Two years after ‘retirement,’ Dr. Shamash is still on the grid
Yacov Shamash knows all about resiliency.
The one-time Stony Brook University dean of engineering (1992-2015), who “retired” two years ago after 19 years as vice president for university economic development, is as durable as they come – back in the lecture hall, leading research projects, winning grants, after all those years roaming the corridors of power.
Now, he’s focusing on the resiliency of the national energy grid – a wide-ranging research effort backed by a two-year, $7.3 million grant from the Office of Naval Research (ONR).
While quick to note that he was always a professor – even when he was leading SBU through a two-decade innovation and commercialization renaissance, including the creation of two New York State Centers of Excellence – Dr. Shamash is happy to once again be “just a simple professor of electrical and computer engineering.”
And he’s thrilled to be heading up the resiliency project alongside experts from the University of Massachusetts Lowell (UMASS Lowell), which shares the two-year ONR grant and its projected workload (18 total projects, nine at each university).
It’s important stuff, according to Dr. Shamash, who references recent energy headlines as clear evidence.
“What happened in Texas, where the electricity grid collapsed – was that because the windmills didn’t work?” he asks. “Was there no sun, so the solar didn’t work? Were the gas pipes frozen?
“How do you make sure something like that doesn’t bring the national grid down?” he adds. “How do you ensure the grid is resilient to all kinds of conditions, including cyberattack?”
There are many possible answers to these not-so-rhetorical questions: reinforced physical infrastructures, improved sensor technologies, energy-storage upgrades, and more reliable backup systems. Along with their UMASS-Lowell counterparts, Dr. Shamash’s SBU team will test potential combinations involving all kinds of innovative technologies, while considering new opportunities to work renewable energy into the mix.
“Being able to utilize renewables in the grid is increasingly important,” Dr. Shamash notes. “We are considering how to introduce new fuels – what kind of renewable energies can we work into the various grids, and how do we control them?
“What controls will work best when trying to reduce the carbon footprint?” he adds. “We’re also focusing on introducing new storage products to protect the grid, and introducing new sensors that detect when there’s a problem somewhere, so you can isolate the fault.”
All of that next-level work is bolstered by contributions from SBU’s world-class faculty. More than 15 Stony Brook professors are involved in some way with the grid-resiliency research, including experts in chemistry, electrical engineering, computer sciences and material sciences – “a very powerful resource,” Dr. Shamash notes, “in terms of having professors of all these different disciplines working together.”
None of it would be possible without the existence of the Advanced Energy Research and Technology Center (AERTC), according to Dr. Shamash, who is both managing the SBU side of the two-university effort and personally contributing to multiple Stony Brook-based projects.
“If we didn’t have the Advanced Energy Center, we would not have this grant,” notes the scientist, who became vice-chairman of the AERTC Board of Directors in 2009. “This is a big award for the AERTC and the CIEES and the CEWIT Centers, all of which are contributing to this work.
“It really grows out of what we have built at Stony Brook, in terms of the economic-development system and the Centers of Excellence.”
It’s also a bouquet to AERTC COO David Hamilton, Shamash adds, and the Advanced Energy Center’s world-class Board of Directors.
“David has been extremely helpful to us and this particular program, including a lot of help with the funding,” he says. “And needless to say, I’m working hand-in-hand with (AERTC Board Chairman) Robert Catell, who knows the importance of having the grid up and running 24/seven.
“His experiences from over the years have been invaluable,” Dr. Shamash adds. “The AERTC is the perfect example of what can happen when industry and academia interact with a common goal.”