Lin, Hanyang

Hanyang Lin is a PhD stu­dent at Tsinghua-Berke­ley Shen­zhen Insti­tute (TBSI), Tsinghua Uni­ver­si­ty and a vis­it­ing schol­ar at RAEL, UC Berke­ley. His research focus on the elec­tric­i­ty mar­kets and pow­er flow mod­els in the pow­er sys­tem oper­a­tion. His work builds a lin­eariza­tion method of pow­er flow mod­els con­sid­er­ing noze­ro line shunts, and based on the pro­posed pow­er flow mod­els, he pro­pos­es an opti­mal oper­a­tion strat­e­gy for dis­tri­b­u­tion sys­tem oper­a­tors (DSO), com­pris­ing inter­nal pro­sumers who engage in P2P trans­ac­tions, includ­ing the the­o­ret­i­cal analy­sis to exam­ine the influ­ence of dif­fer­ent P2P trad­ing ratios on the DSO’s opti­mal oper­a­tion strat­e­gy. He is a mem­ber of IEEE Pow­er and Ener­gy Soci­ety and INFORMS. Pri­or to join­ing TBSI, Hanyang grad­u­at­ed from Impe­r­i­al Col­lege Lon­don as a mas­ter student.

Zhao, Yayun

Yayun Zhao is a vis­it­ing schol­ar from Huazhong Uni­ver­si­ty of Sci­ence and Tech­nol­o­gy (HUST) in Chi­na, with broad inter­ests in ener­gy tran­si­tion poli­cies and tech­nolo­gies. Her research expe­ri­ence includes pow­er sys­tem mod­el­ing, com­par­a­tive analy­sis of U.S. and Chi­na ener­gy poli­cies, and the sec­ond-use of retired bat­ter­ies. She is pas­sion­ate about explor­ing how pol­i­cy and tech­ni­cal inno­va­tions can dri­ve sus­tain­able ener­gy solu­tions and improve the inte­gra­tion of renew­able ener­gy into pow­er grids.

Xi Xi

Xi Xi is a Master’s stu­dent for the Ener­gy Resource group. Xi Xi uses inter­dis­ci­pli­nary meth­ods such as quan­ti­ta­tive mod­el­ing tech­niques and pol­i­cy analy­ses to assess impacts on emis­sions, ener­gy use, and oth­er socio-eco­nom­ic indi­ca­tors. Xi Xi looks for­ward to apply­ing her knowl­edge in the con­text of inter­na­tion­al devel­op­ment. Xi Xi would also like to study how devel­op­ing coun­tries may be affect­ed by or ben­e­fit from ten­sions between Chi­na and the West relat­ed to China’s emerg­ing role in inter­na­tion­al devel­op­ment and inter­na­tion­al cli­mate politics.

In RAEl she is research­ing US-Chi­na cli­mate pol­i­cy, decar­boniza­tion in Africa, and Chi­na’s role in Africa, among oth­er topics.

Pri­or to join­ing ERG, Xi Xi earned a BA from Welles­ley Col­lege. Xi Xi has worked for the Insti­tute for Glob­al Decar­boniza­tion Progress (iGDP), Abt, and the Mass­a­chu­setts Clean Ener­gy Cen­ter (Mass­CEC).

Xi Xi also enjoys trav­el­ing in their free time.

Ari Ball-Burack

Ari Ball-Burack is a first year PhD stu­dent in the Ener­gy & Resources Group at the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cal­i­for­nia, Berke­ley, advised by Dr. Dan Kam­men. He stud­ies data and com­pu­ta­tion­al tools to inform effec­tive decar­boniza­tion pol­i­cy. Specif­i­cal­ly, he is inter­est­ed in incor­po­rat­ing key com­plex­i­ties such as jus­tice and equi­ty, behav­ioral­ly real­is­tic deci­sion-mak­ing, and tech­no­log­i­cal inno­va­tion in ener­gy pol­i­cy deci­sion sup­port tools. His cur­rent research inves­ti­gates decar­boniza­tion pol­i­cy inter­ac­tions at the nation­al and glob­al lev­els, dis­tri­b­u­tion­al equi­ty in elec­tric vehi­cle charg­ing infra­struc­ture, and rep­re­sen­ta­tions of con­sumer adop­tion in mul­ti-sec­tor ener­gy sys­tem models.

