Education
Gautham Ram is involved in several classroom and online courses related to Electric Mobility at TU Delft
Coordinator for the four-part MOOC on Electric cars on www.edx.org with ~220,000 learners and ~22,000 verified certificates from 175 countries (as of March 2023), with lectures from various public/private establishments
Setting the structure, reviewing course material and creating exercises for the four-part course and the corresponding case studies
Lecturer for the Technology course, teaching the fundamentals of EV charging
Below are a few sample videos from the MOOC. For more videos, register at wwww.tiny.cc/ecarsx
Lecturer in the Technology and the Policy course for the MOOC “Intelligent & Integrated Energy Systems”, a cross university-industry educational program hosted on edx.org, launched in 2022
MSc course, Quarter 3
Taught together with Pavol Bauer.
The goal of this course is to educate students to design and evaluate various (hybrid) electric vehicles with respect to their performance, efficiency, sustainability, charging methodologies and potential for grid support.
At the end of the course, the students should be able to:
Evaluate the performance of hybrids (series, parallel, series-parallel), plug-in hybrid and fully electric drivetrain architectures based on power and energy consumption, efficiency, driving range, well-to-wheel emissions and charging time.
Explain the design trade-offs in the energy sources (battery, fuel cell, super capacitors) and motors used in electric vehicles based on the key performance indicators like efficiency, energy and/or power density, lifetime, and control.
Analyse various charging technologies for electric vehicles (conductive, inductive or battery swap) based on power electronics converters used, type of the charger (AC Vs DC), connector types, power levels, and modes.
Investigate the performance of the (hybrid) electric vehicle drivetrain using quasi-static modelling and simulation in MATLAB/Simulink.
Design a (hybrid) electric drivetrain by sizing and making the relevant choice of the electric machine, internal combustion engine, energy source (batteries, fuel cells, etc.), power electronic converters, transmissions components, and charging technology for a given vehicle specification.
MSc course, Quarter 2
Taught together with Hani Vahedi.
The course gives an overview of different types of electrical machines and drives. Various types of mechanical loads are discussed. Maxwell's equations are applied to magnetic circuits including permanent magnets. DC machines, induction machines, synchronous machines, switched reluctance machines, brushless DC machines and single-phase machines are discussed with the power electronic converters used to drive them. Three lab practicals for DC machines, Induction machines and Synchronous machines, respectively.
By the end of the course, students must be able to:
Apply Maxwell's equations to magnetic circuits including permanent magnets
Explain the construction and principle of operation of the DC machine, (single and three phase) induction and synchronous machine, permanent magnet AC machines, switched reluctance machine, stepper motor, hysteresis motor and universal motor
Derive equations describing the steady-state performance of DC machine, induction machine, synchronous machine and permanent magnet AC machines
Estimate the equivalent circuit parameters; torque-speed characteristics; iron, copper and mechanical losses; power factor; efficiency and operating mode of DC, induction, synchronous machine and permanent magnet AC machines
Verify the operation of DC, induction and synchronous machine using tests on an experimental setup
Choose the appropriate power electronic converter and method for speed control and starting of the machine
BSc course, Quarter 1
Taught together with Jose Rueda, Zian Qin.
This course teaches the fundamentals and analyses’ tools for the study of electrical sustainable power systems. The physics governing electric energy quantities such as voltage, electrical current, impedance, and power are explained. The working principles of the most important electrical energy components such as transformers, electric machines, power electronic devices and converters are given and their mathematical models are derived. Next, the rationale of interconnected electrical sustainable power systems and per-unit normalization for systemic studies are overviewed. The behavior and systemic interplay of power generation, transmission, and consumption are analyzed. The final stage covers the basics of power system control and power flow analysis based on iterative methods.