Themes

Monash University is a global leader in energy research

We aim to showcase the breadth of capabilities in the field of energy at Monash University. Energy research spans a range of disciplines and expertise articulated around 6 themes: Energy resources, Materials and devices, Smart energy systems, Markets and policy, and Consumers.

For more detailed information about the university's energy capabilities and expertise in each theme, please search our researchers’ directory.

Consumers
Materials and devices
Markets and policy
Smart energy systems
Clean fuels and hydrogen
Energy grids

Theme leaders

Consumers

Emerging technologies
Energy futures
Demand response
Decision making
Peer-to-peer trading and sharing
Energy access and affordability, social justice

The world is facing an increasingly uncertain energy future, ushered in by climate change, population growth, decentralised power generation, new digitally-enabled lifestyles, and emerging technologies. In this context of uncertainty, it is urgent that research led by the social sciences, design and behavioural sciences plays a central role in formulating new approaches to understanding and intervening in our energy futures. This means producing new knowledge and understandings of the socio-technical relations through which energy will be consumed in the future, and developing methods to ensure that our energy futures are equitable, sustainable and support the growth of human health and wellbeing.

Emerging Technologies Research Lab

Bringing together social science and design research and intervention, through the work of the Energy Futures research programme in the Emerging Technologies Research Lab.

BehaviourWorks

Our collaboration with BehaviourWorks enables us to connect behaviour change experts with practitioners, translate research evidence into practice, and foster business, and economic and social change, for a better energy future.

Theme leader

Materials and devices

Next-generation solar cells: Light and energy interconversion materials
Batteries and energy storage
Electroactive materials
Next-generation ultra-low energy technologies: Atomically thin and low dimensional materials
Energy-efficient separation processes

Monash University is a global leader in energy conversion materials and devices.

Our researchers are working on a diversity of materials which are sustainable and game changers in how we generate, store and use energy. These have developed in the key areas outlined below and are currently being demonstrated through major research initiatives supported by the Australian Research Council (ARC) and industry.

Theme leader

Markets and policy

Policy
Regulation
Economics
Transition

Monash Energy Institute intersects with Australian Electricity Market Initiative (AEMI) by working in some interdisciplinary manner with electrical engineers, computer scientists and storage specialists to better understand the physical characteristics of these technologies and design more appropriate pricing mechanisms.

Australian Electricity Market Initiative (AEMI)

AEMI aims at informing policymakers, assisting them in policy formulation and evaluating policy proposals using rigorous economics analysis. AEMI works on: market design, the regulation of transmission and distribution assets, the industrial organisation of the electricity sector, and the impact of new and emerging technologies such as renewables and large-scale storage.

Theme leader

Smart energy systems

Sensor networks
AI and optimisation
Data science and ML
Transport
Power
Energy access
Cognitive buildings
Cybersecurity, cryptocurrency and blockchain
Data visualisation and immersive analytics

Artificial Intelligence and Optimisation

The AI-based Discrete Optimisation research group is working on both targeted and generic solving techniques to address complex discrete optimisation problems, with the view to making optimisation technologies more widely accessible, across a range of applications. In particular, our team is focused on research that helps users (a) model and solve these problems more easily, (b) interrogate the system regarding the provided solution, and (c) interactively re-optimise based on additional user information. In this way, it has a ‘human-in-the-loop’ approach to Discrete Optimisation that makes our team quite unique.
Machine Learning

Machine learning is the science behind big data, data mining, data science, and artificial intelligence. It enables systems to learn from data, identify patterns, and make decisions with minimal human intervention. Over the last 10 years Machine Learning has grown to become a fundamental technology driving innovations: Self-driving cars, Siri the iPhone personal assistant, Netflix movie recommendations, cancer diagnosis, discovery of physics’ laws, and scientific progress. Our team covers Association discovery, Bayesian methods, causal models, classification, deep learning, forecasting, images, natural language analytics, online learning and learning from non-stationary distributions, semi-supervised models, spatio-temporal, text and time series analytics.
Cognitive buildings

We are experimenting with research, design and implementation techniques in our Clayton campus to bring a new level of intelligence and decision making capability to service occupants in buildings. This ‘living laboratory’ approach enables our team to collect available data and user feedback to enhance facilities and security management, and to create comfortable spaces for students and staff while drastically reducing energy consumption.
Energy Data Visualisation and Immersive Analytics

Our energy visualisation and immersive analysis research groups are interested in helping people to understand complex, interlinked data through visualisation. Our work to date has focused on the problem of finding high-quality layout for network diagrams and human interaction with technologies. Our group has been working with large interactive surfaces and augmented and virtual reality – to help people perform data analysis.
Cybersecurity

Monash research in cybersecurity, cryptocurrency and blockchain has been supported by the Australian Research Council (ARC), Data 61 and industry partners. Our mission is to develop solutions to the security, privacy, reliability, trust, and performance issues of different system environments. Our cybersecurity lab at Monash University has strong collaboration between academics, industries and governments, both locally and internationally.
Cryptocurrency and Blockchain

Our key areas of research include cryptography, blockchain, cryptocurrency technology, big data security, privacy enhanced technology, trusted computing, IoT security, biometric security, and network security.
Sensor Networks

Our research expertise spans areas including radio-frequency identification (RFID), smart antennas for mobile and satellite communications, electromagnetic bandgap structure assisted radio frequency (RF) devices, and various forms of antennas. Our capability extends into processing data obtained from sensor networks to visualise and interact with energy networks and applications.
Transport

The transport sector makes up close to a third of our energy consumption. The uncertainty in future oil production and the long term need to transition away from carbon-emitting fuel sources has suggested that an alternative source to fuel our transport needs is imminent.Monash has one of the largest and broadest capabilities in transport infrastructure research in the world. Our leading capabilities are railway engineering and public transport. We also have leading expertise in intelligent transport systems, traffic systems, road safety, industrial design in vehicles, transport modelling, light-weight metals for automotive and aerospace applications, logistics and supply chains, and aerodynamic testing of vehicles in our wind tunnel.
Energy access

Globally, close to 3 billion people are without access to clean cooking facilities and close to 1 billion without electricity. The issue affects Indigenous communities in Australia and communities in emerging economies around the world. Our energy access group is working to accelerate the uptake of sustainable energy access through international interdisciplinary research partnerships between researchers and private, public, and not-for-profit organisations. Our capabilities include governance, energy technologies, optimised grids, visualisation of energy systems, participatory methods of engagement, and market systems for energy access.

