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ASEM 2025 International Annual Conference

September 24th to 27th, 2025

Hosted by University of Idaho

Join engineering management professionals, academics, and industry leaders for four days of immersive learning, collaboration, and innovation. The program features keynote addresses, expert panels, technical workshops, exclusive industry tours, networking receptions, and a Saturday virtual session.

The conference will be in-person. The time zone will be Mountain Daylight Time (MDT), UTC-6.

Wednesday (Sept. 24)

• 1:00 - 3:00pm MDT: Industry Tour 1 at Micron Technology
• 3:30pm - 4:45pm MDT: Industry Tour 2 at UI Center for Ecohydraulics Research (CER)
• 1:00pm - 5:45pm MDT: In-person technical sessions, workshops and panels
• 5:30pm - 8:00pm MDT: Welcome Reception; ticket provided with paid registration

Thursday (Sept. 25)

• 8:00am - 5:45pm MDT: In-person keynote, technical sessions, panels, and workshops.
• 6:00pm - 8:00pm MDT: Social Event; ticket available for purchase with registration.

Friday (Sept. 26)

• 8:00am - 5:45pm MDT: In-person keynote, technical sessions, panels, and workshops.
• 6:00pm - 9:00pm MDT: Awards Banquet; ticket provided with paid conference registration.

Saturday (Sept. 27)

• 8:00am - 1:00pm MDT: Virtual Presentations Only

Please plan your travel accordingly.

Conference Registration Includes:

• Wednesday: Welcome Reception
• Thursday: Breakfast, Lunch, and Breaks
• Friday: Breakfast, Lunch, Breaks, and Awards Banquet

ABOUT THE INTERNATIONAL ANNUAL CONFERENCE

The program features keynote addresses, expert panels, technical workshops, exclusive industry tours, networking receptions, and a Saturday virtual session. The conference will be in-person with a virtual component on the last day.

In addition to entrance fees for exciting workshops, keynote speaker events, and special presentations, conference registration includes special awards and scholarship presentations.

Registration is now open! Visit https://asem.org/event-5966669/

For accepted presenters, the first presentation is included in the registration fees. Each additional presentation per registration will incur an additional fee of $100.

Note Regarding Registration

ASEM members: Please login in order to receive member's rate. Please use the "Forgot Password" link to retrieve your password if necessary.

Registration without a valid payment will be deleted after 15 minutes.

When the schedule is published, it will be available at https://asem2025.exordo.com/

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John Kumm is Executive Director of the University of Idaho Energy Institute, a role he has held since early 2025. Prior to that, John was with POWER Engineers since 2007 and held roles as project manager, department manager, and Business Unit Director for teams performing power system analysis and substation and power plant electrical testing. John graduated from the University of Idaho in 1989 with a BS in Electrical Engineering and earned an Executive MBA degree from Boise State University in 2011. In 2025, he attended the University of Idaho Energy Executive Course. His technical interests center on protective relaying, SCADA, power system security, and energy generation of all sorts. Prior to joining POWER, John served as an applications and product engineer at Schweitzer Engineering Laboratories in Pullman, WA and spent eight years leading his own consulting firm prior to its acquisition by POWER.

In his free time, John enjoys flying, woodworking and spending time outdoors with his family. He is a licensed pilot, a drummer for his church worship team, a Senior Member of the IEEE, a registered professional engineer, a certified executive coach, and a proud grandfather and great grandfather.

About the Panelists

Vern Malensky, PE, is the Director of Electrical Engineering, including the Wildfire Resiliency program at Avista Corporation in Spokane, WA. He is a proud University of Idaho graduate with a degree in civil engineering. Vern has nearly twenty years of professional experience and fourteen years working in the electric and gas utility industry. He is currently accountable for leading engineering and design teams including substation, transmission line, distribution, system protection, wildfire resilience, and asset maintenance. Prior this role, he has held leadership roles in Avista’s Advanced Metering Infrastructure (AMI) programs, gas and electric operations, and energy efficiency engineering. He will soon be transitioning to a new role, Director of Enterprise Resource Planning Fusion, with a focus on implementing a new Enterprise Resource Plan (ERP) solution across the enterprise. Outside of work, Vern spends his time enjoying the Idaho outdoors with his wife, Estee, and four children as well as supporting his youngest daughter in her 4-H livestock projects.

