Speakers

Venkat Tirupati is Vice President and Chief Technology Officer at ERCOT, reporting to the CEO. In this role, he leads enterprise technology, data, and AI strategy, and oversees the technology innovation capabilities of the Grid Research, Innovation, and Transformation (GRIT) initiative.

Mr. Tirupati guides staff, systems, and solutions to address the increasing complexity of a rapidly transforming electric power grid and fosters collaboration with external stakeholders, including technology vendors, academic institutions, research organizations, and electric power industry consortiums. He joined ERCOT in 2020 as Director of Grid and Market Solutions and previously served as Vice President of DevOps and Grid Transformation.

Prior to joining ERCOT, Mr. Tirupati served as Director of Line of Business at the Lower Colorado River Authority (LCRA), where he led teams supporting the wholesale power and water business units with business and operational technology solutions. He previously held roles as Manager of Market Systems and Supervisor of EMS and Advanced Applications at LCRA, supporting control room operations and advanced grid applications. Before LCRA, Mr. Tirupati worked as a Senior Reliability Engineer in the Reliability Risk Management Group at the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC). He began his career at Siemens Power Transmission and Distribution, where he held various power-systems applications engineering roles supporting global electric utilities with grid automation technologies.

Mr. Tirupati has served on multiple industry committees and has chaired the NERC Energy Management System Working Group (EMSWG) and the ERCOT Technology Working Group (TWG). He holds a Master of Science in Electrical Engineering (Power Systems) from Illinois Institute of Technology, and a Master of Business Administration with a focus on data analytics and sustainability from Massachusetts Institute of Technology. He earned his Bachelor of Engineering in Electrical Engineering from the University of Mumbai. Mr. Tirupati is a registered Professional Engineer (PE) in the State of Texas and a Senior Member of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE).