MEI ENERGY CONVERSATION - Data Centre Boom: Energy, Environment and Communities.

To be confirmed

Prof. Pierluigi Mancarella, Energy Systems Program Leader, Melbourne Energy Institute, Chair of Electrical Power Systems, Dept of Electrical and Electronic Engineering, Faculty of Engineering and IT

Pierluigi is an internationally recognised leader in power systems and the clean energy transition. He has pioneered new approaches to integrating electricity, gas, heat and hydrogen networks, helping shape the future of low-carbon energy systems worldwide. His research has influenced energy policy, market design and infrastructure planning across Australia, the UK and Europe, including major contributions to Australia’s landmark Finkel Review.

A/Prof. Leslie Martin, Associate Professor, Department of Economics, Faculty of Business and Economics, University of Melbourne

Leslie’s research lies at the intersection of environmental, energy, international development, and‬‭ industrial organisation. She is the lead investigator of MEDAL, the Melbourne Environmental Data Analytics Lab‬, that uses frontier data analytics and a network of industry and government partnerships to design effective economic policy for the decarbonisation of energy, transportation, and manufacturing and protection of forest and water systems.

Dr. Robert Ryan, Research Fellow in Atmospheric Composition Modelling, School of Geography, Earth and Atmospheric Sciences, Faculty of Science, University of Melbourne

Robert is a researcher in atmospheric chemistry. His areas of research interest include remote sensing of atmospheric gases and aerosols, using techniques such as DOAS and Lidar from ground and satellite-based platforms, and modelling atmospheric chemistry using tools such as WRF-Chem and GEOS-Chem.

Prof. Andrea Carson, Professor in Political Communication, Centre for Advanced Journalism, School of Culture and Communications, Faculty of Arts, University of Melbourne

Andrea's research crosses the humanities and social sciences with a focus on information quality and its impact on democracy. She is a trained political scientist and award-winning journalist with 15 years’ experience reporting for both commercial (the Age) and public media (the ABC, RRR) organisations. She applies quantitative and qualitative methods and has written extensively about journalism, digital media, the business of news, political communication, misinformation, election campaigns, and women in media and politics in dozens of scholarly articles, edited volumes, and books.

Prof. Richard Sandberg, Director, Melbourne Energy Institute, University of Melbourne

Prof. Sandberg is the Melbourne Energy Institute’s Director and Chair Professor of Computational Mechanics in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the University of Melbourne. His main interest is in high-fidelity simulation of turbulent flows in turbomachinery and aerospace applications in order to gain physical understanding of flow and noise mechanisms. He also uses the data to help assess and improve low-order models that can be employed in an industrial context, in particular by pursuing novel machine-learning approaches.