Past events

Loughborough University RT040

The session will feature two excellent talks from recent ERBE graduates: Dr George Dawes (Distributed Flexibility Policy Lead, NESO) and Dr Jaydeep Bhadra (Domestic Sector Technical Manager, CIBSE), both of whom completed their PhDs at School of ABCE, Loughborough University in 2025. They will reflect on their PhD journeys, key research findings, viva experiences, and transitions into their current roles.

Who can attend: ERBE students and supervisors to attend as well as other invitees, in person, as there will be a networking session with refreshments following the talks.

Remote attendance is possible. Please email the ERBE inbox for the link.

Agenda

13:30 – Coffee and Welcome

13:50 – Introduction

14:00 – 14:45 – Dr George Dawes: “Flexibility Transitions: from Single Buildings to the GB Energy System” 

Thesis title: Exploring the thermal demand response potential of English households using electric heating systems

(30–35 min talk + 10 min Q&A)

14:45 – 15:00 – Break with refreshments (Atrium, School of ABCE)

15:00 – 15:45 – Dr Jaydeep Bhadra: “From PhD to Profession: Finding My Path”

Thesis title: Evaluating the potential of cooling beds for sleep thermal comfort and sleep quality in overheated UK bedroom conditions

(30–35 min talk + 10 min Q&A)

16:00 – 17:30 – Food & Networking (Atrium, School of ABCE)

Join us for the ERBE Annual Colloquium on 5 Nov 2025 at The Building Centre! This free attendance and in-person event is a fantastic opportunity to network, learn, and engage with the latest research in the field of Energy Resilience and the Built Environment. Whether you’re a seasoned professional or just starting out, this colloquium is sure to inspire and educate.

Online registrations have closed and the Colloquium is full.
If you wish to attend please email us, in case of cancellations.

Access the online conference programme and booklet here.

What is the Colloquium?
The annual Colloquium is a whole-day event where our PhD students, academic supervisors, industry partners, and stakeholders come together to hear about and discuss the latest findings in research at the interface of energy and the built environment, to share knowledge and network.

The event is fully catered with breakfast, lunch, and refreshments, followed by drinks and canapés in the evening. You are welcome to attend only part of the day, let us know if that is the case.

PROGRAMME – 5 November 2025 – The Building Centre
Keynote speakers are the former Directors of our LoLo and ERBE Centres for Doctoral Training: Prof Kevin Lomas (Loughborough University) and Prof Robert Lowe (UCL).

10:00 – 10:30   Registration and breakfast refreshments

10:30 – 10:50   Opening address and highlights – Prof. Cliff Elwell (UCL) and Prof Brian Ó Gallachóir (MaREI)

10:50 – 11:35   Final year student presentations: Session 1 – Healthy Indoor Environments and a Just Transition

Presenters and titles – Session 1

• Maha Sohail: Development of a building design process for improving the thermal resilience of non-domestic buildings using ventilative cooling solutions
• Hooman Azad: Application of grey box modelling in a Passivhaus office building in the UK to predict indoor temperature during a heatwave
• Sapna Halai: Future cooling scenarios for UK homes

11:35 – 11:45    Coffee break

11:45– 12:15    Poster Session 1 – Healthy Indoor Environments and a Just Transition

12:15 – 13:00    Final year student presentations: Session 2 – New Methods and Models for Decarbonisation

Presenters and titles – Session 2

• Will Markiewicz: The impact of live data streams in digital twins
• Shyam Amrith: Optimising the performance of the building stock
• Marios Kordilas: Carbon and impacts beyond carbon of buildings’ Life Cycle Assessment in light of evolving electricity mixes and climate change

13:00 – 14:00   LUNCH

14:00 – 14:30   Poster Session 2 – New Methods and Models for Decarbonisation

14:35– 15:20    Final year student presentations: Session 3 – Flexibility and energy resilience

Presenters and titles – Session 3

• Jordan Townsend: The physical understanding of space heating flexibility
• Megan Rush: Assessing the Impact of Residential Electrification on UK LV Networks
• Eva Elali: The digital characterisation of the building stock: automatic façade analysis

15:20 – 15:30   Comfort Break

15:30 – 16:00   Poster Session 3 – Flexibility and energy resilience

16:00 Closing remarks and introduction to keynote speakers

16:05 – 17:05   Keynote speakers: Prof Kevin Lomas and Prof Robert Lowe

17:05    End of conference and thank you – Prof David Allinson (Loughborough University)

17:10 – 18:55   Networking, drinks and food – upstairs gallery

ERBE and CIBSE Young Energy Performance Group

Attend the 7th ERBE x CIBSE YEPG Seminar.

