PhD in Electrical and Electronic Engineering: Advanced Protection Strategies for Low Voltage Networks with High Penetration of Power Electronic Devices (Prot-LVNet)

Award Summary

100% fees covered, and a minimum tax-free annual living allowance of £20,835 (2025/26 UKRI rate).

Overview

The Award

This PhD project is a partnership between Scottish Power and Newcastle University through the Industrial Doctoral Landscape Award (IDLA). The project runs alongside the £8m D-Suite Beta Strategic Innovation Fund project. As an IDLA PhD student, you will be offered the opportunity to undertake a placement within Scottish Power as part of your program.

The project

Power Electronic Devices (PEDs) have been proposed as a new approach to increase the uptake of low-carbon technologies (such as electric vehicles and heat pumps) in Low Voltage (LV) networks. PEDs include Soft Open Points, Static Compensators (STATCOMs), and Smart Transformers (STs), which have been trialled and show significant promise in addressing network congestion. However, these PEDs substantially increase the complexity of protection of LV networks, with major issues of voltage/current waveform distortion and reduced fault level necessitating an increase in coordination in the protection scheme.

This PhD project seeks to address these challenges through comprehensive electromagnetic transient (EMT)-type computer simulations by developing fundamentally innovative and advanced protection strategies. To enhance the reliability and safety of low-voltage networks with a high penetration of power-electronic devices, the research will integrate established classical protection schemes with data-driven methods, including artificial intelligence and machine learning. The proposed protection strategies are expected to exhibit the following key attributes: (a) security, (b) reliability, (c) selectivity, (d) speed, and (e) robustness.

10086622 | ENA Innovation Portal

Number Of Awards

1

Start Date

October 2026

Award Duration

4 years

Application Closing Date

28th February 2026

Sponsor

UKRI/EPSRC and Scottish Power Energy Networks (SPEN)

Supervisors

Professor Vladimir Terzija

Dr Matthew Deakin

Eligibility Criteria

The award is available to UK and international applicants. You should have, or expect to achieve, at least a 2:1 Honours degree, or international equivalent, in Electrical Engineering or closely related discipline. If English is not your first language, you must have IELTS 6.5 overall (with a minimum of 5.5 in all sub-skills)

International applicants may require an ATAS (Academic Technology Approval Scheme) clearance certificate prior to obtaining their visa and to study on this programme. 

How To Apply

You must apply through the University’s Apply to Newcastle Portal 

Once registered select ‘Create a Postgraduate Application’.  

Use ‘Course Search’ to identify your programme of study:  

• search for the ‘Course Title’ using the programme code: 8060F
• Research Area: Electrical and Electronic Engineering 
• select ‘PhD Electrical and Electronic Engineering (full time)’ as the programme of study 

You will then need to provide the following information in the ‘Further Details’ section:  

• a ‘Personal Statement’ (this is a mandatory field) - upload a document or write a statement directly in to the application form
• the studentship code ENG161 in the ‘Studentship/Partnership Reference’ field.  
• when prompted for how you are providing your research proposal - select ‘Write Proposal’. You should then type in the title of the research project from this advert. You do not need to upload a research proposal.  

Contact Details

matthew.deakin@newcastle.ac.uk

vladimir.terzija@newcastle.ac.uk

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