Research Projects

Postgraduate research topics currently available are listed on the following Research theme(s):

• Tyndall Manchester

• Climate Change

Research grants

Research specialisms

• Climate Change

Specialisms

• Energy demands and networks
• Built Environmment
• Low carbon transport

Research themes and Research centers

• Climate change
• Tyndall Centre

Dr Ruth Wood is a Senior Lecturer in Environment and Climate Change, a Research Fellow with the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research and Co-Director of the EPSRC Power Networks Centre for Doctoral Training. Her research interests include developing and applying emissions and energy accounting methods to different sectors and spatial scales; the development of scenario tools for use in interdisciplinary projects; the relationship between society and infrastructure and its effect on both resource demand and resilience to future climate change impacts.

Ruth's current research includes the EPSRC funded MYStore Project which examines energy storage options. Previous projects include RESNET (Resilient Electricity Networks for Great Britain) funded by the EPSRC where she led a work package to develop and apply a scenario tool to explore future scenarios of spatially resolved diurnal electricity demand profiles in Great Britain. The scenarios will be used to assess the implications for the transmission network and its resilience to future climate impacts. While at Tyndall Manchester she has been involved in a number of projects including assessing the greenhouse gas impacts of food consumption, shale gas extraction, and the development of a new emissions apportionment method for aviation for application at a sub-national scale. Her work on aviation emissions accounting won a best paper prize at the European Transport Conference 2008.

Ruth originally trained as a Chemist specialising in environmental science at the University of Bristol graduating in 2001 with a 1st Class (Hons) MSci. After graduating she worked as a civil servant in policy development before joining the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research at the University of East Anglia to undertake an interdisciplinary environmental science PhD. Her PhD research, completed in 2007, explored the co-benefits of greenhouse gas and air pollutant emissions reduction for cities and regions.

She has published her research findings through peer reviewed journals, industry publications and conferences, more widely through public seminars and lectures and through the medium of comedy appearing at Bright Club in Manchester, the Green Man Festival 2012 and Edinburgh Festival Fringe 2013. She was a contributing author to the Infrastructure Chapter of the Evidence Report for the Climate Change Risk Assessment 2017, fow which she reviewed climate risks to the UK energy system. 

• Climate mitigation
• Infrastructure and societal resilience to climate impacts