Full list of speakers to be confirmed soon.

ERBE and CIBSE Young Energy Performance Group

Attend the 6th ERBE x CIBSE YEPG Seminar.

The event features four presentations on thermal comfort metrics, models, and measurement. Speakers bring a wide range of expertise from different disciplines and countries.
◾ Dr. Arash Beizaee, a senior lecturer in building energy at Loughborough University focusing on multi-disciplinary research surrounding energy demand reduction, and health and wellbeing in the built environment.
◾ Dr. Simon Hodder, a chartered ergonomist with over 25 years academic and industrial research experience gained from conducting wide variety ergonomics and human factors studies.
◾ Dr. Francesco Babich, a senior researcher at Eurac Research specialising in numerical modelling and experimental research for indoor environmental quality (IEQ).
◾ Shanti Srinivas, a doctoral researcher in the ERBE CDT utilising hygrothermal modelling to evaluate the potential of passive thermal comfort improvement.

ERBE and CIBSE Young Energy Performance Group

The YEPG x ERBE seminar series continues with its fifth event, spotlighting low-cost cooling solutions and featuring insights from 7 expert presenters: Andrew Simmonds, Ben Roberts, Toby Cambray, Tim Hulse, Huda Elsherif, Ben Shirley, from across the AECB, UCL, and Loughborough University.

🔗 Register here!

This engaging seminar series fosters discussions about energy resilience in buildings, exploring topics like:

• Energy efficiency measures
• Energy demand reduction
• Load shifting and energy storage
• Building-integrated generation

Our mission is to inspire and educate the next generation of engineers, exposing young professionals to cutting-edge ideas in building services and building energy. These presentations and discussions provide a platform to deepen your understanding and spark passion for sustainable solutions.

🗓 Date: Wednesday 29th Jan, 2025
🕒 Time: 14:30 – 16:30 GMT
📍 Location: RT037, Sir Frank Gibb Building, Loughborough University
📍Online: Microsoft teams meeting through Eventbrite linked

MaREI are delighted to welcome ERBE students to UCC for the 2024 ERBE Summer School

Outline of Workshop Sessions
The aim is to produce a paper provisionally entitled “Methodological challenges in research on energy resilience of the built environment.” This paper will review the relevant literature to determine key issues that need to be considered to ensure methodologies used are fit-for-purpose. Examples could include tacit assumptions, inadequate generalizability, data inconsistency and confirmation bias. The paper will be co-authored by all contributing workshop participants.

Objectives

• Draft the paper’s scope and outline
• Begin to populate each section
• Assign tasks for completion of the paper

PROGRAMME

Monday 24 June 2024

9AM – 12PM Session 1: The overall plan for task will be described. Participants will identify (on post-it notes) methodological challenges in research on energy resilience of the built environment. They will display these on boards. After a discussion an initial grouping (based on common facets) of the challenges displayed will be made. The participants will be divided into initial teams. Each of these will examine grouping(s) presented in more detail.

12PM – 2PM Lunch and UCC Buildings Tour

2PM – 4PM Session 2: Via PowerPoint presentations each initial team will report on their assignment from session 1. Discussion will identify further questions, gaps, inconsistencies. The groupings will now become the key sections of the ultimate paper. These will be addressed by “new” teams formed from the participants. The new teams will be asked to seek out literature that discuss/address the issues identified.

4PM – 7 PM Transfer to Beaufort Building, LIR Tour & Dinner

Tuesday 25 June 2024

9AM – 12 PM Session 3: The new teams will each report on the literature they have found, further gaps identified and what they have concluded. After discussion and debate, post workshop tasks will be assigned, and timelines agreed.

12PM – 2PM Lunch/Present Paper

2PM – 4PM Session 4 & Advisory Board Meeting

4PM – 5PM Discussion (optional)

11th Annual Student-Led Conference
Theme: ‘how models can inform policy making for the energy transition’
Keynote speakers: Dr Erica Thomson (UCL) and Adam Bell (Stonehaven)

The registration and call for abstracts is now open
This year, the conference will be hosted in-person by Loughborough University on the 17th April 2024.

Abstract and Poster intent Deadline: 15th March 2024
Registration Deadline: 3rd April 2024