Meet our Scientific Committee
Roland Bründlinger
Roland Bründlinger studied at the Technical University, Graz, Austria and the Royal Institute of Technology (KTH) in Stockholm and received his M. Sc. degree in Power Engineering in 2000. Since 2001 he has been with the Austrian Institute of Technology in Vienna, Austria. As Senior Research Engineer he is responsible for qualification testing and conformity assessment of Grid Connected Power Converters at the ISO 17025 accredited AIT SmartEST laboratory. His main research interest lies on performance analysis and the interaction between inverter-based Distributed Energy Resources, protection schemes and electricity grids with a focus on power electronics converter-based systems. Roland Bründlinger is member of national and international Technical Committees working on Solar PV and DER standardisation and is member of the Board of DERlab e.V., the Association of the European Laboratories for Distributed Energy Resources. As Task Manager of IEA-PVPS Task 14, he has coordinated the international research activities in the framework of the “Solar PV in the 100% RES based power system” task within the Photovoltaic Power Systems Technology Collaboration Programme of the International Energy Agency.
Graeme Burt
Graeme directs InstEE, Strathclyde’s academic research unit for electrical power engineering. His research interests span decentralised and hybrid energy systems, electrification of propulsion, and experimental validation of resilient power systems. Professor Burt is lead academic for PNDC and its MW scale innovation and testing infrastructures, and director of the Rolls-Royce UTC in Electrical Power Systems. He also serves as Interim Co-Director for Scotland’s Energy Technology Partnership. He is an active researcher, with a track record of leading involvement in many national and international power systems consortia research projects and professional activities (such as the CIRED WG for DC Distribution Networks), and an extensive track record of publication. He codirects the EPSRC Centre for Doctoral Training in Net Zero Aviation. Professor Burt serves on the Steering Committee of the European Energy Research Alliance (EERA) Joint Programme in Smart Grids, the Scientific Advisory Body of Europe’s Clean Aviation Joint Undertaking, and the Board of the Association of European Distributed Energy Resources Laboratories (DERlab e.V.). He furthermore serves on the International Committee for the UPEC, and the technical committee for IRED. Professor Burt is a committed teacher, and directs a double degree international Masters in Smart Grids.
Véronique Delisle
Véronique Delisle is a project manager in the Renewable Energy Integration Program at the CanmetENERGY research centre of Natural Resources Canada. She manages projects related to building-integrated photovoltaics (BIPV), the potential and control of flexible loads, smart cities and bulk power system modelling pathways for net-zero regional and national grids. Véronique holds Master’s and Ph.D. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from the University of Waterloo and Polytechnique Montréal, respectively. She is currently the chair of the American Society of Heating, Refrigerating and Air-Conditioning Engineers (ASHRAE) TC 6.7 on Solar and Other Renewables and a Canadian representative on the International Energy Agency (IEA) Photovoltaic Power Systems Programme (PVPS) Task 15 on enabling a framework for the development of BIPV.
Aleksandra Dordevic
Aleksandra Dordevic is an accomplished electrical power engineer with over a decade of experience specializing in electrical design for industrial facilities and project management. As ESP Lab Manager at TU Delft's EEMCS faculty, she blends technical expertise with proven leadership skills. Aleksandra excels in fostering inclusive work environments, mentoring teams, and promoting personal and professional growth. Her passion for technology and effective management enables her to empower individuals while driving innovation and success in technical environments.
Nikos Hatziargyriou
Nikos Hatziargyriou has been with the Electrical and Computer Engineering School, National Technical University of Athens (NTUA) since 1984, Professor in Power Systems since 1995, and Professor Emeritus since 2022. He is part-time Professor at the University of Vaasa, Finland. He was Chairman and CEO of the Hellenic Distribution Network Operator (HEDNO) (2015-2019) and Executive Vice-Chair and Deputy CEO of the Public Power Corporation (PPC) (2007-2012), responsible for Transmission, Distribution and Islands Departments. He has authored more than 350 journal publications and 600 conference proceedings papers. He is included in the 2016, 2017, and 2019, Thomson Reuters lists of top 1% most cited researchers and for many years in the top 2% Scientists by Stanford University. He is 2020 Globe Energy Prize laureate, recipient of 2017 IEEE/PES Prabha Kundur Award and the 2023 IEEE Herman Halperin Electric Transmission and Distribution Award. He was Chair of the IEEE Power System Dynamic Performance Committee and Editor in Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Power Systems, currently EiC-at-Large. He is honorary member of CIGRE and past Chair of CIGRE SCC6 “Distribution Systems and Distributed Generation.” He has participated in more than 60 R&D projects funded by the EU Commission, electric utilities and the industry.
