Miaolei Shao, Ph.D
Dr. Shao has more than 20 years of experience in the energy industry. His expertise is in the areas of power system dynamics and transient analysis, wind, solar and energy storage system modeling, transmission and distribution system planning, control design and development for grid assets (generation, transmission and distribution), sub-synchronous resonance (SSR), system adequacy and security assessment, and interconnecting new equipment into deregulated power systems.
After receiving his Ph.D. degree in 2008, he had spent 11 years in GE Energy Consulting (EC) department (Schenectady New York). His most recent role in EC was Senior Manager of Transmission and Distribution Group, in which he supported global clients across the energy industry, including GE internal businesses, developers, utilities and grid operators. As an engineer, his primary focus has been on the investigation of the impact of high penetrations of renewable energy on the power grid. He has also taught power systems related courses to GE and utility engineers.
From 2018 to 2022, he was Senior Principal Engineer at GE Global Research Center (Niskayuna, New York), in which he was the Principal Investigator and Lead Engineer for two U.S. Department of Energy projects. He was also the primary engineer for "GE Research Center Energy Management System Development" project.
Dr. Shao is a Senior Member of Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers (IEEE) and the current vice chair of IEEE PES Renewable System Integration Coordinating Committee (RSICC). In 2015, he was the recipient of the Energy Systems Integration Group (ESIG) Achievement Award “For leadership in improving the understanding of power system dynamics in WECC under high variable generation condition”. He holds two U.S. patents (US20140175887 and US20160036229) and has over 20 technical papers in the field of renewable energy and electric power system. Miaolei lives in upstate New York with his wife and two children.
Ryan Konopinski
Ryan worked for 13 years as a power systems engineer for GE. During his GE tenure he performed various steady state, transient stability, and transient switching studies involving modeling and analysis of power system equipment and bulk power systems.
In recent years, his focus has been on grid integration of off-shore wind and BESS black-start applications. These projects have involved detailed EMT modeling, analysis, and specification of cables, capacitor banks, current limiting reactors, harmonic filters, circuit breakers, surge arresters, equipment grounding, motor starting, self-excitation, and converter control interactions.
He has also performed other numerous analytical studies that include sub-synchronous resonance, transient torque, torsional vibration relay settings, MOV protection of series capacitors, back-to-back capacitor switching, insulation coordination, AVR/PSS tuning for thermal, renewable, battery, and synchronous condenser applications.
Early in his career he performed transmission planning and interconnection studies, many involving grid code compliance and weak grid applications. He has also been a course instructor teaching the fundamentals and mechanics of steady state power flow analysis for over 10 years.
Prior to his power systems career, he worked as a research assistant with the Electric Power and Energy Systems group while completing an M.S.E.E. degree at Iowa State University. Before this he briefly worked for Marathon Petroleum Company as an electronics and instrumentation technician repairing and troubleshooting equipment used at light petroleum and asphalt product terminals.
Ryan lives in northern Vermont and spends as much time as he can recreating outdoors, rain, snow, or shine.