UCD Teams Shine in EirGrid CleanerGrid 2025 Competition
The UCD SEC is thrilled to celebrate the outstanding achievements of our students in the EirGrid CleanerGrid 2025 Competition. The competition was fierce with an impressive 170 entries this year, but three UCD teams showcased their creativity and innovation in developing sustainable energy solutions.
A special congratulations to Todhchaí Glas (Green Future), who secured first place with their ground-breaking proposal on pumped hydropower storage!
First Place: Todhchaí Glas – How Pumped Hydropower Storage Can Solve Energy Intermittency
Team Members: Eoin O’Duffy, Stephen Murphy, and Ruairí Collins (pictured)
One of the biggest hurdles in transitioning to a fully renewable energy grid is intermittency—the challenge of maintaining a consistent power supply from variable sources like wind and solar. The Todhchaí Glas team presented a compelling solution: a network of pumped hydropower storage facilities across Ireland.
Currently, Ireland has only one pumped hydro plant—Turlough Hill in Co. Wicklow, operational since 1974. Due to high construction costs (€500 million - €1.5 billion), no further facilities have been developed. The team proposes innovative financing through public-private partnerships and economic incentives to drive investment in long-duration energy storage. They believe that pumped hydropower storage will be the key enabler of a fully renewable energy grid and Ireland’s net-zero 2050 goals.
Sustainable Pioneers – Revolutionizing Urban Mobility with Cycle-to-Grid (C2G)
Team Members: Sze Kei To, Jia Dong Cher, and Natrajabishek Narasimhan Devasena
The Sustainable Pioneers are tackling urban emissions and energy decentralisation with their Cycle-to-Grid (C2G) initiative. This innovative concept integrates cycling infrastructure with the electricity grid, allowing urban commuters to contribute clean energy while promoting sustainable transport. Their model incentivises individual participation, offering a seamless way to power a greener, smarter future.
Team Power Rangers – AI-Powered Wind Energy Management System (WEMS)
Team Members: Yue Han, Xinyi Liu, Fuyu Cai, Ming Tu
Wind energy curtailment—when excess wind power is wasted due to grid limitations—is a major issue in Ireland’s renewable energy transition. Team Power Rangers introduced WEMS (Wind Energy Management System), an AI-powered tool that leverages real-time forecasting and smart dispatch to optimise wind energy usage. Their solution improves grid efficiency and ensures a cleaner, more sustainable energy future.
Celebrating Innovation and Sustainability
UCD SEC co-chair Paula Carroll (pictured) played a pivotal role in mentoring these teams, guiding them to refine their ideas and push the boundaries of sustainable energy solutions.
We are incredibly proud of our students’ success and their contributions towards a cleaner, greener future. Congratulations to all participants, and especially to Todhchaí Glas for their well-deserved first-place win!
Green Week 2025 Energy Hack
Lab energy efficiency project
Did you know that research labs are some of the biggest energy users in universities?
Equipment like refrigerators and freezers run 24/7, consuming a huge amount of power. This project is all about finding smarter, more efficient ways to use cooling equipment in UCD labs.
While there are challenges—like strict technical standards and regulations—there’s also a big opportunity to cut energy waste, save money, and reduce carbon emissions.
By analysing energy usage patterns and exploring solutions like dynamic power management, we aim to make lab cooling more efficient and sustainable.
Green Week Energy Hack
Green Week 2025 is here!
Join us from Monday 3 March to Friday 7 March as we celebrate UCD's commitment to sustainability and environmental initiatives.
Don't miss the Energy Hack, an Energy Awareness event hosted by the UCD Sustainable Energy Community on Tuesday, 4 March, from 10:00AM to 12:00PM in UCD Village.
Discover cutting-edge UCD research on energy communities, electric vehicles, green hydrogen, energy storage, the just transition, energy markets, heat pumps, and offshore wind. Learn how these innovations are shaping Ireland's clean energy future - whether it's fostering local energy cooperatives, advancing battery technology, integrating renewables into the grid, or ensuring a fair and inclusive transition to a low-carbon economy.
Meet special guest partners including (opens in a new window)Wind Energy Ireland, the (opens in a new window)Irish Solar Energy Association and the (opens in a new window)Heat Pump Association of Ireland. Plus, take on the (opens in a new window)Pedal Bike Energy Challenge - can you power up with your own energy?
View our Energy Hack poster here.
Get involved, get inspired, and go green!
An Uber-Sustainable Energy Community for Higher Education in Ireland?
Sustainability has become an integral part of third-level education and training. As well as an explosion in sustainability and related degrees and modules, students and staff across campuses are often keen to reduce waste and carbon emissions.
Many Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) are now making sustainability a priority both in policy and practice, with initiatives such as plastic-free campuses and local clean energy schemes in the form of heat pumps and solar panels.
So, can HEIs in Ireland work together to have even more impact on energy sustainability? That’s what representatives from around Ireland set out to discuss at a recent gathering in May 2024.
The meeting, hosted by University College Dublin’s Sustainable Energy Community (SEC), welcomed representatives from the Sustainable Energy Authority of Ireland (SEAI) and its mentor network, the EU-funded AURORA project and HEIs including Atlantic Technological University (ATU - Galway, Mayo and Sligo), Dublin City University (DCU), Technological University of Dublin (TU Dublin), University of Galway (UG) and UCD.
Sustainable Energy Communities (SECs) are an initiative of the SEAI that look to engage and enable energy citizens to work together to achieve their energy goals. One of the key topics up for discussion at the UCD workshop was whether and how HEIs in Ireland should pool resources and approaches and build such a community.
The meeting heard from individual institutions about their current practices and challenges, where local SECs seek to lead the energy transition in their locality, in some cases through an active leadership role and demonstrating energy efficiency and emission reduction in action.
Martin Brocklehurst spoke about the EU-funded (opens in a new window)AURORA project, which empowers several thousand citizens across five locations in Denmark, England, Portugal, Slovenia and Spain to make more informed energy decisions.
One of the key messages from the meeting was that HEIs have a significant opportunity to reach many students and staff now and impact their behaviours into the future. HEIs also offer an environment for mixing research and education for energy sustainability, for example through ‘living labs’.
The discussion highlighted that HEI’s face some similar challenges around sustainable energy and can so share best practice, though each locality may have its own nuances and opportunities for positive change.
Given the diversity of approaches taken by the HEIs, further thought is needed on whether a Community of Common Interest could be beneficial, or if a looser network of HEI SECs would be more useful.
Next year will see another workshop to map communalities and share progress.
You can read the full report here.
In February 2024, Paula Carroll (UCD College of Business) gave a UCD Earth Institute coffee morning research talk on Sustainable Energy Communities: UCD leading (lighting?) the way.
Abstract: EU citizens are anticipated to play a central role in the future EU clean energy system. Community groups will engage in renewable energy generation, and energy sharing or trading, storage, or supply. Ireland’s community energy sector is at an early stage of development. The Commission for Regulation of Utilities is adapting the regulatory framework, and “Sustainable Energy Communities” are proposed by the SEAI as a stepping stone to engage citizens. In this talk Paula Carroll highlighted SEC-OREA (Supporting Energy Communities - Operations Research and Energy Analytics), an IRC funded CHIST-ERA project.