Alan Prouty has worked in the environmental and natural resource field for 40 years. During this period, he has led major environmental projects/studies, published technical papers related to aquatic toxicity of metals and environmental pollution control, managed permitting of projects (including energy related, industrial and mining), overseen major remediation work, and participated in the development of natural resource policies, legislation and regulations at both the state and the federal levels.

He is currently the Vice President of Environmental and Regulatory Affairs for the J.R. Simplot Company. Besides his work for Simplot, he has had experience in pulp and paper/forest products, food processing, mining, chemical manufacturing and wildfire management.

Alan serves on the boards of the Idaho Mining Association, the National Mining Association, Alliance of Western Energy Consumers, and Food Northwest (formerly NW Food Processors) and chairs the environmental committee of the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry. He has current appointments from Idaho Governor Little to the Idaho Strategic Energy Advisory Council and the Idaho National Forest Roadless Commission. He was previously appointed by Secretary of Interior Jewell to a federal advisory committee on the management of federal lands in Idaho.

His education background includes degrees from Idaho State University (B.Sc. in chemistry) and the University of Idaho (M.Sc. from College of Natural Resources).

Dr. Todd Combs helps advance the nation’s energy and national security goals at Idaho National Laboratory in his roles as deputy laboratory director for Science and Technology and chief research officer. His leadership focuses on moving INL toward designing and demonstrating a new class of advanced nuclear technologies, building out the proving ground, and increasing the resiliency of the nation’s critical infrastructure. This will elevate INL’s research eminence and strengthen its recognition and position within the Department of Energy complex and broader scientific communities.

Combs joined INL in 2017 and previously served as associate laboratory director for INL’s Energy and Environment Science and Technology directorate. In this role, he managed 350-plus research staff members focused on advanced transportation, alternative energy integration, advanced manufacturing and environmental issues.

Before joining INL, Combs was director of the Global Security Sciences Division at Argonne National Laboratory, where he led a multidisciplinary research team of over 200 that found solutions to protect against, mitigate, respond to, and recover from a wide spectrum of national and global security threats. He also served nearly 14 months as Argonne’s interim associate laboratory director for Energy and Global Security. He led the applied research and development organization of over 800 people, addressing domestic and global sustainable energy and security issues. He oversaw research and operational activities of the energy systems, nuclear engineering and global security sciences division.

Combs began his DOE laboratory career in 2008 at Oak Ridge National Laboratory as an operations research scientist. He left for Argonne in 2012 while serving as group leader for Transportation Planning and Decision Science. His research has included energy systems modeling and analysis for DOE, including critical materials supply chains, as well as the application of modeling and simulation to national and homeland security issues for the departments of Defense and Homeland Security.

Combs is a member of the Boise State University College of Engineering’s Industrial Advisory Board and Idaho’s Higher Education Research Council committee. He previously served as chair of the Idaho Strategic Energy Alliance, a board that informs the governor and other leaders on state energy issues. He also serves on the Idaho Falls Symphony board of directors.

Combs earned his doctorate in operations research and master’s in operations analysis from the Air Force Institute of Technology, and is a graduate of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. A retired colonel in the U.S. Air Force Reserve, his military experience includes assignments at the Air Force Research Laboratory, the Air Force Office of Scientific Research, and the Air Force Studies and Analyses Agency.

He is a member of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences and the Military Operations Research Society.

Please see the following pages for more information:

• IAC Call for Paper (you will also find the submission information on this page)
• Authors Instructions and Templates
• IAC Venue, Lodgings, and Attractions
• Sponsorship, Recruitment and Promotion Information
• IAC 2025 Rates