Session 4: Transforming the Heating and Cooling Sector

Fred Morse is the President of Morse Associates, Inc, a renewable energy consulting company formed in 1989. He is the former Senior Advisor of US Operations for Abengoa Solar, Inc. Dr. Morse was responsible for preparing the proposals for the 280 MW Solana and 280 MW Mojave Concentrating Solar Power (CSP) plants and for securing loan guarantees for those two projects. Dr. Morse first became involved in renewable energy issues in the late 1960s when he served as Executive Director of the White House Assessment of Solar Energy as a National Energy Resource. In his work at the US Department of Energy he played a significant role in defining and managing major solar energy R&D programs, including Solar Heating and Cooling, PV and CSP. Dr. Morse was the Chairman of the Western Governors’ Association Solar Task Force and is Chairman of the Utility-Scale Solar Power Division of the US Solar Energy Industries Association. Dr. Morse is a graduate of Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, received an M.S. in Nuclear Engineering from MIT and a PhD in Mechanical Engineering from Stanford University.

Maria Wall is associate professor at the Division of Energy and Building Design, Lund University, Sweden. She has a MSc in Architecture and a PhD in Engineering. Over the years, her research has included different issues related to energy-efficient buildings as well as solar energy strategies. She is presently leader of the research project IEA SHC Task 63 on Solar Neighborhood Planning (2019-2023), including both passive and active solar energy strategies. She was former leader of the IEA SHC Task 41 on Solar Energy and Architecture (2009-2012) that focused on active solar technologies for buildings, especially architectural aspects, and was then appointed as leader for the IEA SHC Task 51 on Solar Energy in Urban Planning (2013-2018).

She was the main initiator and developer, and is also the Director of the 2-year Master’s Programme in Energy-efficient and Environmental Building Design at Lund University. This programme is enrolling international students from different backgrounds, both in architecture and in engineering, since interdisciplinary teamwork is needed when designing sustainable buildings and neighborhoods.

Prof. Dr. Andreas Häberle is director of the Institute for Solar Technology SPF at the University of Applied Sciences HSR in Rapperswil, Switzerland. Dr. Häberle is a physicist from the Technical University of Munich and earned his PhD at the Fraunhofer Institute for Solar Energy Systems in Freiburg, Germany in the field of concentrating solar thermal collectors. In 1999 he co-founded the company PSE AG that offers various technologies and services for the solar sector.

The institute SPF has been a driving force in research and development of innovative energy technologies for more than 30 years, with focal areas in energy efficiency and renewable energies in general, as well as solar thermal and solar electrical energy in particular.

Steven Meyers served on the ISES Executive Committee from 2016 to 2019, heading the ISES infographics working group. Steve is a mechanical engineer with a PhD in Solar and Renewable Low Carbon Heating. Steve holds a global expertise in solar energy, energy efficiency and quantitative research and is the Vice President Of Engineering at Oishii.

Dr. Vassiliki Drosou is Head of the Solar Thermal Systems Department of the Greek Research Center for Renewable Energy Sources and Saving (CRES). She is also Manager of Solar Keymark Network (SKN), Technical Secretary of CEN TC312 "Thermal solar systems and components" and leader of Subtask D “Standardization and Certification” of the IEA Task 64/IV “Solar Process Heat”. She is also a Board Member of Greek Solar Thermal Industry Association (EBHE).

Qing tai Jiao (Professor-level senior engineer) is Vice President and Chief Engineer of Solareast holdings Co., Ltd.(China). He has nearly 20 years of experience in solar thermal utilization product development and technology research, with more than 30 invention patents. He is the Deputy Director of the National Solar Energy Standardization Technical Committee of China, and participated in the formulation of more than 30 national solar energy standards. He also leads Subtask B of the IEA-SHC Task55, Convenor of ISO TC180/WG3 and Gold Member of ISES.

Prof. Dr. Uli Jakob is director of Dr. Jakob energy research GmbH & Co. KG (JER) in Weinstadt, Germany. He holds a PhD in Applied Thermodynamics from De Montfort University Leicester, U.K. and a diploma degree in building physics from the Stuttgart University of Applied Sciences, Germany. Dr. Jakob has over twenty years of professional experience as an engineer and specialist for RES systems and energy-efficient buildings and industry processes. Prior to starting JER, he worked as a CTO/Director at the international system supplier SolarNext AG, Germany and as a general Manager/Scientific Assistant at the Forschungszentrum Nachhaltige Energietechnik (zafh.net) in Stuttgart, Germany. Since September 2012 Dr. Jakob is the General Manager of the Green Chiller Association for Sorption Cooling e.V. based in Berlin, Germany. In May 2020 he has received an Honorary Professorship from the Stuttgart University of Applied Sciences, Germany and in June 2020, he was appointed Operating Agent of the IEA SHC Task 65 on Solar Cooling for Sunbelt Regions (2020-2024).