PhD Studentships (x4) in System Services in 100 % Renewable Grids
Fully funded studentships (stipend and tuition fees)

Position Summary:

Applications are invited for four PhD studentships, to be undertaken at Imperial College London (Electrical and Electronic Engineering Department) as part of the project “System Services in 100% Renewable Grids.” The project is funded by the Leverhulme Professorship held by Professor Mark O’ Malley and aims to investigate services needed in 100% renewable electricity grids. The efficacy of the services will be assessed across multiple objectives for the electric grid including but not limited to reliability, cost-effectiveness, affordability, and resiliency. As part of the project, emerging resources enabled by the digitalization and hybridization of energy systems will be modelled and their contribution to existing and proposed services will be studied to identify any potential revisions to resource participation models.

The project team will include Professor Mark O’Malley (Leverhulme Professor), Dr Elina Spyrou (Leverhulme Lecturer), four post-doctoral Research Associates, four pre-doctoral Research Assistants, and four PhD students. The team is aligned to the Global Power System Transformation (G-PST) initiative and its Research Agenda.

Summary of Project:

As the penetration of renewable resources in electricity grids pushes towards 100%, services need to be redefined around the new resources in a way that ensures resilience is achieved at lowest cost. This is a challenge requiring the coordination of evolving technical needs and capabilities with economics and hard to define societal reliability and resiliency needs. This exciting mix of issues is made further challenging by the pace of change and the trend in digitalization of the entire energy systems (including grids) that is happening in parallel.

Funding:

There are four studentships available. Although both overseas and home students are eligible to apply for these studentships, successful overseas candidates would need to cover the difference between home and overseas fees as the studentships will cover home fees only (Who pays home fees in England), a stipend of approximately £19,668 per year (tax-free) for three and a half years, support of research expenses and travel to collaborators and conferences.

Duties and responsibilities

The responsibilities include defining the research questions and plan, reviewing literature and conducting independent research, reporting progress and disseminating results in high-impact journals, conferences and other gatherings. The successful candidates will be based at Imperial but will also travel regularly to coordinate with the partners in the G-PST. Suitable backgrounds for these PhD positions include but are not limited to power engineering, mathematics, computing and economics.

Essential Requirements:

Applicants should have a good first degree or a Master’s degree (or other equivalent experience). Suitable backgrounds for these PhD positions include but are not limited to power engineering, mathematics, computing and energy economics.

Further Information and application:

For informal enquiries, please contact Prof Mark O’Malley (m.omalley@imperial.ac.uk).

Please click here to apply. Course code: Electrical Engineering Research – H6ZX. The application should also include a cover letter and your CV.

NB: In the application, the proposed research supervisor should be Prof Mark O’Malley to indicate that the application is for this post.

Full guidance on application process is available here. Any further queries regarding the application process should be directed to Miss Emma Rainbow e.rainbow@imperial.ac.uk.

Closing Date: 17 March 2023. EARLY APPLICATION IS HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.

About Imperial College London

Imperial College London is the UK’s only university focussed entirely on science, engineering, medicine and business and we are consistently rated in the top 10 universities in the world.

Additional information on the PhD programme in the Department of Electrical and Electronic Engineering can be found here.