October 8, 2024
A consortium of 11 industrial and academic partners spanning from Scandinavia to Italy was granted by European Commission to investigate and testing solutions for the storage of electricity in connection with existing hydropower. This will support the production from increasing renewable resources (i.e., solar and wind) which cannot be tuned towards energy consumption.
The novel solutions for granted project, namely Store2Hydro, are based on (i) retrofittable pump turbine technology which is typically used in reservoir to reservoir layout and (ii) knowledge based digital twins including hydraulic and sediment dynamics for pumped-storage in river-to-river layout.
Particularly, a PhD position is foreseen to contribute on hydraulic-sediment tasks. These tasks area aimed at optimizing sediment management in hydropower layouts. To this objective the PhD will collaborate in developing the basis for the building of generic digital twins which will include the simulation of pump-turbine technology effects on sedimentation at different scales and its validation.
The Civil, Chemical, Environmental and Materials Engineering of University of Bologna, DICAM - UNIBO will open a PhD research fellowship position for a three-year period, starting form November 2024,affiliated to the Hydraulic/Fluid Mechanics group with emphasis on sediment dynamics in rivers. The official call for applicants will be soon available under “University of Bologna PhD programmes” at the following webpage here.
The successful PhD candidate is expected to work under the co-supervision of prof. Nils Ruther from Technical University of Munich where he/she will spend a 6 months internship specifically focusing on CFD approaches to sediment dynamics in rivers.
The candidate will participate in several tasks namely the hydraulic modelling of case studies spanning European hydropower fleet and the calibration of mathematical tools aimed at sediment dynamics modelling. The candidate will be also involved in the development and testing of a physical model which will validate represented sediment dynamics. This position involves a strong component of laboratory/experimental work to be carried out at the Hydraulic Engineering Laboratory – LIDR of UNIBO .
The candidates for this position must have a Master’s degree in Civil and/or Environmental Engineering with a focus on hydraulic engineering. Other similar and relevant backgrounds will also be considered.
A strong background in river hydraulics and sediment transport is important, but not mandatory. Knowledge of hydraulic laboratory techniques and instrumentation, numerical modelling and data analysis is an asset.
Availability to travel and a good knowledge of English are required.
For further information, please contact: Professor Massimo Guerrero, DICAM-UNIBO, massimo.guerrero@unibo.it
