NVIDIA Inception program for cutting-edge startups, are developing a set of domain-specific, multimodal large language models trained on massive libraries of proprietary energy and electrical engineering data from EPRI that can help utilities streamline operations, boost energy efficiency and improve grid resiliency.
The first version of an industry-first open AI model for electric and power systems was developed using hundreds of NVIDIA H100 GPUs and is expected to soon be available in early access as an NVIDIA NIM microservice.
“Working with EPRI, we aim to leverage advanced AI tools to address today’s unique industry challenges, positioning us at the forefront of innovation and operational excellence,” said Vincent Sorgi, CEO of PPL Corporation and EPRI board chair.
PPL is a leading U.S. energy company that provides electricity and natural gas to more than 3.6 million customers in Pennsylvania, Kentucky, Rhode Island and Virginia.
The Open AI Consortium’s Executive Advisory Committee includes executives from over 20 energy companies such as Duke Energy, Pacific Gas & Electric Company and Portland General Electric, as well as leading tech companies such as AWS, Oracle and Microsoft. The consortium plans to further expand its global member base.
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Global energy consumption is projected to grow by nearly 4% annually through 2027, according to the International Energy Agency. To support this surge in demand, electricity providers are looking to enhance the resiliency of power infrastructure, balance diverse energy sources and expand the grid’s capacity.
AI agents trained on thousands of documents specific to this sector — including academic research, industry regulations and standards, and technical documents — can enable utility and energy companies to more quickly assess energy needs and prepare the studies and permits required to improve infrastructure.
“We can bring AI to the global power sector in a much more accelerated way by working together to develop foundation models for the industry, and collaborating with the power sector to y apply solutions tailored to its unique needs,” Mansoor said.
Utilities could tap the consortium’s model to help accelerate interconnection studies, which analyze the feasibility and potential impact of connecting new generators to the existing electric grid. The process varies by region but can take up to four years to complete. By introducing AI agents that can support the analysis, the consortium aims to cut this timeline down by at least 5x.
The AI model could also be used to support the preparation of licenses, permits, environmental studies and utility rate cases, where energy companies seek regulatory approval and public comment on proposed changes to electricity rates.
Beyond releasing datasets and models, the consortium also aims to develop a standardized framework of benchmarks to help utilities, researchers and other energy sector stakeholders evaluate the performance and reliability of AI technologies.
Learn more about the Open Power AI Consortium online and in EPRI’s sessions at GTC:
To learn more about advancements in AI across industries, watch the GTC keynote by NVIDIA founder and CEO Jensen Huang:
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