How e-CIGRE Accelerates Research
Inauguration Event of CIGRE UK NGN University of Birmingham Hub
A CIGRE UK NGN seminar was successfully hosted in University of Birmingham, in the noon of 8th December 2023, to promote CIGRE UK NGN. The theme of this event is “How e-CIGRE Accelerates Research”, where a keynote speech is given by the local PhD student, Mr Shuailong Dai, who is also a CIGRE UK NGN member.
To start the event, Dr Nan Chen, the Secretary & Treasurer of CIGRE UK NGN, welcomed everyone and briefly introduced the programme of this event. Then Dr Jiajie luo, the Vice-Chair of CIGRE UK NGN, was invited to give a detailed introduction to NGN and the benefits of joining NGN.
The benefits of joining CIGRE UK NGN have been summarised as follows:
- Free for students;
- More opportunities of technical webinars in power systems;
- Networking with senior colleagues;
- Joining Working Groups and learning from experts;
- Invaluable massive digital resources (e-CIGRE), such as Technical Brochures;
- Benefit from mentoring scheme;
- Career opportunities!
To download the presentation click here: CIGRE UK NGN – Introduction
Dr Jianing Li, the Chair of CIGRE UK NGN, expressed welcome to everyone and provided valuable comments and highlighted the benefits NGN can bring to individuals, as well as introducing how to register with CIGRE student memberships in a more convenient way.
After the detailed introduction to CIGRE UK NGN, Dr Nan Chen introduced CIGRE UK NGN University of Birmingham (UoB) Hub and announced its inauguration which has been formally discussed during CIGRE UK AGM on 14thNovember 2023.
The CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub aims to provide a communication platform for local students including undergraduate students, Mater students, PhD students, postdoctoral researchers, early career researchers and young academics to discuss hot topics related to power system with each other, especially in the areas of the 16 Study Committees of CIGRE. Together with the CIGRE UK Ambassador programme, CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub can provide local students and researchers with opportunities of communicating with and learning from senior CIGRE members, as well as contribute to the development of CIGRE including reputation increase and membership growth.
Dr Nan Chen thanked the kind support provided by CIGRE UK, especially CIGRE UK NGN and CIGRE UK Technical Committee in planning and establishing the university hub. He also announced that all individuals from the local community are welcome to join the hub and improve their professional expertise in power systems as well as career development acceleration.
The benefits that CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub can bring include:
- Local Support: Provide local support for all events held by the CIGRE UK and NGN including face-to-face event venue booking, online-event technical support, hybrid event coordination.
- Membership development: Local postgraduate students and early career researchers could be invited to the hub and potentially developed as NGN members after their participation in local CIGRE events. Experts could be developed as CIGRE Member.
- Reputation increase: The local hubs could build CIGRE UK and NGN reputations in local communities and institutions by delivering technical activities and providing networking opportunities.
- Education: Young professional training and professional development by collaborating and networking with senior CIGRE members.
- Innovation: Provide a platform for young professionals and experts to work on innovative topics and projects.
- Skill Improvements: Hub members can improve their soft skill like leadership and teamwork through supporting the local CIGRE events, lead interest groups, collaborate with colleagues.
To download the presentation click here: CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub – Introduction
Professor Xiao-Ping Zhang, who has more than 15 years of experience getting involved in CIGRE and will act the advisor of the CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub, gave a warm welcome to everyone and emphasised the motivation and benefits of the local university hub.
With the event’s theme of “How e-CIGRE Accelerates Research”, Mr Shuailong Dai, a local PhD student and a member of CIGRE UK NGN, gave the keynote speech with the title of “How to utilise e-CIGRE to support my research”. During his presentation, Shuailong introduced in detail how to find useful resources such as Technical Brouchures, Green Books, Electra, Paris Session Reports, etc. on e-CIGRE and gave an example to further demonstrate how the resources supported his PhD research work.
Besides, one of the benefits of joining CIGRE UK NGN – free to download CIGRE resources, is validated by presenting the fees of downloading a certain Technical Brouchure – € 300 for non-member while all of them are totally free for (student) members to download! Besides, all students can join CIGRE as a student member without any membership fee.
This step-by-step introduction and validation provided an insightful overview of the benefits provided by CIGRE to all in-person audience, and all attendees got well engaged in the presentation and were highly inspired with such a wonderful platform.
The presentation lasted for around 20 minutes, followed by a warm networking lunch with pizzas and drinks. Due to the time limit, the Q&A session was moved to the networking lunch. All attendees had relaxing chats with colleagues and senior CIGRE members about personal development as CIGRE UK NGN members and future career development.
To download the presentation click here: How to utilise e-CIGRE
Again, we thank all participants for attending our events, especially Prof. Xiao-Ping Zhang and Dr Zhongbei Tian from the Department of Electronic, Electrical and Systems Engineering, University of Birmingham, Dr Jianing Li, the Chair of CIGRE UK NGN, Dr Jiajie Luo, the Vice-Chair of CIGRE UK NGN, and all the local students and post-doctoral researchers. We also appreciate the University of Birmingham and CIGRE UK NGN for sponsoring this event.
For more details about this event and the presentation slides, please contact the CIGRE UK NGN team: https://cigre.org.uk/ngn/about-cigre-uk-ngn/ngn-team/
To join CIGRE UK NGN and/or CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub, please follow:
https://cigre.org.uk/ngn/join-ngn/
By Dr Nan Chen
Secretary & Treasurer, CIGRE UK NGN
Chair, CIGRE UK NGN UoB Hub
Academic Staff, School of Engineering, University of Birmingham