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Innovation Day 2025: From Ideas to Action | National Grid

National Grid’s history of innovation dates to the 1930s, when the U.K. created the first centralized, national electricity transmission grid. National Grid Innovation Day 2025, held recently in Boston, honored that past while carrying its legacy forward.  

The one-day event—held in a massive brick structure that was once the world’s largest power plant—convened several hundred utility industry leaders, tech entrepreneurs, policymakers, and regulators for an immersive conversation about the future of energy. 

Innovation Day 2025 showcased technologies from across National Grid and from startups supported by National Grid Partners, the company’s venture investing arm. Breakthrough solutions clustered across three themed zones: Customer, Resilience, and Growth.  

In the Growth Zone, innovators focused on scaling smarter, cleaner, and faster. They included Emerald AI, whose tools help data centers automatically toggle back their electric loads during times of high demand—ensuring grid stability. Another startup, LineVision, uses LiDAR sensors to monitor power lines in real time, allowing utilities to safely increase the amount of electricity those lines can carry.  

In the Resilience Zone, Exodigo demonstrated its underground mapping solution, which helps locate buried pipelines and other obstacles before construction begins. Urbint (acquired on the eve of the event by infrastructure management company Itron for $325 million) uses artificial intelligence to boost worker safety and reduce excavation-related damage. 

Innovation is more than action; it’s a way of thinking. The Customer Zone demonstrated how National Grid teams are reimagining how to serve customers—moving away from the traditional, one-size-fits-all model toward more tailored, data-driven solutions. One example is Silversmith, a National Grid research project exploring technology to optimize existing grid infrastructure as an alternative to building new assets. Another project is SMITN (Smart Meter Innovations and Test Network), which uses anonymized customer data to predict and manage energy flows. 

In the same customer-first spirit, the day also highlighted promising projects from outside of National Grid—most notably, Kraken Technologies. Recently spun off from Octopus Energy Group, Kraken is an AI platform that helps businesses manage customer service and billing. National Grid is currently rolling out Kraken to 6.5 million customers across Massachusetts and New York. 

Showcasing breakthrough solutions

If startups were the stars of this year’s Innovation Day story, a robust lineup of speakers and panelists provided the narrative arc. Their messages centered on balance: Meeting customers’ need for reliability and affordability while advancing the urgent mission to modernize the grid. 

Massachusetts Lt. Gov. Kim Driscoll addressed the energy challenges of our time, noting the state’s mandate to lower emissions even as AI drives a surge in energy demand. (According to one industry estimate, AI by 2030 could consume as much as 9% of total U.S. grid capacity, triple today’s percentage.) Given those twin challenges, Driscoll underscored the need for coordinated, large-scale change. 

Ted Wiley, president and chief operating officer of next-gen battery developer Form Energy, followed with insights on delivering rapid change: Choose partners and customers carefully, set realistic expectations, and experiment and validate before scaling. 

In separate panels, Lisa Wieland, president of National Grid New England, and Nora Brownell, a veteran energy investor and former regulator, stressed that accelerating the energy transition requires regulatory frameworks that ensure reliability and cost controls while leaving room for innovation and collaboration.

Balancing needs

Ultimately, National Grid’s objective for the day was to drive the industry from innovation to implementation. As outgoing CEO John Pettigrew put it: “National Grid is leading so others can follow. We’re working to inspire collective action.”

From innovation to action

Scenes from National Grid Innovation Day 2025 

Sparking Ideas, Sparking Connection