Ari grad­u­at­ed from Williams Col­lege, where he stud­ied Com­put­er Sci­ence and Physics, and received MPhil degrees in Advanced Com­put­er Sci­ence and Envi­ron­men­tal Pol­i­cy from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Cam­bridge. Pri­or to join­ing ERG, he worked as a researcher at the Cam­bridge Insti­tute for Sus­tain­abil­i­ty Lead­er­ship. Ari enjoys run­ning, play­ing music, and qual­i­ty time with loved ones (ide­al­ly in nature).

Martha Hoffmann

In her doc­tor­al stud­ies in Ger­many, Martha is work­ing on the real­iza­tion of a social­ly just and accept­ed ener­gy tran­si­tion. For this, she plans to add social and eco­log­i­cal aspects to the cur­rent tech­ni­cal and eco­nom­i­cal focus with­in ener­gy tran­si­tion plan­ning process­es. The devel­op­ment of an inte­grat­ed ener­gy sys­tem mod­el will assess the impact of ener­gy mar­ket reforms on com­mu­ni­ty and house­hold lev­el as well as their impli­ca­tions for dis­trib­u­tive jus­tice. Her inter­ests, broad­ly, encom­pass, ener­gy jus­tice, the ener­gy tran­si­tion, ener­gy mod­el­ing, and Open Source meth­ods and strategies.

Her work is super­vised by Prof. Dr. Pao-Yu Oei from the Depart­ment of Ener­gy and Envi­ron­men­tal Man­age­ment at Europa-Uni­ver­sität Flens­burg (EUF).

Martha wrote her mas­ters degree the­sis  at the TU Berlin in the research group Off-Grid Sys­tems at the Rein­er Lemoine Insti­tut and devel­oped the sim­u­la­tion tool Off­grid­ders, which sizes elec­tri­fi­ca­tion options. Fol­low­ing  this, from 2019 to 2021, she worked as a researcher at the Rein­er Lemoine Insti­tut and was respon­si­ble for the project man­age­ment with­in the scope of the H2020 research project E‑LAND, in which RLI devel­ops and applies a sim­u­la­tion tool for sec­tor cou­pled ener­gy sys­tems (Mul­ti-Vec­tor Sim­u­la­tor).

Martha’s fel­low­ship is financed through the C‑BEAR+ project (link: https://reiner-lemoine-institut.de/en/c‑bear/) , fund­ed by the Fed­er­al Min­istry for Eco­nom­ic Affairs and Cli­mate Action of Germany.

She will be a vis­it­ing schol­ar at RAEL for Spring 2023

Con­tact: martha.​hoffmann@​rl-​stiftung.​de

Qin, Guangyu

Guangyu joins us for a year from North Chi­na Elec­tric Pow­er Uni­ver­si­ty, where he has already worked on clean ener­gy mar­kets and wind ener­gy forecasting.

At RAEL (and LBL) he will be work­ing on aggres­sive decar­boniza­tion path­ways for Chi­na, and the expan­sion of clean ener­gy ser­vices in heavy industry.

His recent paper on day-ahead wind fore­cast­ing is avail­able on the RAEL pub­li­ca­tions pages.  To take a look, click here.

Send him note and wel­come & get to know Guangyu!

Joyceline Marealle

Joyce­line is a Tan­zan­ian who holds a bachelor’s degree in chem­i­cal engi­neer­ing from the Uni­ver­si­ty of Rochester.

Her research inter­est lies in ener­gy decen­tral­iza­tion, diver­si­fi­ca­tion, eco­nom­ics and pol­i­cy mak­ing to empow­er women and improve the stan­dard of liv­ing in East Africa.

She cur­rent­ly works at the Renew­able & Appro­pri­ate Ener­gy Lab­o­ra­to­ry on Off grid sys­tems in remote areas in East Africa.

Pri­or to her MS, Joyce­line interned at MIT and con­duct­ed research on alu­minum bat­ter­ies for elec­tric vehi­cles. Addi­tion­al­ly, since 2017 she has been work­ing to empow­er mar­gin­al­ized young women of New Hope For Girls Orga­ni­za­tion in Tan­za­nia. Among her recent projects is her team win­ning a $10,000 Davis Project for Peace Fel­low­ship to estab­lish a green­house farm­ing busi­ness to act as a sus­tain­able income gen­er­a­tor for the girls.

