It’s my pleasure to write the foreword for this edition as I’m always happy to report on all the great things happening in my region of Europe/UK and around the world.
We’ve participated in several virtual and hybrid conferences lately and share our takeaways from those events in this issue. Of special note, Richard Adams has received another recognition from CIGRE for his work with the B5 Study Committee during the 2020 e-session.
Speaking of recognition, we’re highlighting a great article by the University of British Columbia’s Electrical and Computer Engineering school about our own Abdullah Al-Digs, who received his Electrical and Computer Engineering Ph.D. from UBC this year.
We’re also featuring “Climate change and the electric grid,” a thoughtful article by guest contributor Ernie Hayden, as well as an overview of ESB’s transformation plan by our own Andrew Eviston.
Lastly, you’ll notice a new section of our newsletter, “Get to know our team,” where we feature some of our talented employees and talk about their lives outside of work.
We hope you enjoy this issue of the PSC News and welcome any feedback you have.
Tim Miles, PSC Europe Managing Director
Guest Contributor: Ernie Hayden
Climate change and the electric grid
PSC is pleased to publish this blog post by author and thought leader, Ernie Hayden, founder and principal of 443 Consulting, LLC. Ernie offers examples of climate change impacts to the electric grid, noting the potential solutions are expensive and will take valuable time to implement.
ESB’s transformation plan to deliver a low carbon electricity system by 2030
ESB Networks announced their “National Network, Local Connections Programme” which will transform how energy on Ireland’s electricity network is managed and consumed locally by customers and communities across the country.
The University of British Columbia’s Electrical and Computer Engineering school has published an article about our own Abdullah Al-Digs, who received his Electrical and Computer Engineering Ph.D. from UBC this year. The article showcases Abdullah’s career path thus far and his passion for contributing to a more sustainable energy future. We are proud to have Abdullah on our North America team and look forward to our continued work together!
PSC’s General Manager in Ireland, Carlos Galvan, represented PSC at the recent Irish Solar Energy Association’s virtual conference. In this post, Carlos offers his thoughts on the event and voices his concerns related to the lack of concrete plans to combat the growing climate emergency.
CIRED – where the electricity distribution community meets every two years in venues across Europe – took place in a virtual environment again this year. The CIRED 2021 event marks its 26th international conference and exhibition, including papers from PSC electricity distribution experts.
PSC’s Negar Shams looks back on another successful virtual event, the 2021 Energy Networks Innovation Conference, where PSC and strategic partner Harmonic Analytics were proud exhibitors and participants.
PSC’s Aiman Suhailah Saifuddin, a studies engineer based in Singapore, attended the hybrid Singapore International Energy Week October 25-29. Her takeaway? Collaboration is key to the energy transition.
PSC offers in-house know-how and proven engineering competencies to develop opportunities and provide solutions for clients looking to achieve benefits from investing in Battery Energy Storage Systems (BESS).
PSC helped NorthernGrid members comply with regulatory requirements
Engaged by NWPP to help NorthernGrid members with regulatory compliance, PSC provided its strong technical support and analysis capabilities to deliver processes and tools in support of facilitating compliance with FERC Order No. 1000.
In each issue of the PSC News we introduce you to our new starters. We thought it would be nice to also start featuring some of our existing employees and ask them questions about their lives beyond work, to get to know them better as people, not just as colleagues. We hope you enjoy this new section.
Victor Francisco celebrates 10 years of excellent service
L-R: Victor Francisco being presented his gift by John McLean, General Manager – Market Systems APAC
Congratulations to Victor Francisco who has just celebrated 10 years of service at PSC. He celebrated this milestone during October with a lovely meal at the renowned Japanese restaurant Nobu with his colleagues.
Victor started his employment at PSC with a brief stint in both New Zealand and Singapore before settling in Perth, Australia where he has been providing Market Systems expertise for numerous clients in the APAC region and further afield. This has included numerous analysis, design and software development projects with AEMO, building a bespoke trading system for Tuas Power in Singapore, and providing expert system integration expertise for Siemens in Minneapolis.
Last year, Victor was promoted to Market Systems Manager for Western Australia where he has continued his excellence in consulting while managing our team of our Market Systems specialists here in Perth. Thank you Victor for your 10 years of outstanding service for PSC.
— North America —
Stella Zhang PSC welcomes Stella to the North American team. Stella is PSC’s first employee based in Winnipeg! She completed her Master’s degree in 2020 in Electrical Engineering at the University of Manitoba researching on power amplifiers, HVDC transmission, and DC/DC converters. She also has a Master’s degree in Economics from Nanjing University in China. Stella will be based remotely in Winipeg.
— Asia Pacific —
Marie Slako PSC welcomes Marie Slako as General Manager of Operational Technologies in APAC. Most recently working at AusNet Services, Marie led teams of engineers and data scientists to answer questions about the network and assets that AusNet uses, handling a wide array of energy data and analytics challenges across the Transmission, Distribution and Gas landscape. Marie held various roles in science, engineering and government organisations before moving to Melbourne in 2011 to work for a spatial/surveying consultancy. Marie will be based in our Melbourne office in Australia.
Rosa Khanaki We welcome Rosa Khanaki to the APAC Power System Studies team. Rosa has received her PhD from QUT, with a focus on power electronics applications in renewable energy. She joined Aurecon after graduation in November 2020. Her work experience at Aurecon started with grid connection and due diligence studies using PSCAD and continued to AEMO’s National Connection Team as a secondment in June 2021. Rosa will be working on a mix of AEMO and PSC projects, and will be based in the Brisbane office in Australia.
Sarah Steel PSC welcomes Sarah Steel who has joined PSC as Contracts Coordinator for Australia and North America, covering for Andrea Williams while she is on parental leave. Sarah has a Bachelor of Laws and a Bachelor of Arts (Geography) from the University of Auckland, and worked as a corporate/commercial lawyer in Auckland before moving to Canada in 2005. Sarah’s most recent role was in Calgary as an in-house corporate paralegal at Enbridge, which is North America’s largest energy company and one of the leading suppliers of renewable energy. Now back in New Zealand, Sarah will be working remotely from Auckland.
Hamish Allan PSC welcomes Hamish Allan to PSC. Hamish joins PSC in New Zealand as a Graduate Engineer after recently completing his Electrical Engineering degree at University of Canterbury. Hamish has previously worked for the New Zealand Defense Force as an Armourer and a Training Supervisor and has more recently undertaken a summer internship at Meridian Energy. Hamish will be based in the Christchurch office in New Zealand.
— Europe —
Changmei Li PSC welcomes Changmei Li, Principal Consultant, who joined the Europe team after almost 3 years of retirement life. Before that, she worked with the National Grid for almost 28 years. She was a Power System Engineer in the area of Network Design, System Planning, Outage Planning, and lately Generator Compliance. She obtained her PhD from the University of Durham after finishing her university study in China. Changmei will be based in our Warwick office in the UK.
