The Ansbach University of Applied Sciences is currently still on semester break, but the summer semester starts again on March 15. The team at the Campus Feuchtwangen is therefore already busily preparing the next lectures and fine-tuning the timetable for the students of the Smart Energy Systems (SES) master’s program.

In the second semester, the modules Virtual Power Plants, Artificial Intelligence (AI) Applications in Energy Systems, Optimization of Energy Systems and Energy Entrepreneurship are scheduled, as well as an SES project paper.

In Virtual Power Plants, Prof. Dr.-Ing. Johannes Jungwirth deals with the interconnection of decentralized actors in the electricity market, which are coordinated via a common control system. The actors can be power generators such as biogas, wind power or photovoltaic plants, but also power consumers, battery storage or so-called power-to-X plants. The purpose is joint marketing and flexibility.

How such systems communicate securely with each other and make decisions autonomously – without human intervention – is the topic of the module AI Applications in Energy Systems by Prof. Dr. Sigurd Schacht.

In Optimization of Energy Systems, Prof. Dr. Mathias Moog takes up the knowledge and tools from the first semester in order to be able to optimally align and operate even complex energy systems using simulation.

Energy Entrepreneurship sheds light on entrepreneurial thinking and action. Johannes Hähnlein from the start-up consultancy of Ansbach University of Applied Sciences prepares the students to realize their own ideas, e.g. in start-ups. In addition, selected guest lecturers from the business world will present their own personal success stories as entrepreneurs.

“Hands on!” is the motto of the project work by the head of the course, Prof. Dr.-Ing. The students first program microcontrollers that behave like individual actors in the energy landscape – producers, consumers and regulators or monitors. The challenge lies in networking and exchanging data via a wide variety of protocols at the end – ideal preparation for later professional life.

The elective German I was highly appreciated and well attended in the first semester. Therefore, Monica Baudracco-Kastner will continue her teaching in the second semester and will continue to work with students on their German skills in German II.

Prof. Dr.-Ing. Michael Walter offers an outside-the-box view with the elective Designing Products with 3D-Printing. The non-trivial process will require the students to come up with unusual design solutions in order to reach their goal. In the process, they will learn all the more to take into account the special features of 3D printing and to organize themselves as a team. Because in the end, everyone’s individual parts have to fit together with the others.