The PES Region 7 has seen a very active year with numerous technical seminars, conferences, tutorials and other events hosted in 2019. There are about 1800 PES members in this Region. The Chapter Representatives for Canada-East is Branislav Djokic and for Canada-West is Alex Nassif. Jahangir Khan is the Region Representative for R7. The current chapter chairs are:

• Canadian Atlantic Section Joint Chapter (Chair: Labib Labib)
• London Section Chapter (Chair: Jin Jiang)
• Montreal Section Chapter (Chair: Ambrish Chandra)
• Ottawa Section Chapter (Chair: Branislav Djokic)
• Toronto Section Chapter (Chair: Omid Alizadeh)
• Kitchener-Waterloo Section Chapter (Chair: Sahar Azad)
• Hamilton Section Chapter (Chair: Mehdi Narimani)
• Northern Canada Section Joint Chapter (Chair: Colten Thurrott)
• Winnipeg Section Chapter (Chair: Yi Zhang)
• North Saskatchewan Section Joint Chapter (Chair: Cosme Loi)
• Southern Alberta Section Chapter (Chair: Anakarina Alvarez)
• Vancouver Section Joint Chapter (Chair: Kenny Poon)

In addition to the PES Chapters, there are five PES student chapters located in Dalhousie University, McMaster University, University of British Columbia, British Columbia Institute of Technology and University of Calgary.

The Region 7 team welcomes Sahar Azad, Yi Zhang, Cosme Loi, Labib Labib and Anakarina Alvarez as the new incoming Chapter Chairs.

Technical Seminars:

A significant number of technical events were held by the Region 7 Chapters. A brief list is given below:

• Computational electromagnetics for complex environments – by Montreal Chapter
• IEEE Montreal Keynote Event: Towards New Personalized Education Involving Digital Twins – by Montreal Chapter
• Can combating climate change result in renaissance of electric power engineering? – by Montreal Chapter
• Integrated battery chargers for electric vehicles – by Montreal Chapter
• Stacked multilevel inverter topologies for variable speed drives applications – by Montreal Chapter
• Monitoring Industrial Emissions with mm Wave Radar – by Montreal Chapter
• Power-Dense High-Efficiency Engine-Coolant-Capable 200 kW Silicon Carbide Inverter For Heavy-Duty Vehicles – by Montreal Chapter
• Hierarchical Signal Processing for Tractable Power Flow Management in Electric Grid Networks – by Montreal Chapter
• Unconventional electrical machines: optimized topologies and design methodologies – by Montreal Chapter
• Naturally-Clamped Snubberless Soft-Switching Current-Fed DC-DC Converters – by Montreal Chapter
• Building Energy and Demand Management through Data Analytics – by Ottawa Chapter
• Opportunities and Design Considerations for GaN HEMTs in Industrial and Automotive Applications- by Ottawa Chapter
• Intelligent Control for Hybrid Electric Vehicles and Advanced Technologies for Autonomous Vehicles – by Hamilton Chapter
• Investigation of Cross-Magnetizing Phenomenon in Saturated Synchronous Machines – by Hamilton Chapter
• Architectures, Control and Industrial Applications of DC Distribution Systems and Microgrids – by Hamilton Chapter
• Thermal Management of Automotive Power Electronics – by Hamilton Chapter
• ETAP electrical power system analysis software – by London Chapter
• Sub-synchronous Currents Damage 500 kV Shunt Reactor – by Vancouver Chapter
• Grid Reliability and its Vital Signs – by Vancouver Chapter
• Synchrophasor-assisted Power System State Estimation – by Vancouver Chapter
• Smart City: A Field Pilot Project for Research and Development on Smart Distribution System – by Saskatchewan and Northern Canada Chapters
• Heat Management Systems (HMS) – by Northern Canada Chapter
• Sub-synchronous Interaction and Harmonic Control Instability in Wind Plants – by Northern Canada and Southern Alberta Chapters
• Transformer Installation and Testing – by Northern Canada and Southern Alberta Chapters
• Building blocks of a smart city – by Northern Canada Chapter
• IEEE Standards and the Recent Revisions of IEEE 1584: Arc Flash Calculations – by Northern Canada and Southern Alberta Chapters

Conferences:

Similar to the previous years, Region 7 held CCECE and EPEC conferences where PES members and volunteers had an active presence. In addition, the Industrial and Commercial Power System Conference (I&CPS 2019) was held in Alberta this year. The region is excited to host the PES General Meeting in Montreal next year. Preparation for the 3^rd Canadian Grid Modernization workshop in Alberta is going on in full swing. The Northern Canada Chapter is planning to arrange a workshop on Modern Power Electronics Applications in September.

Tours:

Southern Alberta Chapter held a tour at Shepard Energy Centre. The Kitchener-Waterloo Chapter is planning to host a tour at the Eaton’s manufacturing plant later this year.

Tutorials:

The Southern Alberta Chapter held a series of tutorials as part of the I&CPS conference (topics included: PV modeling, electrical safety, power quality, and high-resistance grounding). Several more tutorials on topics such as, Insulation Coordination and Power Electronics are being arranged by the Alberta Chapters. The Kitchener-Waterloo Chapter hosted a tutorial on SKM software tool.

Distinguished Lecture:

The Vancouver Chapter arranged a DLP delivered by Dr. Sen on the topic of power flow controllers. A series of talks are being planned by Northern Canada, Saskatchewan and Winnipeg Chapters for lectures by Dr. John McDonald on Grid Modernization, Big Data and IoT.

YP and other events:

The Saskatchewan Chapter held several social / industry events involving Saskatoon Engineering Society and Young Professionals.

The Region 7 mourns the passing of Dr. Mo El-Hawary, who served as the IEEE Canada President, D – among many other roles. An obituary is posted on IEEE Spectrum in his memory (https://tinyurl.com/y5lffq4f).

Jahangir Khan, Alex Nassif and Branislav Djokic