Hannah Daly is Professor of Sustainable Energy at University College Cork, where she co-leads the Energy Policy and Modelling Group. Her research focuses on modelling national and global decarbonisation pathways, with particular expertise in energy systems, carbon budgets, and climate policy. She is Principal Investigator of multi-million-euro research projects, serves as the founding Programme Director of UCC’s new BSc Sustainability, and has served as a lead author of Ireland’s Climate Change Assessment.
Before joining UCC, Hannah worked at the International Energy Agency in Paris, leading the World Energy Outlook work on energy access and sustainable development. She is a recognised public voice on climate and energy, writing a monthly column for The Irish Times, and frequently advises government, parliament, civil society, and international organisations.
She was born when atmospheric CO2 concentrations were 351 parts per million; they now stand at nearly 430 parts per million.
Career profile
2019-present: Professor (since 2022) in Sustainable Energy, University College Cork. You can find out more about my Teaching and Research on this website. I’m affiliated with MaREI, the SFI Centre for Climate, Energy and the Marine and co-lead the Energy Policy and Modelling Group at UCC’s Sustainability Institute.
2015-2019: Lead on energy access at the International Energy Agency (IEA), leading the topic of energy development for the World Energy Outlook (WEO), co-authoring the 2017 Energy Access Outlook report.
2012-2015: Postdoctoral researcher in energy systems modelling at the UCL Energy Institute, developing the UK TIMES Model (UKTM) and helping bring about its adoption by the (former) Department for Energy and Climate Change as the central energy systems tool for the UK government. My research also developed the state-of-the-art of the representation of behaviour, demand and populations in energy system models, and integrated indirect GHGs in energy systems analyses.
2009-2012: Ph.D. with the Energy Policy and Modelling Group at University College Cork, under the supervision of Professor Brian O’Gallachoir. Ph.D. thesis: “Transport energy demand: techno-economic modelling and scenarios for Irish climate policy” (download thesis here).