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Master of Environmental Governance graduate Caterina Pacini has started her position as PhD student at the Chair of Sustainability and Transformation Research. She will work on issues related to the transformation to low-carbon industrial clusters, path dependencies, lock-ins, reflexive governance and the question of how to link academic and applied research.

The trinational summer school offered 20 PhD and master students from various disciplines, in the framework of Eucor Universities, the opportunity to learn interactively about innovative formats and methods of transdisciplinary research.

The sustainable transformation of our society does not only require the production of knowledge and the development of scientific solutions. In order to implement scientific findings successfully, it is necessary to deal with the social framework conditions. This requires close cooperation between science and society. The subject of transdisciplinary research is to design and structure this cooperation in a scientific and practice-oriented way.

During the summer school, the students discovered and tried out different transdisciplinary formats and methods based on a case study on climate adaptation of the city of Emmendingen (north of Freiburg, Germany). As the trinational Upper Rhine region is particularly affected by heat and as even higher temperatures and more frequent and longer heat periods are expected in the future, cities and municipalities are called upon to quickly develop adaptation strategies and measures. The PhD students tackled these issues concretely and in direct cooperation with the City of Emmendingen.

For more information see here.

"The climate neutrality network is a giant step" say energy experts Franzsika Flachsbarth and Prof. Dr. Dierk Bauknecht. They are optimistic that the expansion of the German transmission grid - which is necessary for the energy transition but has been delayed for a long time - can now pick up speed. However, an important set screw is how the remuneration of network operators will be regulated in the future.

The interview was conducted by Jörg-Rainer Zimmermann for the energy transition magazine "Neue Energie".

Read the interview here.

As part of the project ENSURE - Neue EnergieNetzsStruktURen für die Energiewende, a master thesis can be written at the Öko-Institut.

Topic: Regulation of Innovation and Transformation in Power and Energy Networks

1. Which concepts for the regulation and governance of energy network are there to enable innovation and transformation as well as infrastructure development across networks?
2. Which approaches have been implemented internationally, how has this been done?
3. What are practical experiences and effects of these approaches?

Conditions

• Start: May-June 2023
• 6 month student job at Öko-Institut e.V., 19,5 hours per week, 14 EUR per hour
• Supervisor: Prof. Dr. Dierk Bauknecht
• Further supervision by colleagues working on the project

About Öko-Institut e.V.

Öko-Institut is one of Europe's leading independent research organizations working for a sustainable future. Öko-Institut advises decision-makers in policy, business and civil society. You will support the Energy and Climate Protection department in Freiburg, where our team conducts research on the transformation of the electricity sector.

About you

We work in an interdisciplinary team and your motivation and ability to acquire and apply knowledge quickly and with attention to detail is more important to us than your scientific background. Experience with power grids and their regulation is an advantage.

Next steps

Please send us a brief email by 2 May 2023 explaining why you are motivated and qualified for the role and attach your resume.

Contact: m.vogel@oeko.de

The Oeko-Institut is one of Europe’s leading independent research and consultancy organizations working for a sustainable future. Based on value-oriented research, the Oeko-Institut provides consultancy services for decision-makers in politics, industry and civil society. You will support the Energy and Climate department in Freiburg, where our team does research regarding the transformation of the buildings sector towards more energy efficiency and climate neutrality.

About your task:

At Oeko we use a bottom-up stock model for projecting the energy demand and greenhouse gas emissions in the buildings sector. The model is used in several projects for the German Ministries to support policy-making. The aims of your thesis are to

1) develop an approach for regionalising the output data of the model

2) develop a concept for visualisation of these results in QGIS

3) derive recommendations for policy-makers to address regionally different frameworks, challenges and opportunities within the transition of the German buildings sector.

Supervisors: Sibylle Braungardt, Malte Bei der Wieden

About you:

We work in an interdisciplinary team and your motivation and ability to gain and use knowledge quickly and with love for details is more important to us than your scientific background. Nevertheless, experience in the processing of spatial data is required for the task (e.g. with QGIS).

Next steps:

Please write a short email where you explain why you are motivated and qualified for the task attaching your CV until 1^st March 2023. Contact: m.beiderwieden@oeko.de