Advanced undergraduate and graduate students, PhD students
The oil crises of the 1970s provoked debates about the finite limits of energy resources and triggered increases in energy efficiency and innovations in the production of alternative fuels / renewable energy technologies. There is an effort to produce more low-carbon energy technologies. In many cases, the new developments in low-carbon energy technologies are decentralised due to their positive socio-economic and ecological impacts.
Yet despite these developments, the following decades saw rather energy consumption increase dramatically – first in the Global North and later in the Global South. For all that, electric power is still scarce and electricity supply is unreliable in many developing countries such as India, Indonesia and most African states, particularly in territorially remote locations.
If these countries increase their use of fossil fuels to meet the rising energy demands of their growing populations, while established major emitters fail to reduce their emissions dramatically, atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gases will lead to unmanageable global warming.
Since 1992, the international community has negotiated successive agreements that aim to considerably reduce greenhouse gas emissions to net zero levels in the second part of this century.
These agreements assume an intensifying effort to replace fossil fuels (or reduce their consumption) by using renewable energy sources and drive significant improvements in the energy efficiency of industries, transport and cities. However, the need for rapid emission reductions goes well beyond what a transition to non-carbon-based fuels can provide – raising questions about geo-engineering and other potential technologies and their impacts.
The need for rapid emissions cuts, alongside growing global demand for (renewable) energy, raise critical questions about the technological potential and socio-economic and political implications of various technologies and approaches.
Driven also by the political demands, scientists at universities and research institutes as well as in the industrial sector are working on novel energy conversion and storage systems, around the world. This is urgently required for a secure and affordable supply of environmentally-friendly energy. As future energy systems will be diverse, a broad knowledge of different conversion and storage applications is needed. Therefore, we will cover fundamental knowledge and specific case studies as well as possible solutions for novel energy systems from an engineering point of view. The development of flexible decentralised smart energy systems and the hybridisation of renewable energy systems will be presented during this summer school course. These topics are widely discussed in the energy strategic planning on European and international level in order to end up with efficient systems with a minimal environmental impact and reduced CO2 footprints.
For more detailed information on the course content and lecturers, please visit our website.
A very good command of the English language (preferably level B2) is a requirement for your participation in the course. Please provide proof of your language level by submitting a language certificate (e.g., TOEFL, IELTS, Cambridge) with your application.
Please submit your application and supporting documents (CV, motivation letter, enrolment certificate and proof of language proficiency) via our website:
http://www.summerschool.uni-bayreuth.de/
Please contact us by e-mail if you have any questions regarding the application procedure.
Included in the programme fee:
Examples of our events and social programme:
Language course/short course
