Marellie Akoury

There are two types of challenges that one has to face up to in life; those thrust upon us and those of our choosing. Studying in Lebanon, a very competitive country in the Middle East with one of the highest literacy rates in the world wasn’t my choosing; however I chose to strive for excellence. The perception that Engineering is a not a profession traditionally chosen by women is not one I made nevertheless; it is my career of choice. My working life begun when I secured employment abroad in Qatar, right after completing my Electrical Engineering Bachelor’s degree at the Lebanese American University (LAU). I was immediately thrust into the deep end as an Electrical Engineer on the Utilities Package of Qatar’s prestigious but challenging New Doha International Airport project. This meant being involved in the safe and timely installation, testing and commissioning of Electrical-Mechanical installations for the Central Utilities Plant.

After around two years of site experience, I decided to pursue an MSc with emphasis on sustainability to increase my knowledge and research skills. I sought a deeper understanding of existing technologies; which would empower me to contribute to the development and implementation of new sustainable energy, power systems and strategies. Studying in the UK was a natural choice as it offers very high standards in education and with its international reputation. The engineering school at Brunel University responsible for the MSc in Sustainable Electrical Power strongly represented the best there is.

I was impressed by the way the course structure and content are linked to each other particularly the advanced concepts of sustainable electrical power systems, from energy generation to distribution management. During my course, I had access to great network of support from fellow students, tutors, lecturers and professors. I was able to carry out both theoretical and practical studies and research with the abundance of academic resources, infrastructure and cutting edge facilities. In addition to this, the software used during the workshop sessions, the site visits and industrial presentations broadened my knowledge in sustainable energy, power electronics, electricity market, power system management and smart grids. I was enthralled by the fact that the course was closely linked to the needs of industry and approved by the IET.

I was fortunate to be selected to do an industrial based project with National Grid entitled “Online Visualisation of State-Estimated Transmission System Voltages”. The aim of study was to provide National Control Centre with suitable PC-based graphing package which would provide control engineers with immediately understandable visualisations of voltage conditions and assist in taking corrective measures for unfavourable voltage conditions in real time while taking into consideration Human factors.

On completion of my course, I gained employment with National Grid as an iEMS Network Analysis & Data Interfaces Engineer. Our team is responsible for ensuring that the IEMS tool used in the UK national control room accurately reflect the performance of the Electricity Transmission System under varying scenarios.

While at Brunel, I relished exploring the incredible heritage and cultural diversity. I even had the pleasure of being elected as the student representative of my class and my academic efforts were culminated by receiving the best overall student prize from EDF.

During my spell at Brunel, I gained additional skills and knowledge which I believe will enhance my career. Because of this, I overwhelmingly recommend the Brunel Study experience!