In 1998, Professor Damien Ernst graduated from the University of Liège. His did his master thesis on Electricity Networks, focusing on loss of synchronism phenomena that can lead to power blackouts in a matter of just a few seconds.
| He changed direction for his doctoral thesis (which he defended in 2003), to focus on reinforcement learning. “However, I used reinforcement learning techniques to solve control and decision-making problems in electricity networks. After my thesis, I continued on that path, and I have been published many times on the subject.” This took place during his three-year post-doctoral research, funded by the F.R.S-FNRS and where he spent time at CMU and MIT in the USA, and at ETH in Zurich. Prof. Ernst then headed to France, where he was a professor at Supélec, an engineering school that has now merged with Centrale, to form CentraleSupélec. “2006 was a great year,” he recalls, “Mainly because of my contacts with French industry.” He then returned to the F.R.S-FNRS (2007-2011) as a research associate, where he continued his work on reinforcement learning. In the period between 2011-2016, he held the EDF-Luminus Chair on Smart Grids at the University of Liège. |  |
“Thanks to this chair, I’ve learned a great deal from working more closely with industry. It’s given me a more complete and less academic vision of energy systems. I’ve also been able to develop very important research projects to facilitate the integration of renewable energy into electrical networks.”
In 2018 Prof. Ernst was the proud recipient of the prestigious Blondel Medal, awarded each year in France by the Société de l’Électricité, de l’Électronique et des Technologies de l’information et de la communication (SEE) in recognition of outstanding research work in the field of science and the electrical industry in the broad sense (telecommunications, electronics, electrical networks, etc.).
Prof. Ernst now works at the University of Liège, as a full professor. Since 2021, he has also been the Chief Scientific Officer at Haulogy, a company that publishes (intelligent) software for the energy sector. He has also been a visiting professor at Télécom-Paris since 2021. He is regularly consulted by industries, governments, international agencies and the media for his deep understanding of the challenges of the energy transition.
Beginning in 2024, Prof. Ernst has begun to focus some of his research efforts on the use of artificial intelligence in the defense sector.
Damien Ernst 