Carnegie Mellon University

Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center

Carnegie Mellon University's College of Engineering and Tepper School of Business

Research Group

Current Members

Hüseyin BahtiyarHüseyin Bahtiyar is a Ph.D. candidate in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. He received his M.S. in industrial and systems engineering from University of Florida. In addition, he holds B.S. degrees in industrial engineering and computer engineering from Selçuk Üniversitesi and a B.A. in business administration from Anadolu Üniversitesi. He is working currently on a highly resolved modeling approach to estimating vehicle and electrical-appliance adoption. His research interests include renewable-energy integration, electricity markets, optimization, and data mining.
Xander BardXander Bard is a B.S. student in industrial and systems engineering at The Ohio State University. He will be continuing this, with a focus in operations research, for his M.S. during autumn 2023. Xander's current research is a techno-economic comparison between photovoltaic and concentrating-thermal solar power as an extended-duration peaking resource. His research interests include applications of optimization theory to electricity systems, electricity markets and policy, and renewable-energy modeling, optimization, and integration.
Weiying GuWeiying Gu is a Ph.D. student in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. She received her M.S in electrical and computer engineering from The Ohio State University in 2020. Her research focuses on power markets, optimization, and renewable energy. She has two adorable cats and loves traveling and cooking.
Yunjing GuoYunjing Guo is a Ph.D. student in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. He received a B.A. in electrical engineering and automation from China Agricultural University and an M.S. in electrical and computer engineering from The Ohio State University. His research interests are in the optimization of electricity systems and interactions beween water and electricity systems. He likes drama, music, and photography and is learning boxing.
Yuzhou JiangYuzhou Jiang is a Ph.D. student in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. He received an M.S. in operations research and supply chain management from Case Western Reserve University and a B.S. in economics from Beijing Institute of Technology. His research focuses on modeling and analysis of energy storage, decomposition techniques for solving bi-level problems, and game theory. His research interests include energy storage, optimization, and game theory. He likes traveling and spending time with his strictly indoor cat—sadly he cannot do both simultaneously.
Hyeong Jun KimHyeong Jun Kim is a Ph.D. candidate in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. He received an M.S. in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University during December, 2016 and a B.S. in industrial engineering from Hanyang University, South Korea. He is working currently on operational models of energy storage providing frequency regulation. His research interests include optimization, energy storage, resource-adequacy analysis, energy markets, and game theory. He enjoys traveling and playing squash.
Liping LiLiping Li is a Ph.D. candidate in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. She received a Ph.D in electrical engineering from Chongqing University. She is working currently on energy-storage modeling. Her research interests include energy economics, optimization, energy storage, energy-market design and modeling, and decision science. She enjoys cooking, hiking, gardening and playing with her toddler son.
Ramteen SioshansiRamteen Sioshansi is a professor in Department of Engineering and Public Policy and Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering and the director of Carnegie Mellon Electricity Industry Center at Carnegie Mellon University. He is also an adjunct professor in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. Prior to joining Carnegie Mellon University, he was a professor in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering and Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering, founding director of the EmPOWERment National Science Foundation (NSF) Research Traineeship (NRT) Program, and an associate fellow in the Center for Automotive Research at The Ohio State University. He has earned degrees from University of California, Berkeley and London School of Economics and Political Economics. His Ph.D. in industrial engineering and operations research focused on the design and analysis of restructured wholesale electricity markets. A brief stint as a postdoctoral research fellow at National Renewable Energy Laboratory resulted in a career detour, since he focuses now on analyzing techno-economic impacts of decarbonizing energy systems. This includes the use of renewables, energy storage, and electromobility. He enjoys dabbling in electricity market design and policy, especially as they pertain to decarbonization. He is an IEEE Fellow and served three two-year terms on the Electricity Advisory Committee, a federal advisory committee to U.S. Secretary of Energy, and chaired its Energy Storage (Technologies) Subcommittee.
Yumo ZhangYumo Zhang is a Ph.D. student in Department of Integrated Systems Engineering at The Ohio State University. He holds an M.S. in Environmental Management and Economics from Johns Hopkins University and an M.S. in Mining Engineering from University of Kentucky. Out of an interest in renewable energy he took a career detour from once being an engineer in the fossil-fuel industry. His current research interests lie in the design and analysis of restructured wholesale electricity market with high-penetration of renewable energy, with a focus on reserve markets and flexibility products. He is enthusiastic about analyzing and hopefully solving problems that arise from the energy transition towards sustainability.