Theme leader

Clean fuels and hydrogen

Bio conversion
Hydrogen and alternate fuels
(synthetic CH4, NH3)
CO2 capture, storage and use
Gasification
Geothermal energy
Energy in mining

Clean fuels and hydrogen underpin an effective energy transition for Australia and Monash University is engaged in a range of research activities spanning technical, social, political and legal aspects.

Woodside Monash Energy Partnership

The Woodside Monash Energy Partnership is a long term, strategic, research partnership focused on Woodside’s decarbonisation and energy transition road map. Launched in July 2019, the Woodside Monash Energy Partnership is a natural extension of a successful relationship that began with Woodside FutureLab at Monash in 2016. The research program is structured into three focused research themes: New Energy Technologies; Carbon Capture, Conversion, and Utilisation, and Energy Leadership. The activities under these themes span fundamental technical and non-technical research all the way through to pilot and demonstration projects.

MC3 club

Monash Carbon Capture and Conversion, also known as MC3, is an international, interdisciplinary student team at Monash University, bringing together Monash students from Clayton and Sunway campuses. Driven by their passion for environmental sustainability, the MC3 team are at the forefront of innovation as student-led pioneers of technological solutions to climate change.The MC3 vision encapsulates the successful development of novel, sustainable, scalable and economically viable solutions to capture and store carbon to improve the outlook for the future of the planet.
Carbon capture and Fuels from Renewable Sources

In addition to hydrogen related research, Monash is also a leading centre for carbon capture and conversion research. Our research projects include capture of carbon dioxide from air, conversion of this captured carbon dioxide to chemicals using thermochemical and biological methods, and utilisation of these chemicals into renewable fuels and products.

Projects

Ammonia Production from Renewables

Perovskite-based electrocatalysts for water electrolysis

Seawater Electrolysis

Green Energy in the Global Stage

Life Cycle Analysis and Energy Assessment Tool to assist decision making

Liquid Hydrogen Boil-off Gas Management

Large-scale and long-term storage of hydrogen in underground reservoirs

Theme leader

Energy Grids

Wind (on/off-shore)
Utility scale solar
Power grids
Grid planning
Grid forming Inverters
Utility scale storage

Australia’s electricity grid is embarking on a dramatic transformation, driven by new technologies and increasingly empowered customers. New energy infrastructure, new market designs and dynamic regulatory environments are required for the rapidly approaching low-carbon world. The new energy transport infrastructure needed includes new and enhanced electricity transmission, as well as new transportation infrastructure for green hydrogen and its derivatives. The latter is likely to include hydrogen pipelines. This theme primarily focuses on large-scale power grids and pipelines, while ensuring the emerging interactions between the distribution network level and bulk power systems are fully captured.

At Monash Energy Institute, we have the required expertise and capabilities to answer various questions about the ongoing energy transition. This theme focuses on the large-scale power system for which we are currently trying to address the challenge of planning and operating the energy system for economic efficiency, reliability and security on the way to 100% renewables.

Key challenges we are addressing include questions such as:

How can we manage the secure operation of the bulk energy system with a high level of penetration of variable renewable energy sources?
How can we integrate large-scale storage such as batteries, into the electricity grid for its stable/secure operation?
And for all these, how do we ensure optimal investment in, and operation of, grid and storage infrastructure?
Finally, how can we repurpose the national grid and gas pipeline network to support a decentralised energy system?

Power Engineering Advanced Research Laboratory (PEARL)

PEARL aims to develop innovative technologies to deliver secure, sustainable, and reliable electric power. To achieve this goal, we carry out leading-edge research in the areas grid integration of renewable energy resources, application and control of power electronic converters, power system stability, real-time monitoring systems, advanced protection and fault location techniques, and electromagnetic transients in power networks. Our focus is mainly on the grid integration of renewable energy resources, studying the interaction of renewable farms, and devising control algorithms for inverter-based resources to unleash their full potential.

Themes

Monash University is a global leader in energy research

Theme leaders

Consumers

Emerging Technologies Research Lab

Future Grid Homes

Digital Energy Futures

BehaviourWorks

Theme leader

Materials and devices

ARC Centre of Excellence in Exciton Science (ACEx)

ARC Research Hub on Graphene Enabled Industry Transformation

ARC Centre of Excellence in Electromaterials (ACES)

ARC Centre of Excellence for Future Low-Energy Electronics Technologies (FLEET)

ARC Research Hub for Energy-efficient Separation

Theme leader

Markets and policy

Australian Electricity Market Initiative (AEMI)

Theme leader

Smart energy systems

Artificial Intelligence and Optimisation

Machine Learning

Cognitive buildings

Energy Data Visualisation and Immersive Analytics

Cybersecurity

Cryptocurrency and Blockchain

Sensor Networks

Transport

Energy access

Theme leader

Clean fuels and hydrogen

Woodside Monash Energy Partnership

MC3 club

Carbon capture and Fuels from Renewable Sources

Projects

Theme leader

Energy Grids

Power Engineering Advanced Research Laboratory (PEARL)