Rafael Martinez Gordon

Bio

Country of origin: Spain
University: University of Groningen
Main supervisor: Professor André Faaij
Industry partners: Scottish Power Energy Networks (Scotland), Swedish Energy Agency (Sweden), Swedish Energy Agency (Sweden).

Project objective: expected results and contribution to society

Energy models have been widely used in the previous literature to discuss, analyze and compare energy systems, as well as for policy recommendations. According to most of these previous studies, during the 1970s and 1980s there was a high increase in the use and development of energy system modelling tools, specially to analyze and understand energy demand and supply interactions.

The North Sea has traditionally been a key player in terms of oil and gas extraction and today around 300 fields, 500 platforms and 10000 km of pipelines can be found. In the future, and as a consequence of policies to cut greenhouse gas emissions, such as the Paris Agreement or the European Commission policies, large deployments of offshore renewable energy sources are expected. My project aims to explore this future interaction between old oil and gas infrastructure and these new deployments.

Together with key partners of my project I will develop optimization models including different energy sectors, such as electricity, heat or transport. The output of these models will help to understand which technologies are cost-effective, what investments in offshore sources are required, and when and where these investments should take place.

I firmly believe that working in ENSYSTRA is a great opportunity, because it permits that technical sciences, social sciences and humanities work together, and this interaction between different points of view will for sure help to add value to the 15 PhDs and to understand the energy transition from different perspectives.