Register today for the first seminar of the ESE Fall 2025 Seminar Series: The Janak Raj Lectures. This seminar is available online only via Zoom. 

Presented by: Dr. Rudy Shankar, Director & Professor, Energy Systems Engineering, Lehigh University

REGISTER HERE

TIME: 12:00 PM - 1:30 PM Eastern Time 
LOCATION - ZOOM MEETING link to be sent prior to the seminar date
CONTACT US: inesei@lehigh.edu  

ABSTRACT:  If one were to rewind to same time last year, you will have found an energy landscape that was decommissioning coal-fired power plants, substituting with NG driven turbines and/or Combined Cycle Gas Turbine plants, Solar,  Wind assets. For the first time, solar output exceeded coal plants output. However, CCGT was found to be an invaluable asset to meet peak demands quite frequently even while the name-plate capacity of renewables showed a steady increase. In other words, fossil-fueled generation energy output over the previous decade dominated and hardly moved.

Under the new administration,  fossil fuels are making a comeback as essential to guarantee grid reliability. Nuclear power was rightly considered the one green energy source that could provide at scale what was sought from renewables but never realized because of intermittency. While this change was generally viewed as negating the advances of renewable energy, the focus on advanced nuclear generation as well as carbon capture and storage (CCS) for coal plants gives hope that perhaps the net zero goals by 2050 may yet be achieved. The advance of artificial intelligence methods for electric power generation and delivery has further emphasized the unique role data centers are expected to play in the energy landscape.

This talk will examine how far we have come, how far we need to go, to meet a low-carbon or no-carbon economy. Come join us for this seminar!

BIO:  Ramesh ("Rudy") Shankar is the Director of the Energy Systems Engineering program at Lehigh University, Bethlehem, PA,. The program supports the 10-month, 30-credit Master of Engineering (M. Eng.) in Energy. In this capacity, his responsibilities include development of course curriculum and industry projects. 
He was previously the Vice President and Chief Technology Advisor for the Tennessee Valley Authority which managed more than 11 million customers in seven States. His duties included managing renewable energy technology, developing electric transportation & infrastructure, consumer innovation, technologies for power generation and power delivery. His previous appointments included: President/CEO of Signatech Systems and led the efforts to develop requirements for asset management and fleet-wide monitoring for a large Asian utility (30 GW capacity); consulted with the U.N. IAEA on nuclear power requirements for developing countries. He was a Program Manager for fossil- and nuclear-generation sectors for the Electric Power Research Institute (EPRI), 

Dr. Shankar completed his undergraduate work at the Indian Institute of Technology Delhi; Ph.D. in Applied Sciences from the University of Delaware, and an MBA at Queens University in an Executive-sponsored Program. Dr Shankar has attended Leadership Development course at Eckerd College and project management training. He has conducted power industry-related training courses & workshops around the globe in Europe, Asia and the Americas.