Gone, But Not Forgotten

Josué Barrera SantanaJosué Barrera Santana worked in the group as a visiting Ph.D. student at The Ohio State University during 2019 and earned his Ph.D. from Universidad de La Laguna during 2022. He holds also a B.E. in naval radioelectronics and an M.S. in renewable energy, both from the same university. In addition, he holds an M.S. in big data and business intelligence from Spanish School of Industrial Organization and other professional certifications, such as innovation consultant, research-project manager, and data scientist. His academic interests include developing and applying optimization, simulation, statistics, and machine-learning techniques to address challenges in the areas of renewable-energy development, energy storage, electric vehicles, energy consumption, and long-term energy planning. His Ph.D. work focused on the development of an optimization framework to provide capacity- and transmission-expansion models for island power systems. He is currently a research scientist and energy planner at Canary Islands Institute of Technology
Shubhrajit BhattacharjeeShubhrajit Bhattacharjee received his Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from University of Calgary and is a former visiting scholar in the research group. He received also an M.Sc. degree in electrical engineering from University of Calgary, with a focus on radio-frequency-distortion mitigation and a B.E degree in electronics and telecommunication from University of Pune, India. His research interests include the integration of hybrid energy storage resources and applications of statistical learning and optimization to operations and planning of grid-scale resources. He is working currently as an energy market engineer at New York Independent System Operator, where he develops prototypes for new market solutions and manages synchrophasor technology and its applications. Shubhrajit enjoys traveling, tasting different cuisines, and can play tabla (hand drums) if so required.
Benjamin ChaikenBenjamin Chaiken received his Ph.D. in operations research from The Ohio State University during 2021. He holds a B.A. in economics, with a minor in philosophy, from University of Chicago. His research interests are in mechanism design and market analysis, game theory, and combinatorial optimization. He is a classical guitarist and enjoys (among other things) hiking, playing tennis, science fiction, and the philosophy of Soren Kierkegaard. He is currently a member of the research group at Parametric in Seattle, Washington, where he works on portfolio-optimization algorithms.
Joseph E. Duggan, Jr.Joseph E. Duggan, Jr. earned a Ph.D. in economics from The Ohio State University during 2018. He holds also a B.A. in economics and mathematics from Boston College and an M.S. in operations research and an M.A. in economics from The Ohio State University. His research interests focus on market design and regulation, industrial organization, applied game theory, and energy economics. His current work explores the social-welfare implications of policies that are designed to incentivize the adoption of carbon-sequestration technologies. In addition, he is studying how the presence of renewable generation impacts equilibrium behavior in wholesale electricity markets. He originally hails from New England and styles himself an armchair cryptozoologist. He is currently an assistant professor of economics at University of Dayton as well as a sustainability scholar at University of Dayton's Hanley Sustainability Institute.
Michelle FischerMichelle Fischer earned her M.S. and B.S. in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University. While completing her M.S., she studied the impact of vertical integration on natural-gas and electricity markets. She works currently as an engineer at General Mills making fruit snacks. When she has free time, Michelle enjoys hiking, playing disc golf, knitting, and making pottery.
Xiaoli Liu Xiaoli Liu earned her M.S. and B.S. in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University. She works currently as a senior technical program manager at Amazon Web Services.
Yixian LiuYixian Liu worked in the group from 2012 to 2016 and earned a Ph.D. from The Ohio State University in industrial and systems engineering during 2016. She has also a B.E. in logistics engineering from Tianjin University and an M.S. in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University. Her academic interests include forecasting, optimization, decision science, and game theory. She enjoyed her Ph.D. work by focusing on weather forecasting, electricity capacity investment, and pricing. She also has a love of traveling, drawing, and food.
Seyed Hossein MadaeniSeyed Hossein Madaeni earned a Ph.D. while working in the group at The Ohio State University. He holds also B.S. and M.S. degrees in electrical engineering from University of Tehran. After graduating, he worked in Short Term Electric Supply and Market Design and Integration Departments at Pacific Gas and Electric Company and in Grid Engineering Solutions at SolarCity. Thereafter, he worked in Grid Services at Tesla Energy, providing technical oversight for several groundbreaking wholesale-market-facing software applications. Next, he joined AMS, eventually becoming chief executive officer of AMS and pioneering a wholesale-market-bidding-software business model that led to AMS's acquisition by Fluence. Following the acquistion, be became chief digital officer of Fluence, where he played a central role in the company's successful $5B+ IPO, overseeing its digital offers. Following his departure from Fluence, Seyed co-founded and became chief executive officer of Verse, Inc., a software-as-a-service start-up that empowers organizations to define and achieve their sustainability goals. With electricity contributing to a third of global greenhouse gas emissions, Seyed recognized the urgent need for companies to procure clean power. Yet, despite the corporate imperative, buying clean energy remains a complex process requiring specialized expertise and tools. Verse, Inc. addresses this challenge by offering cutting-edge software solutions that simplify clean energy procurement for businesses of all sizes.
