Keynote Speaker
Pierluigi Mancarella, FIEEE
Chair Professor of Electrical Power Systems, The University of Melbourne, Australia
Professor of Smart Energy Systems, The University of Manchester, UK
pierluigi.mancarella@unimelb.edu.au
Keynote Title: Enabling the DER revolution
Abstract:
Distributed Energy Resources (DERs) such as rooftop solar photovoltaics, battery energy storage systems, electric heat pumps, electric vehicles, and so forth, in case aggregated in local energy systems (e.g., energy communities and microgrids), are becoming widespread in most countries worldwide and are poised to play an essential role towards net-zero targets and increasing power system resilience.
In this keynote we will present fundamental techno-economic aspects of key approaches that could enable large-scale deployment of DERs – from dynamic pricing to virtual power plants, energy communities, and microgrids – and discuss the benefits of demand side integration into systems and markets. Several case studies from recent international projects will be used to exemplify the concepts presented.
Keynote Speaker’s Biography:
Pierluigi Mancarella is the Chair Professor of Electrical Power Systems at The University of Melbourne (Australia), where he is also the Energy Systems program leader at the Melbourne Energy Institute, and Professor of Smart Energy Systems at The University of Manchester (UK). His key research interests include techno-economic modelling and analysis of multi-energy systems, grid and market integration of renewables and distributed energy resources, energy infrastructure planning under uncertainty, and security, reliability and resilience of low-carbon networks.
Pierluigi is a Fellow of the IEEE, an IEEE Power and Energy Society Distinguished Lecturer, and the Convenor of the Cigre C6/C2.34 Working Group on “Flexibility provision from distributed energy resources”. He holds the 2017 veski Innovation Fellowship for his work on urban-scale virtual power plants, is a recipient of an international Newton Prize 2018 for his work on power system resilience in Chile, and was the technical chair of the 2022 International Microgrids Symposium and the inaugural chair of the Energy working group of the IEEE European Public Policy Initiative. He has been visiting researcher/professor in a number of international institutions, including NREL in Colorado, Tsinghua University in China, Ecole Centrale de Lille in France, and the Universidad de Chile, and was the 2024 Otto Mønsted Visiting Professor at DTU, Denmark.
Pierluigi is author of several books and book chapters and of over 400 research papers and reports, is a Senior Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Power Systems and of the Oxford Open Energy journal, and an Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Energy Markets, Policy and Regulation.
Currently he is actively involved in a number of research and consultancy projects with industry and policy makers in Australia and internationally and is the Australian Director of the USA-UK-Australia Global Centre in Climate Change and Clean Energy “Electric Power Innovation for a Carbon-Free Society (EPICS)”.