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About

The PES (Power and Energy Society) Student Chapter Leuven envisions creating a community of students and young professionals who are passionate about the new challenges and opportunities in the global energy sector. Our objective is to disseminate the latest developments in the field, and to bridge the gap between academia and industry. The mission of IEEE PES forum is to be the leading provider of scientific and engineering information on electric power and energy for the betterment of society, and the preferred professional development source for our members. We organize a variety of activities such as lectures, visits and symposia.

Upcoming events

Team

Giacomo Bastianel – Chair

He obtained his B.Sc. in Energy Engineering from Universita’ degli studi di Padova in 2019 and his M.Sc. in Energy Engineering from KU Leuven in 2021. Currently, he works as a PhD student for ELECTA research group from KU Leuven/EnergyVille in Leuven/Genk. His fields of research are how to deal with flexibility and uncertainty on the transmission system, decision support for grid operators, HVDC integration in the electric system and general optimization problems in energy systems.

Hélène Ponsaerts – Vice-Chair

She obtained a MSc in Electrical Engineering from KU Leuven, Belgium in 2023 and she is currently pursuing a joint PhD with the Flemish institute for technological research (VITO) and KU Leuven/EnergyVille. Her work focuses on system identification of low voltage distribution networks. Besides PES, she is also vice-chair of WIE Leuven.

Carlos Eduardo Gil Simancas – Secretary

Currently pursuing a PhD in Electrical Engineering at KU Leuven. I am electronics engineer from Colombia passionate about sustainability and renewable energies integration into de system. I made a Master in Energy for Smart Cities with Innoenergy, KULeuven and KTH and I have worked for 4 years in different roles in multiple industries: Oil and Gas, Process Automation and more recently, eMobility.

Mohamed Numair – Treasurer

Experienced electrical power engineer with an established software and embedded hardware development experience and a keen grasp of engineering and project management. Demonstrated multi-tasking, hard-working, leadership, and research skills. My interests are oriented towards using Industry 4.0 technologies for the monitoring, control and optimization of Smart Grids.

Francisco Javier Cifuentes Garcia – Media and events

Fran received the B.S. in Energy Engineering (2018, honors) and M.Sc. in Industrial Engineering specialized in Electronics (2021) from the Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya (UPC), Spain. He was a research assistant at CITCEA-UPC, Barcelona (2018-2020), and KU Leuven (2021) as part of the InnoDC project. He is a PhD student of KU Leuven & etch (EnergyVille) focusing on the control and stability of power systems with high penetration of power electronics.

Volunteers and previous members: Matteo Rossini, Sari Kerckhove, Merijn Van Deyck, Hossein Fani, Lucas Bex, Ziqing Guo, Muhammad Hafeez Saeeed, Chandra Kant Jat, Mohammad Heidari.