Power & Energy Society Hybrid Lecture | Watts Next? Imperial Alumni Insights into Power & Renewables by Dr Nicolás Cifuentes, Dr Michael Evans and Mr Ali Gulrez
In this seminar, “Watts Next? Imperial Alumni Insights into Power & Renewables,” three distinguished alumni shared their journey from academia to industry, offering invaluable insights into the challenges and opportunities in the path to decarbonisation.
Hosted by Imperial College London’s PES Student Chapter and IEEE SB, in collaboration with the UK and Ireland Power and Energy Society Chapter, this event navigated the evolving landscape of power and renewables.
About the Speakers
Nicolás Cifuentes received BSc and MSc degrees in electrical engineering from the University of Chile, Santiago, Chile, in 2017. He received the PhD in electrical and electronic engineering from Imperial College London in 2021. He is currently working as senior power system engineer in the electrical system design and grid compliance department at Orsted.
Michael Evans is Optimisation and Analytics Lead at Octopus Energy Group, bringing together optimisation design, market access and customer propositions to harness flexibility from domestic and commercial assets, at scale. Example products include Octopus Zero Bill Homes and Power Pack, both guaranteeing customers pay nothing to consume energy, covering entire homes and EV charging respectively. Michael holds a PhD in flexibility from distributed energy resources from Imperial College London.
Ali Gulrez is the Chief Technology Officer for Lower 48 Energy where he is responsible for the roll out of Battery Storage projects in the UK. He joined Lower 48 Energy 5 years ago and has helped scale the business where it is now been acquired by a global energy infrastructure investor Castleton Commodities International (CCI). Ali has a background in Electrical Engineering and has a First Class Masters degree in Sustainable Energy Futures from Imperial College London. Prior to moving to London Ali worked in Larsen & Toubro in Mumbai as a senior engineer in Product Management division of electrical switchgear.