November 5 — China’s National Energy Administration (NEA) publicized a list of 93 pilot projects under its “AI Plus” energy program, according to the NEA website. Covering scenarios from intelligent decision-making for substation equipment maintenance onward, the list is open for public comment from November 5 through November 11.
The review was conducted under the NEA general department’s notice on releasing a catalog of high-value “AI Plus” energy scenarios and organizing pilot applications. Each shortlisted project passed expert review and a verification step before entering the public-comment period; the final list will be confirmed once the seven-day window closes.
Key facts at a glance
Projects publicized: 93, starting with intelligent maintenance decisions for substation equipment
Comment window: November 5–11, 2026
Basis: NEA notice on high-value “AI Plus” energy scenarios and pilot applications
Timeline: pilot program launched November 2025; scenario catalog released May 2026
The announcement marks a shift from scenario mapping to project-level execution. The NEA launched the “AI Plus” energy pilot program in November 2025 and published its catalog of high-value scenarios in May 2026, inviting applications. The 93 projects now publicized are the reviewed outcome of that application round.
Grid scenarios lead the list. The first project, intelligent decision-making for substation equipment maintenance, targets a long-standing operations pain point: substation assets are diverse and maintenance still leans on human experience, so AI-assisted decisions that combine equipment-condition data with maintenance protocols can shorten fault-handling chains. Beyond the grid, the list spans power generation, oil and gas, production operations, asset management and customer service.
The energy sector sits on both sides of the AI trade. Xinhua reported on November 4 that Huzhou, Zhejiang is coordinating computing load with power dispatch under a “compute-power synergy” model for its intelligent-computing industry. Rising electricity demand from model training and the digital retrofit of the grid itself are converging on the same network.
For vendors, the list reads as a demand catalog. Projects are defined around concrete business problems, and shortlisting places them in a national-level pilot position with expected support on data access, standards and replication. How deeply energy-digitalization and power-AI suppliers engage will set the pace at which these names turn into results.
Once the comment period ends, the final 93 projects and their builders will be confirmed. Energy is among the most clearly scoped arenas of the “AI Plus” agenda, and the pace of this batch offers a measurable sample of how fast AI lands in asset-heavy industries.