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The University of New Mexico will stage UNM Tech Days 2026 on Wednesday and Thursday, April 29-30, offering no-cost programming across the Student Union Building. Organized by the Office of the Chief Information Officer, the event gathers faculty, staff and students for presentations, hands-on demos and cross-disciplinary dialogue. Attendees can expect a heavy emphasis on artificial intelligence — both its technical applications and the ethical frameworks that should guide campus deployment. Registration is available online at techdays.unm.edu, and many sessions traditionally fill quickly, so early sign-up is encouraged.
Beyond the event logistics, Tech Days intentionally connects campus technology debates to broader infrastructure and finance trends. Rising compute demand — driven by AI research, cloud services and high-throughput applications — has tangible effects on energy use and supply chains. In that context, public policy tools such as transferable tax credits (TTCs) become relevant to university planners and researchers. Transferable tax credits are a market mechanism that lets eligible holders sell federal clean energy and manufacturing credits for cash, accelerating capital deployment into projects that power research campuses and regional industry.
What to expect at Tech Days: sessions, keynote and community labs
Program highlights include a keynote by Bernardo J. Gallegos, staff adviser for UNM Esports and technical analyst with UNM IT and UNM Bookstores, titled “UNM Esports: A Brief History of Engaging a New Subculture.” The schedule features panels and workshops that span high-performance computing, new AI platforms, and practical tools supporting campus operations and research. Many sessions are designed to be interactive, enabling participants to test systems, ask operational questions and learn implementation strategies that may be adopted across departments. The Student Union Building will host demonstrations and partner booths so attendees can see emerging tools in action.
Trustworthy AI and policy co-design
A major strand of programming is devoted to building trustworthy AI at UNM: sessions titled “Be a Part of Developing Trustworthy AI Policy” and “Co-designing UNM’s AI Policies and Decision Making” convene faculty, staff and students. Panelists include Melanie Moses, Sonia Gipson Rankin, Stephanie Moore, Kathy Powers, Grace Faustino and Todd Quinn, who will explore how AI affects consequential decisions in admissions, employment, grading and financial aid. These conversations blend technical insight with legal, ethical and administrative perspectives to shape campus-level governance and practical guardrails for automated decision-making.
Why transferable tax credits matter to campuses and clean energy
Simultaneous to university dialogue about compute and governance, the financing landscape for energy and manufacturing is evolving. The Inflation Reduction Act enabled a set of federal incentives to be sold in private markets, creating the modern transferable tax credits regime. Transferable tax credits allow project developers to monetize federal credits by selling them to eligible taxpayers, turning tax benefits into immediate capital. Market uptake has been rapid: TTCs have catalyzed more than $500 billion in private capital since 2026, mobilizing funds for diverse technologies and supply chain investments.
Practical mechanics: buyers, sellers and intermediaries
On the transaction side, TTC deals usually start with a transfer election statement filed with tax returns and proceed through buyer due diligence, negotiated indemnities and, often, insurance. Advisors and banks accelerate pre-signing diligence by validating commercial in-service timelines, fair market value, cost-segregation reports and project contracts. Indemnities protect buyers against credit recapture or disallowance, and insurance is commonly used as an additional safeguard. Market practice has seen coverage levels frequently in the 90–140% range, with some deals exceeding that threshold; insurance premiums often run roughly 2–5% of the insured limit.
Platforms like Crux position themselves as transaction hubs that streamline sourcing, diligence and market standards for TTCs, helping developers and buyers find vetted opportunities and manage documentation. For campus stakeholders thinking about procurement, energy partnerships or research infrastructure, understanding the role of TTCs and intermediaries helps translate policy incentives into tangible projects that can lower energy costs and support resilient compute environments.
Bringing the threads together
UNM Tech Days 2026 offers a timely intersection of technology, ethics and finance: conversations about building trustworthy AI on campus will coexist with sessions and partner exhibits that illuminate how broader market tools like transferable tax credits fund the energy and manufacturing systems required for modern research. Whether you are an administrator deciding on procurement, a researcher concerned about compute sustainability, or a student exploring careers at the intersection of policy and engineering, the event is designed to spark collaboration. For full program details and registration visit techdays.unm.edu, and for more on tax credit markets consider market platforms and advisors that specialize in TTC transactions.