Contact Dr Pegah Mirzania

Background

Pegah is an Academic fellow in Local Energy Systems at the Center for Energy Systems and Strategy. She is the Module leader of the Energy Economics and Policy Module for the MSc in Renewable Energy Course. Pegah obtained her PhD at the Centre for Efficient and Renewable Energy in Buildings (CEREB), London South Bank University in 2019 where she researched distributed energy systems, in particular, Community-owned solar projects in the UK. The primary aim of her research was to evaluate how the integration of solar PV and electricity storage can be structured to be a feasible and financially viable model for community-owned solar projects in the post-subsidy condition. Pegah received her Master's degree in Energy and Economics from the City University of London, where she worked on energy performance policy frameworks to improve and promote energy efficiency in community and public buildings. In February 2019, Pegah has joined ¹û½´ÊÓƵ¹ÙÍø as a Postdoctoral research fellow. Her main research focus was on analysing the sustainability and livelihood impacts of Concentrated Solar Power plants on local communities by drawing insights from theoretical concepts on the socio-technical evolution of energy systems, and the territorial nature of energy networks.

Research opportunities

I am interested in supervising / co-supervising research (PhD) students with a research interest in:

Smart local energy system

Community renewable energy

Demand-side management

Decentralised energy system

Multi vector energy systems

Green Hydrogen Economy

Current activities

Pegah's overall research interests focus on developing ways to achieve a sustainable, fair and clean socio-technical energy system. She is particularly interested in developing innovative business and techno-economic models for local energy systems and investigating how communities fit in and function in processes linked to scaling up renewables.

Active Projects:

Empowering Communities: The Green Hydrogen Network (2024). I am working as the Principal Investigator on this project funded by the Cranfield Global Research Fund. The project aims to explore the potential and challenges of community-driven hydrogen projects by examining existing initiatives in Germany and the UK.

Prototype Planning Tool for Green Hydrogen Generation and Use in UK Agriculture (2022-2024). The project funded by EPSRC Impact Acceleration Account. The project aims to explore the potential and challenges of integrating hydrogen into agricultural technologies and farming practices to help reduce emissions from the sector.

Protecting Minority Ethnic Communities Online (PRIME) 2022-2025: EPSRC funded project. This project aims to understand online harm and explore how it can be mitigated through new systems, tools, and processes. The focus is on the experiences of Middle Eastern (ME) communities with digitalized services, particularly in the areas of housing, health, and energy.

Completed Projects:

MACRO Project (2021-2023), Understanding and managing cyber security risks for low-carbon mobility-as-a-service applications. For this EPSRC-funded project, I worked on WP4, exploring the social, behavioral, regulatory, and market opportunities and barriers to the development of Mobility as a Service (MaaS) in the UK. This involved analyzing the implications for the governance of the MaaS ecosystem.

TRILEMA (2022), Transition to low emission airport infrastructure from an energy systems perspective: worked on this project which is funded by HEIF as a Co-I researcher, the overall aim of the project is to create knowledge exchange activities between the energy and aviation sector.

LOCESA- Department for Transport and Connect Places Catapult (2021-2022)- Low Carbon Energy Demand Scenarios For Aviation.

Network H2, UK Research and Innovation - Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Councils (2021-2021) Techno-economic feasibility study of hydrogen-fuelled freight transport

H2020-LCE-11-2017, Project number 792103, SOLWATT , Solving Water Issues for CSP Plants-Sustainability and livelihood impacts of CSP plants

JET-SEMLEP-Higher Education Innovation Fund- HEIF (2019-2020)- 'Just' Energy Transitions within SEMLEP Region (JET-SEMLEP)

Research Grants:

Empowering Communities: The Green Hydrogen Network, (Cranfield Global Research Fund, 2024-2025, PI: £14,998)

Navigating EDI Complexity: Addressing Challenges in Energy Research Sector (IGNITE Network, 2024-2025, Co-I: £ 19,998)

Sustainable energy transitions in South Africa: socio-economic aspects (Global Challenges Research Fund, 2019-2020, Co-I: £19,921)

Beyond the Technical: Social and Political Implications of Delivering a Low Carbon Heat Future in the UK, The UK Energy Research Centre, UKERC Networking Grant,2019, Co-I, £3,900)

Teaching

Module Leading:

1. Energy Economics and Policy (MSc Module)

2.The Socio-Economic Acceptance of Low Carbon Technologies (PhD Module)

Selected Teaching:

- Cost-Benefit Analysis

- Socio-Economic Aspects of Solar Projects

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Current PhD Students:

Mirac Celik - Peer-to-Peer Energy Trading with Community-Level Virtual Storage Units

Rilwan Usman - Optimising Residential Electricity Demands Through Innovative Demand Side Management Strategies in Nigeria

Clients

European Community-H2020 programme

Energy UK

Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC)

UK Energy Research Centre (UKERC)

Brits Energy

Water Resources East (WRE)

Connected Places Catapult

London Borough of Hounslow Council

Publications

Articles In Journals

Conference Papers

Books