Last Thursday on the 9th of March, Professor Vassilios Agelidis gave his inaugural lecture “Affordable, Reliable and Sustainable Energy Systems for a Digital Society” as he was welcomed by colleagues and friends as a Professor at Center for Electric Power and Energy, DTU Electrical Engineering.
Professor Vassilios Agelidis has been with DTU Electrical Engineering since October last year and has since then taken on several projects and has also recently been appointed Group Leader of the Electric Power Components Research Group.
Vassilios began his talk by welcoming people to the lecture and by underling how much he has enjoyed coming to Denmark, and how trilled he is to work with sweet and talented colleagues in an elite university with amazing research facilities. This, he did in Danish – which is very impressive since he has only been in the country for 5 months.
In his lecture, Vassilios Agelidis pinpointed electrification as the greatest engineering achievement of the 20th century. He argued this from the understanding that electricity and energy infrastructure underpins all economic, social and industrial activities, secures quality of life, and improves health and life expectancy. Although our world has moved fast the last 30 years, Professor Agelidis stressed the point that even though wind turbines were only for dreamers 30 years ago, still, 16 pct. of the global population did not have access to electricity in 2016.
“Intelligence is not information. Intelligence is making decisions based on information,” Professor Agelidis says, referring to the fact that electrical engineering should reach higher. He thinks that electrical engineers should work on making the same evolvement in the electricity grid that companies have made in the development of the mobile phone. Where not only have they made it modular, which makes it easier to replace individual components, but also, they have made it multi-functional and given it a multi-purpose by bringing together computer, camera and telephony. In the same way, electrical components that support the grid should be thought to feature multiple functions. Now is the time for multi-energy system thinking he explains.
The lecture was followed by a reception, where head of Center for Electric Power and Energy, Professor Jacob Østergaard, welcomed Professor Vassilios Agelidis at the center, and wished him the best of luck in future projects.
Vassilios is currently working with his new colleagues at DTU and industry members on researching electrical system equipment technologies to become more intelligent to enhancing the flexibility of the electricity distribution grids.
Vassilios Agelidis receives flowers from Head of Department, Kristian Stubkjær, after an inspiring lecture.