Aki Hirohisa
Professor Aki Hirohisa received a B.S. and M.S. in electrical engineering from Osaka University, Japan in 1994 and 1996, respectively, and a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from Yokohama National University, Japan in 2002. He has worked for the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology (AIST) for 15 years. He is a Professor at Institute of Systems and Information Engineering, University of Tsukuba. He was a Visiting Scientist at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, California in 2008. He also served as a Deputy Director, Ministry of Economy, Trade and Industry, Japanese Government in 2009. His research interests include the integration of distributed energy resources including mobility in societies. Prof. Aki is a member of the IEEE, the Japan Society of Energy and Resources, the IEE of Japan, and CIGRE.
Mark McGranaghan
Mark McGranaghan is a Fellow at EPRI, located at the EPRI Europe office in Dublin. He received his BS and MS degrees in Electrical Engineering from the University of Toledo (Ohio) in 1977 and 1978, respectively. He has authored more than 70 technical papers and articles on topics ranging from power quality to insulation coordination. Mark has been a leader in the areas of power quality, development of the smart grid, and distributed resource integration for over 20 years. He is an IEEE Fellow and in 2014 received the Charles Proteus Steinmetz Award for his expertise and dedication to power engineering standards development.
James Reilly
Jim Reilly is an independent consultant in the electric power industry, focusing on the aggregation and integration of distributed energy resources in transmission and distribution systems for reliability and resilience. Among the clients he has served are the Department of Energy, Office of Electricity (Microgrid Program); Argonne National Laboratory (Grid Integration); Idaho National Laboratory (SMR integration in distribution networks); NEDO (congestion management); and NIST (interconnection and smart grid). Over the past ten years Jim has initiated PAR and been an officer of eight IEE SA working groups in the IEEE 2030™ Series. Among these are IEEE 2030.4™-2023 Interoperability, IEEE 2030.7™-2017 Microgrid Controllers, IEEE 2030.11™-2021 Distributed Energy Resources Management Systems (DERMS), and now IEEE P2030.14 Virtual Power Plants. Jim has authored or coauthored numerous articles and led research projects on advanced microgrids, the aggregation of renewable energy, energy management systems, power system restoration and system protection. Jim holds advanced degrees from Georgetown University and Columbia University and is a senior member of the IEEE Power Engineering Society and the IEEE Standards Association.
Thomas Strasser
Thomas Strasser holds a master’s, PhD, and Venia Docendi (habilitation) in automation from Technische Universität Wien (TU Wien). For over 14 years, he has been a senior scientist at the AIT Austrian Institute of Technology’s Center for Energy, focusing on smart grid automation and mentoring junior researchers. Previously, he spent six years researching advanced automation systems at PROFACTOR. He also teaches at TU Wien. Dr. Strasser has co-authored about 300 scientific publications, holds two patents, and frequently presents at international conferences. He serves as an associate editor for IEEE and Springer journals and is active on program committees for scientific events. With over two decades of involvement in national and international research projects, he has held roles such as coordinator, work package leader, and evaluator for European and national funding agencies. Dr. Strasser also contributes to IEC and IEEE working groups. He is a senior member of IEEE, holding leadership positions in IES, SMCS, PES, and the Austria Section. He also represents Austria in CIGRE Study Committees. His career reflects significant contributions to automation, smart grids, and scientific collaboration.
Philipp Strauss
Dr.-Ing. Philipp Strauss is the founder of DERlab e.V. and currently serves as the Spokesperson for its Board. He is the Director of the Power System Stability and Converter Technology division at Fraunhofer IEE and chairs the German Mirror Committee for IEC TC 8, which focuses on "System Aspects of Electrical Energy Supply." Philipp Strauss coordinated the IRED cluster of European projects involving over 100 institutions and industry partners, which, in collaboration with U.S. institutes, initiated the IRED series of global conferences on the "Integration of Distributed Energy Resources." His work encompasses topics such as converter-dominated grids and the integration of renewable energies, with a strong emphasis on investigating the stability of future power systems and developing innovative solutions for converter technology. Mr. Strauss studied Electrical Engineering at the Technical University of Berlin and earned his doctorate on power system stability at the University of Kassel. In 2002, he coordinated the establishment of the first microgrids utilizing grid-forming battery units and distributed power control of photovoltaic systems through grid frequency on the Greek island of Kythnos.
Diana Strauss-Mincu
Dr. Diana Strauß-Mincu graduated in Electrical Power Systems (2006) at the University "Politehnica" Bucharest, Romania and received her PhD degree (Dec. 2010) at the Technical University of Grenoble, France on the topic "Modeling of Dynamic Equivalents of Electrical Grids". Mrs. Strauß-Mincu has more than fifteen years of experience in the field of grid stability and the integration of decentralized energy generation. She has coordinated and worked on various research projects related to this topic. Her current work focuses on smart grids, the integration of converter-based generation, dynamics, stability, and control of converter-dominated grids.
Peter Vaessen
Peter Vaessen has 40 years of experience in power systems and high voltage technologies. He is innovation manager at KEMA Laboratories and head of the High Voltage Technologies group at Delft University.