Gbemisola “Gbemi” Akinsipe

My inter­ests range from the inte­gra­tion of renew­ables into exist­ing grids,the pos­si­bil­i­ty of indi­genes (espe­cial­ly women) in rur­al com­mu­ni­ties pro­duc­ing their own pow­er or at least under­stand­ing its work­ings and the inter­ac­tion between sci­ence and pol­i­cy mak­ing in devel­op­ing coun­tries. I would love to study in the Renew­able & Appro­pri­ate Ener­gy Lab­o­ra­to­ry (RAEL) or the Ener­gy Mod­el­ing, Analy­sis and Con­trol Group (EMAC)

Raghavan, Shuba

Shu­ba is the co-direc­tor of the Cal­i­for­nia Ener­gy Com­mis­sion spon­sored project

” Engag­ing Com­mu­ni­ties in the Design of  Sus­tain­able Ener­gy and Local­ized Futures  (SELF)”

Among her many pub­li­ca­tions are a num­ber that address­es the ener­gy-access-afford­abil­i­ty-cli­mate nexus, including:

1. The Cal­i­for­nia Demand Response: Poten­tial Study, Phase 3; Bri­an F.Gerke,Giulia Gallo,Sarah J. Smith, Jingjing Liu, Peter Alstone, Shu­ba V. Ragha­van, Peter Schwartz, Mary Ann Piette, Rongx­in Yin and Sofia Stensson. 
2. Trans­lat­ing cli­mate change and heat­ing sys­tem elec­tri­fi­ca­tion impacts on build­ing ener­gy use to future green­house gas emis­sions and elec­tric grid capac­i­ty require­ments in Cal­i­for­nia; Bri­an Tar­ro­ja, Feli­cia Chi­ang, Amir AghaK­ouchak, Scott Samuelsen, Shu­ba V. Ragha­van, Max Wei, Kaiyu Sunand Tianzhen Hong, Applied Ener­gy, 2018, vol. 225, issue C, 522–534
3. Build­ing a Health­i­er and More Robust Future: 2050 Low-Car­bon Ener­gy Sce­nar­ios for Cal­i­for­nia. Cal­i­for­nia Ener­gy Com­mis­sion. Pri­ma­ry Authors: Max Wei, Shu­ba Ragha­van, Patri­cia Hidal­go-Gon­za­lez, Con­tribut­ing Authors: Rodri­go Hen­riquez Auba, Dev Mill­stein, Madi­son Hof­fack­er, Rebec­ca Her­nan­dez, Eleonara Ruffi­ni, Bri­an Tar­ro­ja, Amir Agha Kouchak, Josi­ah John­ston, Daniel Kam­men, Julia Szi­nai, Col­in Shep­ard, Anand Gopal, Kaiyu Sun, Tianzhen Hong, and Florin-Langer James. Pub­li­ca­tion Num­ber: CEC-500‑2019-033; March 2019
4. Path­ways to Decar­bonize Res­i­den­tial Water Heat­ing in Cal­i­for­nia, Shu­ba V Ragha­van, Max Wei, Daniel Kam­men, Ener­gy Pol­i­cy 109 (2017) 441–451
5. Adop­tion of Solar Home Light­ing Sys­tems in India: What might we learn from Kar­nata­ka? Har­ish, Iychet­ti­ra, Ragha­van, Kan­d­likar, Ener­gy Pol­i­cy, Vol 62, Novem­ber 2013, pp ‑697–706.
6. Assess­ing the impact of the tran­si­tion to Light Emit­ting Diodes based solar light­ing sys­tems in India, San­tosh Har­ish, Shu­ba V Ragha­van, Milind Kan­d­likar, Gireesh Shri­mali, Ener­gy for Sus­tain­able Devel­op­ment, Vol­ume 17, Issue 4, August 2013, pp. 363–370.

Bo Li

Bo is a doc­tor­al stu­dent in Elec­tri­cal Engi­neer­ing  at Chongqing Uni­ver­si­ty.  His work is focused on the inte­gra­tion of renew­able ener­gy and of elec­tric vehi­cle fleets into the Chi­nese pow­er grid.