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David Parra

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M. David Parra

Senior researcher and teaching fellow

+41 22 379 02 84
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Dr. David Parra was appointed in August 2016 as senior researcher and teaching assistant (maître-assistant) at the Chair for Energy efficiency within the Institute for Environmental Sciences (ISE)/ Department F.-A. Forel of University of Geneva. Dr. Parra evaluates the role of energy technologies in the context of the energy transition at the Swiss and international level. Renewable energy and energy storage technologies have been his main research focus so far. He builds models to provide optimum solutions for techno-economic and environmental targets. In particular, he analyses how the deployment of renewable energy and energy storage technologies can be accelerated by the provision of several system benefits while creating positive economic revenues for different stakeholders (benefit stacking). Energy efficiency in the built environment together with renewable energy in district heating and cooling are also part of his current research portfolio. His research is embedded in the activities of the Swiss Competence Center for Energy Research (SCCER) on Heat and Electricity Storage (http://www.sccer-hae.ch/) and in the Swiss Competence Centre for Research in Energy, Society and Transition (http://www.sccer-crest.ch/), funded by the Commission for Technology Innovation CTI. David Parra’s research is interdisciplinary in nature and draws from engineering, economic and environmental sciences. For the master program MUSE (http://www.unige.ch/muse/), he teaches and coordinates several energy related modules such as Enjeux and Research methods. He also guides several Ph.D. and master students.

Before joining University of Geneva he prepared his Ph.D. thesis at University of Nottingham (2010-2014) on optimum community energy storage for end user applications (including PV and demand load management) in a project funded by E.ON and the European Commission. He also taught both master and undergraduate students in the Renewable Energy Technologies Lab and in the Creative Energy homes Lab. From 2008-2010, he was a research engineer at the Heat pump and solar energy laboratory of the Spanish Research Council in Madrid (Spain) where he worked on solar heating and cooling including experimental tests in the context of the INVISO project (Industrialization of Sustainable Housing). In 2009, he earned his M.Sc. in Thermal and Fluids Engineering (with best student award) from Universidad Carlos III of Madrid (Spain) and in 2007 his B.Sc. degree in Energy Engineering from the same university.


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