Energy for the Future: Sustainability Challenges and Perspectives

The Symposium on “Sustainable Energy Systems”, part of the 6th Doctoral Congress in Engineering (DCE25), will take place at FEUP, Porto, Portugal, on June 30th and July 1st 2025.

The Sustainable Energy Systems Doctoral Program (PDSSE) is a four-year program that brings together the Departments of Mechanical, Electrical and Computer Engineering from various Portuguese institutions, including FEUP, ISEG, IST, and the University of Coimbra. Designed to promote collaboration, this program fosters the exchange of knowledge and drives innovation among academic and research institutions at both national and international levels.

The Doctoral Program in Sustainable Energy Systems aims to develop top-tier researchers with the skills to design, analyze, and innovate energy systems while considering their technological, environmental, economic, and social impacts. Through this multidisciplinary research, leadership, and entrepreneurship, this program prepares future leaders to drive impactful changes in academia, industry, and beyond.

As a segment of the 6th Doctoral Congress in Engineering, the symposium will be held across various parallel sessions, offering a valuable opportunity to showcase ongoing research around the topic of energy systems.

The Symposium Organizing Committee is pleased to invite everyone interested in expanding and sharing their knowledge and expertise in the field of electrical or mechanical engineering, with a focus on sustainable energy systems, to submit their work. This invitation is open to PhD and MSc students, as well as other researchers and professionals in this field.

To take advantage of this opportunity, the symposium invites abstract submissions on topics relevant to the fields of Energy and Sustainability, including, but not limited to:

  • Energy Planning, Market Regulation and Environmental Policies

This section consolidates research topics that contribute to creating sustainable societies through energy use, including energy planning, modeling, analysis, and design. It also highlights proposed improvements in energy policies related to energy efficiency, renewable energy, greenhouse gas emissions, and climate change. Furthermore, it examines energy markets, regulation, and sustainable development—three critical areas for advancing reliable, affordable, clean, and integrated energy systems in the future.

  • Sustainable Cities, People and Built Environment

The concept of sustainable cities is centered around the efficient use of available resources, particularly energy. Urban communities depend on the built environment for shelter and comfort, which makes it important to focus on research topics such as sustainable building rehabilitation in urban areas, microgeneration of renewable energy, and urban metabolism. These areas of knowledge are crucial for developing innovative solutions and identifying potential improvements, taking into account the diverse sociodemographic and geographical characteristics of each region.

  • Electric power grids for a decarbonized economy

Decarbonizing the economy is a crucial step in addressing climate change. This shift requires a significant transformation of the electricity system, with the large-scale integration of non-dispatchable renewable energy sources, promoting sector coupling, and widespread adoption of high-energy efficiency technologies on the demand side across residential, commercial, and industrial sectors. Key research areas include:

  • Operation and control of converter-dominated electric power grids;
  • Innovative efforts to monitor, manage and control the currently changing power grids;
  • Renewable energy generation, energy storage and end-user approaches;
  • Information technology and “big data” applications for enhancing the performance of energy networks in smart grids;
  • Smart mobility and energy demand technologies;
  • Multi-energy networks and renewable gases.

This Symposium is organized by PhD students of the Doctoral Program in Sustainable Energy Systems at FEUP, with the support of the Associate Laboratory INESC TEC.

Submissions

Format: Oral or poster communications

Please follow the abstract template (maximum 1 page) according to the Instruction for Authors available under the Registration page. The submission must be done through the SCI-MEET platform.

For more information, please click HERE.

Registration & Payment

Registration is mandatory for all participants through the SCI-MEET platform.

The Doctoral Program in Sustainable Energy Systems (PDSSE) will cover the registration costs for FEUP’s PDSSE students and professors, who register in the scope of the ‘Early Bird Registration’ deadline.

A limited number of ‘Early Bird Registration’ waivers will be granted to other students, researchers or professors from FEUP, depending on the number of attendees. For any questions, please email up202102681@fe.up.pt (Francisco Lobo).

Abstracts will be included in the Book of Abstracts only if at least one author of each accepted abstract is registered and has paid the registration fee (attended the event).

Please note that at least one author per submitted abstract (oral or poster communication) must register for the Congress as soon as possible to secure participation.

Program

|| The full program will be available soon ||

Communications

Oral communication:

  • Prepare a PowerPoint presentation to support your talk.
  • An editable PowerPoint template will be available soon.
  • Language: Presentations and slides must be in English.

Poster communication:

  • The poster exhibition will be held in FEUP’s B Corridor, where posters will be displayed on the corridor windows.
  • Posters should be formatted in portrait mode, size A1 (841 mm height × 594 mm width).
  • Language: Posters must be in English.
  • An editable poster template will be available soon.

Publications

All accepted abstracts, with at least one author registered in the Congress with a paid fee, will be included in the event’s program and the Symposium Book of Abstracts.

|| The Book of Abstracts will be available soon ||

Awards

Authors of accepted abstracts presented at the Congress will be eligible for the Best Oral and Best Poster Communication Awards.

Symposium Committees

Symposium Chairs:

  • Carlos Coelho Leal Monteiro Moreira, FEUP   
  • João Abel Peças Lopes, FEUP   

Symposium Organizing Committee:

  • Carlos Coelho Leal Monteiro Moreira, FEUP 
  • Célia Natividade de Vasconcelos Couto, FEUP
  • João Abel Peças Lopes, FEUP
  • João Paulo Tomé Saraiva, FEUP 
  • Tiago André Teixeira Soares, FEUP 
  • Vítor Manuel da Silva Leal, FEUP 
  • Zenaida Sobral Mourão, FEUP/INESC TEC 
  • Abdelrahman Muneer Mohammed Abdelrahman Elhawash, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   
  • Carlos Alberto Madureira da Silva, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP  
  • Felipe Dantas do Carmo, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP  
  • Fernando José Moutinho Ribeiro, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   
  • Francisco Sousa Fernandes, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   
  • Francisco Sousa Lobo, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   
  • João Carlos Agrela Freitas, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   
  • Sofia Varotto, PhD Student PDSSE, FEUP   

Symposium Scientific Committee:

  • Carlos Coelho Leal Monteiro Moreira, FEUP 
  • João Abel Peças Lopes, FEUP 
  • João Paulo Tomé Saraiva, FEUP 
  • Ricardo Jorge Gomes de Sousa Bento Bessa, FEUP/INESC TEC 
  • Tiago André Teixeira Soares, FEUP 
  • Vítor Manuel da Silva Leal, FEUP 
  • Zenaida Sobral Mourão, FEUP/INESC TEC 

Contact: up202102681@fe.up.pt (Francisco Lobo)