Research

Current studentships

ICT and Control for Aggregated Demand Response

Deadline: 05/07/2024 5:00PM
Studentship code: RDS
Staff name: Professor Michael Short
Research centre: Centre for Sustainable Engineering
Start date: Successful applicants will start in October or December 2024.

An opportunity has arisen to support a fully-funded PhD studentship in the area of Smart Energy Systems – Aggregated Demand Response (ADR). The PhD candidate will explore flexible and scaleable ICT and control system achitectures for practical implementation of ADR in the South African and UK contexts. The research project proposes to research, develop, implement and test control and informatics concepts for an energy management system (EMS) for ADR and renewables integration. The EMS will offer new integrated approaches – based upon recent research in system-of-systems concepts and distributed reinforcement learning – for load and event forecasting, optimization of multiple buildings/assets with integrated photovoltaics, wind turbines, battery storage, hydrogen, and HVAC. The project involves modelling and simulation and will explore the possibility of limited practical implementation and experimentation.

The system is to be principally piloted at the Campus of the University of Pretoria, South Africa and the Net Zero Industry Innovation Center (NZIIC) at Teesside University in the UK. Demonstration use cases involving multiple residential office spaces to improve energy efficiency, enable better integration of local renewable resources (solar, wind) and HVAC cooling resources in real-world practical situations will be carried out. The student will also focus upon calibrated and HIL-based simulation work in NZIIC. The PhD candidate will have a suitable background in engineering and/or analytics/data science, and ideally have familiarity with software platforms such as Matlab/Simulink. The candidate will be jointly supervised by staff in both Teesside University (Professor Michael Short and Dr Geetika Aggarwal) and in Pretoria (Professor Raj Naidoo and Professor Xianming Ye). The student will be hosted by Teesside University and will visit Pretoria and demonstration sites in both countries during the course of the studentship (dependent upon visa requirements for international travel).

Supervisory team: Professor Michael Short, Dr Geetika Aggarwal (Teesside University);
Professor Raj Naidoo, Professor Xianming Ye (University of Pretoria)

Funding eligibility

This fully-funded PhD studentship covers tuition fees for the period of a full-time PhD registration of up to four years and provides an annual tax-free stipend of £18,622 for three years subject to satisfactory progress.

Applications are welcome from UK, EU and International students.

Entry requirements

Applicants should hold or expect to obtain a good honours degree (2:1 or above) in a relevant discipline. A master’s level qualification in a relevant discipline is desirable, but not essential. International students will be subject to the standard entry criteria relating to English language ability, Academic Technology Approval Scheme (ATAS) clearance and where relevant, UK visa requirements and procedures.

How to apply

Please use the Online Application (Funded PhD) application form. When asked to specify funding, select ‘other’ and enter ‘RDS’ and the title of the PhD project that you are applying for.

You should ensure that you clearly indicate that you are applying for a funded studentship and include the title of the topic or project on your proposal document (which you will need to upload when applying).

If you do not clearly indicate that your application is for a funded studentship and state the title of the project applied for, your application may not be considered for the appropriate funding.

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Selection process

All applications received by the closing date will be considered. Successful applicants at the application stage will be shortlisted and contacted to arrange an interview. All interviews will be held online. Unsuccessful applicants will be contacted to confirm that the application will not be progressed. After interview, all interviewed applicants will be contacted to inform them of the outcome. The successful applicant will progress to an offer of a place to commence in either October or December 2024.

About Teesside

We are committed to providing a safe, welcoming and inclusive campus and to supporting all members of our University community to thrive whatever their age, gender, disability, sexual orientation, gender identity, race, marital status, nationality or any other characteristic.
More about our Inclusive campus

As a Teesside University research student, you will join a growing and dynamic research community, allowing you to share your experiences, insight and inspiration with fellow researchers. You will benefit from our academic expertise and be supported through a strong programme of research training. You will be offered opportunities and support at each stage of your research degree. Our research is designed to have impact and to influence policy and practice within our region, the UK and beyond. We work with external organisations to anticipate and respond to research needs, and to put our research into practice in sectors as diverse as the arts, engineering, healthcare and computing. PhD students are encouraged to work with their supervisors to explore the potential impact of their work.

The successful candidate will be expected to participate fully in research group and centre activities, including training sessions and workshops, and will become a member of the University’s wider postgraduate research community. Mentoring and support will be provided for the development of a strong academic and professional CV during the PhD, including publishing research outputs in high quality journals.

Academic enquiries

For academic enquiries, please contact M.Short@tees.ac.uk.

For administrative enquiries before or when making your application, contact research.enquiries@tees.ac.uk.

After an application has been made, please contact research.admissions@tees.ac.uk.

Key dates

Deadline: 05/07/2024 5:00PM
Interview date: We envisage that interviews will take place in July 2024.
Start date: Successful applicants will start in October or December 2024.