Mahan MansouriMahan Mansouri earned his Ph.D. in industrial and systems engineering with a focus in operations research from The Ohio State University. As part of his Ph.D. he applied mathematical modeling and optimization techniques to analyze reliability and operations of electricity systems and markets as they transition to high penetrations of renewable energy. His area of expertise is in electricity-market design and mechanisms, demand management for ancillary services, generation-fleet optimization, and economic impacts of emerging technologies on electricity systems. Mansouri is currently an energy-market analyst with Short Term Electric Supply and Market Design and Integration Departments at Pacific Gas and Electric Company. In this role he is responsible for analyzing market trends, developing pricing strategies, and managing risks that are associated with energy trading.
Danielle MoreyDanielle Morey is a graduate of The Ohio State University. During her time earning her B.S. in industrial and systems engineering, she worked as an undergraduate researcher, exploring the effects of vertical integration on natural gas and electricity markets. She is now in Seattle earning her Ph.D. at University of Washington with a research focus in network topology optimization and global optimization. Outside of academics, Danielle is highly involved in competitive ballroom dancing.
Sushant VargheseSushant Varghese worked in the group at The Ohio State University as an undergraduate research intern during the summer of 2018. He is currently a Ph.D. student in Department of Industrial and Manufacturing Engineering at The Pennsylvania State University. He has a B.Tech. in industrial engineering with a minor in economics from National Institute of Technology, Tiruchirappalli, India. His current research focuses on the value of flexibility in electricity markets. His broader research interests are in applied operations research, specifically with applications to optimization of power systems and networks under uncertainty. He is going broke slowly thanks to his passion for cars.
Fei WuFei Wu worked in the group at The Ohio State University starting during 2013, and earned his Ph.D. during 2016. Fei's dissertation focuses on the design of charging networks for plug-in electric vehicles and charging-control strategies for electric vehicles. Since graduating, he has been working in the fields of supply-chain and logistics optimization. He has worked as a research scientist at LLamasoft, then at Cainiao Network, and currently at Coupang. His work includes applying optimization techniques to enhance the overall efficiency of the e-commerce fulfillment process at all stages from order placement to final delivery of goods.
Xiaomin "josh" Xi Xiaomin "Josh" Xi worked in the group at The Ohio State University as a Ph.D. student and as a postdoctoral researcher. He holds a B.E. in industrial engineering and logistics management from Shanghai Jiao Tong University. After working as a postdoctoral researcher, he worked as a research scientist in Operations Research Lab at General Motors R&D Center. He is currently a research scientist at Lyft. His research interests include developing and applying optimization, simulation, statistics, and machine-learning techniques to address challenges in the areas of transportation, urban mobility, and energy. During his leisure time, Josh enjoys traveling, hiking, outdoor adventures, and volleyball.
Kenjiro YagiKenjiro Yagi earned a Ph.D. in industrial and systems engineering from The Ohio State University during 2020. He received a B.Eng. and an M.Eng. from Tohoku University, Japan. He holds also a professional (mechanical) engineer certificate from Japan's government. His Ph.D. work focused on operational modeling of electricity-generation systems with energy storage, electricity-market modeling, and solving large-scale power-system-expansion problems using decomposition techniques. He is working currently at Tokushu Tokai Paper, trying to optimize energy use within the industrial sector by applying methods that he learned in the group.
Bining ZhaoBining Zhao worked in the group between 2015 and 2018 and earned a Ph.D. in electrical and computer engineering from The Ohio State University in 2018. In addition, she holds a B.E. in electrical engineering from North China Electric Power University and an M.S. in electrical and computer engineering from The Ohio State University. Her doctoral dissertation focuses on the operation and expansion planning of integrated electric-power and natural-gas systems. Her academic interests include energy-system analysis, electricity-market modeling, optimization, and game theory. She has a love of reading, playing the piano, and food. She is working currently as a senior application engineer at Hitachi Energy.