More than a century ago, America’s first great energy transformation was powered by light. Edison’s bulbs illuminated cities. Backed by coal and innovative grit, the infrastructure that gave birth to our modern society was born.

Today, we stand at the threshold of our second great transformation—this time powered by intelligence. Artificial intelligence is poised to become the most powerful technology humanity has ever created, next to the electric grid. And just like the grid, this new era will only be as strong as the system that powers and delivers it.

Unfortunately, that system is straining under the weight of what comes next. But what could come next as we scale data and computing power with the infrastructure of the grid is truly awe-inspiring.

After analyzing over 60 utility grid modernization plans revealing nearly 6,000 challenges, we understood why the industry was experiencing gridlock. Where to focus can feel daunting. That is why this report aimed to cut through the complexity and accelerate action by ranking the top 10 most urgent challenges based on what was being matched the most frequently. This report attempts to reduce complexity by focusing on 10 challenges with clearly defined problem statements that map to a technology stack of commercially available solution options. The report is interactive because the emerging technology landscape is constantly changing. This report is linked to our InnovationWorks platform that can actively map challenges to solutions in real-time. Because the industry is largely cooperative in nature, the goal is to create a centralized hub to accelerate innovation. By sharing challenges, we can remove risks, drive efficiencies and go faster together to find solutions together.

Many confuse innovation with breakthrough. We believe ingenuity drives down costs and innovation is a force multiplier toward affordability. That’s what we’ve attempted to capture in InnovationWorks.

The job we have in front of us is massive. Like a century ago, those who innovated the most efficiently, those that collaborated and share learnings, influenced a great century of growth. The rest fell behind. It’s no different today.

Let’s get to work!