Confirmed Speakers
Professor Keith Bell, Co-Director, UK Energy Research Centre & Member of Committee for Climate Change
Keith Bell is a Co-Director of the UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC) and a Chartered Engineer. In addition to teaching and being involved with energy system research in collaboration with academic and industrial partners, he has a number of additional roles including with; the Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult, the IET Power Academy, the Conseil International des Grands Réseaux Electriques (CIGRE), the European Energy Research Alliance and as ScottishPower Chair in Smart Grids at the University of Strathclyde. Keith has also advised the Scottish Government, Ofgem, BEIS and the Government of Ireland on electricity system issues.
David Bould, Lead R&D Specialist, Ørsted
David is Lead R&D Specialist for Ørsted Offshore where he is responsible for collaborations with universities and research organisations. He has held positions in ORE Catapult, the University of Edinburgh and the Carbon Trust, specialising in offshore wind, wave and tidal energy, and energy systems. He also previously worked offshore as a Chief Field Geophysicist in the oil & gas seismic survey sector.
He holds an MSc in Sustainable Energy Systems and a BSc in Computer Science and Management Science. Originally from Edinburgh, Scotland, he now lives and works in Copenhagen, Denmark
Adel El Gammal, Secretary General of the European Energy Research Alliance (EERA)
Adel El Gammal is the Secretary General of the European Energy Research Alliance (EERA). EERA is a non-profit association constituting the largest energy research community in Europe, bringing together more than 250 public research centres and universities from 30 countries. EERA is the formal research pillar of the EU SET-Plan.
He is a recognized expert and a senior EU Affairs professional in the fields of low carbon technologies, clean energy transition, and climate change. Before joining EERA, Adel was active in the EU climate energy debate for 11 years, notably as Director of the Becquerel Institute, an advanced consultancy on the role of PV in the energy transition, Executive Director of LowCarbonFacts (an ECF-funded programme) and Secretary General of the EU Photovoltaic Industry Association (EPIA, now SolarPower Europe).
Adel is civil engineer from Ecole Polytechnique of Brussels, holds degrees in Business Administration from Solvay Business School (Belgium) and Insead (France) and later specialized in Environment Management (IGEAT, Belgium).
Sofia Koukoura, ETP PhD Alumni & Senior Asset Performance Analysis Engineer, ScottishPower Renewables
Sofia has a background in Mechanical Engineering and Energy Systems. She did her PhD titled “Wind Turbine Gearbox Diagnostics Using Artificial Intelligence” at University of Strathclyde, within the Wind and Marine Energy Systems Centre for Doctoral Training. During her PhD, Sofia was an ETP PECRE exchange student and collaborated with industrial and academic institutions such as the National Renewable Energy Laboratory.
She then worked as an EPSRC Doctoral Prize Research Associate at the University of Strathclyde, with a research focus on hybrid models for wind turbine fault detection and cost of energy reduction. Currently, she works as a Senior Asset Performance Analysis Engineer at ScottishPower Renewables, developing solutions for asset performance maximisation and having a leading role in innovation projects.
Professor Sir Jim McDonald, Chair of ETP and Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Strathclyde
Professor Sir Jim McDonald joined the University of Strathclyde in 1984 following seven years in the electric utility industry and was appointed to the Rolls-Royce Chair in Electrical Power Systems in 1993. He became Principal and Vice Chancellor of the University of Strathclyde in March 2009. He Co-chairs, with the First Minister, the Scottish Government’s Energy Advisory Board.
He is Chairman of the Independent Glasgow Economic Leadership Board. He currently holds several senior business appointments with organisations including the Weir Group, Scottish Power, the UK Offshore Renewable Energy Catapult and the UK National Physical Laboratory. He chairs two of the pan-Scotland research pools in Energy and Engineering and in 2019 he was elected President of the Royal Academy of Engineering (RAEng), becoming the first Scottish holder of the office.
In the Queen’s Jubilee Birthday Honours List on 16 June 2012, Professor McDonald was awarded a Knighthood for services to education, engineering and the economy. He is a Fellow of the Royal Academy, the Royal Society of Edinburgh, the Institution of Engineering and Technology, the Institute of Physics and the Energy Institute.
Professor Neil Robertson, Dean International Partnerships and ETP Solar Theme Coordinator, University of Edinburgh
Neil Robertson graduated from the University of Edinburgh and worked in FU Berlin, University of Wales and Imperial College London before returning to University of Edinburgh. He leads research on new molecular and nanomaterials for solar photovoltaics, photocatalysis, electrical energy storage materials and devices. He is Fellow of the Royal Society of Chemistry, Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, and Energy Technology Partnership (Scotland) Theme Leader for Solar Energy. He led a project in 2014 to develop the first Solar Vision for Scotland and was a member of the 2019 Solar Commission, reporting into solar innovation in the UK.
He has previously served as an Elected Member of Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) Dalton Council and RSC Materials Chemistry Division Council, and is Associate Editor of RSC Journal of Materials Chemistry C. He is Dean International Partnerships for Science and Engineering at the University of Edinburgh.
António Sarmento, Founder & President of the Board of WavEC Offshore Renewables
António Sarmento is the founder and president of the board of WavEC Offshore Renewables in Lisbon and a retired (2013) Associate Professor at Instituto Superior Técnico, Universidade de Lisboa, where he got both his first degree and PhD in Mechanical Engineering.
Between 2017 and 2019 he was the President of the Steering Committee and first CEO of the AIR Centre (Atlantic International Research Centre) by appointment of the S&T ministers of 8 countries bordering the Atlantic Ocean. He was a member of the advisor committee of the Scottish Government for the Saltire Prize in 2008, a co-founder (2006) and board member (2006 – 2010) of the board of Ocean Energy Europe.
António is an Associate Editor of the Journal of Ocean and Wind Energy (IJOWE) and has extensive experience as consultant of governmental bodies and companies (EDP, Galp, AWS, Wedge, Corpower, Iberdrola, GNF, Repsol, etc.). He has been the coordinator of 5 EU funded projects in the area of marine renewable energy and he has over 20 participations in other EC funded projects. He is also the author of over 90 scientific journal and conference papers and the supervisor of 8 PhD students in the area of marine renewable energy.