Research Associate - FEVER

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Overview

The Management School offers a 1-year interdisciplinary post-doctoral position within the FEVER - EPSRC project “Future Electric Vehicle Energy networks supporting Renewables” (FEVER). You will join a wider cross-university project team of leading academics to address key research challenges for renewable generation and energy storage with respect to supporting the transition to electric vehicles and increasing the penetration of electric vehicle fleet charging systems throughout the UK. This grant aims to develop a novel hybrid Off-Vehicle-Energy-Storage solution and design methodology to deliver grid independent (i.e. off-grid) EV charging stations. A hybrid energy store is necessary to address both the temporal (i.e. seasonal), performance (i.e. power vs energy characteristic) and cost issues of this concept, as lithium-ion battery technology on its own cannot enable this vision (too expensive to provide seasonal storage).

The post is on a large, EPSRC funded programme grant and involves working with several other universities, and several industry partners across an interdisciplinary spectrum consisting Social Sciences and Engineering. Thus, we need a forward thinking, imaginative person, who is capable of significantly contributing to work package 5 on smart grids and electric vehicle fleets to deliver the objectives. The project will contribute directly to the decrease in costs associated with, and the grid impact of, the installation of EV fleet charging points, and will therefore impact on the mitigation of climate change and ambitions towards NetZero transport in the UK.

This post aims to support this development through the investigation of commercial EV fleet users and their charging requirements, considering different types of commercial EV fleets and feasibility scoping study reporting, alongside real-world application data analysis from live demonstrator case studies.

Main Duties And Responsibilities

• Undertake research of the interaction between commercial EV fleet energy requirements and energy generation/ storage systems being commissioned at the demonstrator sites.
• Analyse and record data from fleet users and charging station demonstrators to produce useful findings for funders, academics, policy makers and practitioners.
• Write supporting documents (reports, journal and conference publications etc.) to contribute to and support the work of Work Package 5 deliverables, for example, project reports, deliverables and academic outputs.
• Carry out administrative roles related to Work Package 5 project activities, as required.
• Participate in regular project meetings with internal and external project partners.
• Prepare and support the delivery of papers for journals / presentations either in-house or at national/international conferences / seminars / workshops / events to disseminate research findings.
• Maintain a systematic record of academic outcomes.
• Plan own research schedule and workload (in consultation with line manager) to ensure that Work Package 5 deliverables and research objectives are met.
• You will make a full and active contribution to the principles of the ‘Sheffield Academic’. These include the achievement of excellence in applied teaching and research, and scholarly pursuits to make a genuine difference in the subject area and to the University’s achievements as a whole.
• As a member of staff you will be encouraged to make ethical decisions in your role, embedding the University sustainability strategy into your working activities wherever possible.
• Carry out other duties, commensurate with the grade and remit of the post