About

On this page:

Research

My group’s research is on the global transition to a 100% clean and renewable energy system. This includes designing future energy systems that are able to work with high shares of variable renewable electricity. A prerequisite for this is understanding the spatiotemporal variability of renewable generation and demand. But to develop a truly sustainable energy system it is also necessary to consider trade-offs between the energy transition and other concerns such as biodiversity protection. → More on my research areas.

In the course of my work I created and lead development of the open-source energy system modelling tool Calliope. I am also the creator and lead developer of the Renewables.ninja platform to simulate wind and solar power plants worldwide. I am a member of the Open Energy Modelling Initiative, which promotes openness and transparency in energy system modelling, and of the Open Power System Data project, which provides a free and open data platform for power system modelling. → More on my software projects.

Teaching

Online textbook: Energy System Modelling

www.modelling-energy-systems.org is an in-development, free and open online textbook for two MSc courses I teach, SET3061 Energy System Modelling (4 ECTS, taught in Matlab) and SEN1511 Engineering Optimization and Integrating Renewables in Electricity Markets (5 ECTS, taught in Python). Content-wise, the courses are closely related, and deal with using mathematical modelling and optimisation methods to address decision problems in energy systems: e.g., dispatch of power plants, market clearing, as well as capacity expansion and other planning problems.

Textbook: Introduction to Systems Analysis: Mathematically Modeling Natural Systems

Book Cover

Introduction to Systems Analysis: Mathematically Modeling Natural Systems is an updated English version of an originally German-language textbook on applying simple mathematical models to environmental problems.

See www.systems-analysis.org for more info and interactive demonstrations, and github.com/sjpfenninger/modelingbook-web for code.

Talks

A selection of past talks:

Current funded research projects

This is a non-exhaustive overview of some of the current (mostly externally funded) research projects happening in my group.

ECEMF

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ECEMF, the European Climate and Energy Modelling Forum, has dual aims. The long-term goal is to establish a permanent forum to connect policymakers with energy and climate researchers. In the short-term, a funded European research project is also developing a model-based evidence base to inform European climate and energy policy. One of the models used in the project is the Sector-Coupled Euro-Calliope model, which is developed in our group.

JustWind4All

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JustWind4All (Just and effective governance for accelerating wind energy) is a European research project to improve the planning of on- and offshore wind energy deployment, including novel technologies like airborne wind. The consortium is built around a trans-disciplinary approach with a range of methods, and a particular focus on social science. Our group provides energy system modelling input to determine where and how different wind energy technologies can play a valuable role.

SWEET PATHFNDR

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SWEET PATHFNDR is a consortium funded by the Swiss Federal Office of Energy to develop pathways towards an efficient, flexible, resilient, cost-effective, and sustainable Swiss energy system by 2050. Within this future, our main goal is to develop and analyze transition pathways for renewable energy integration in Switzerland. My group is contributing pathways and scenarios at the European level as the context within which Swiss decisions must take place.

RE-INTEGRATE

RE-INTEGRATE (Re-thinking of approaches and toolkits for transdisciplinary integrated assessment of climate-compatible energy strategies from the African Union through to the European Union) is a European project to support the transfer of modelling expertise from the EU to Africa. A range of European and African partner institutes are involved on the modelling side. Our group’s contribution includes analysing the policy needs that models are asked to fulfil and to develop participatory modelling approaches to consider aspects often neglected in energy system modelling.

Past funded research projects

SEEDS

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SEEDS means Stakeholder-Based Environmentally-Sustainable and Economically Doable Scenarios for the Energy Transition. In this project coordinated by my group, a consortium of four European institutions is building an approach to integrate humans into energy transition scenario design, while accurately modelling the relevant technical, economic and environmental constraints. We do this for several case studies in Portugal. One cornerstone of the project is that we go beyond modelling a single optimal solution, by using the SPORES near-optimal solutions algorithm developed by Francesco Lombardi in the course of working with my group.

WindSPORES

Wind power in Switzerland faces difficulties due to perceptions of low productivity, difficult project approval, and resistance due to landscape impact. Yet exploiting wind may be a critical component of a successful Swiss energy transition. In the WindSPORES project (Policy-relevant wind power deployment scenarios for Switzerland), we develop wind deployment scenarios that minimize perceived negative impacts. We provide a range of options for policy and planning to select from based on decision-makers’ priorities.

SENTINEL

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SENTINEL (Sustainable Energy Transitions Laboratory) was a European project to develop a new set of energy modelling tools, able to represent and analyse the drivers and barriers to complete decarbonisation, including decentralisation, a large-scale expansion of fluctuating renewable power leading to a vastly increased need for system-side flexibility, sector-coupling including the electrification of mobility and heating, and the impacts of different market designs on the behaviour of energy sector actors. To achieve this, a range of very different models were connected together to jointly answer questions that a single model cannot tackle.

WindVar

The variability of wind power is a key challenge for its successful integration into the electricity grid. The WindVar (Spatial-temporal variability of wind energy potential in Switzerland and neighbouring countries) project was aimed at quantifying wind power variability at high spatial resolution across Switzerland and neighbouring countries at different timescales, in order to reach a better understanding of the market value of Swiss wind power in the medium-term future, depending on its complementarity with wind power from other regions in Europe.