Book review: Women in Power

Vijay Venu Vadlamudi has written a brief book review on the book «Women in Power.» The book examines core areas of development in electrical power systems, emphasizing the pivotal contributions of female engineers to the industry’s evolution.

This amazing book, a very interesting and illuminating read, highlights the contributions of pioneering women to the research and development advances in electric power systems.

I would categorise this book as a ‘must-read’ for every member of academia, every practising engineer, and every researcher, in the field of electric power/energy engineering. Policy makers could stand to gain as well, from the many insights this book offers.

Women in Power: Research and Development Advances in Electric Power Systems | SpringerLink. Editors: Jill S. Tietjen, Marija D. Ilic, Lina Bertling Tjernberg, Noel N. Schulz.

Springer Link

Reading this book now, I am quite overcome with emotion. I have had the sheer fortune of being mentored by the only Norwegian woman to be featured in this book – Gerd Kjølle. In Chapter#7 in this book, Gerd succinctly crafts a compelling narrative for the concept of ‘Security of Electricity Supply’ in the future intelligent power system. Gerd is currently the Director of CINELDI: Centre for Intelligent Electricity Distribution – a Norwegian Centre for environment-friendly energy research.

 I have had longstanding successful professional collaborations with Gerd, for over a decade. She is a role model par excellence, and I am grateful for the guidance, inspiration, and confidence I continue to receive from her. Her professional brilliance as a teacher, a research scientist, and a research leader, is awe-invoking and inspiring; there is much more admirable and worthy of affection in the way she conducts herself with grace, kindness, and compassion. Pioneers like her, irrespective of gender, are a rarity.

 Through her ceaseless contributions to realising ‘a secure, resilient and sustainable power grid as the backbone of the Norwegian energy system for an electrified and net zero emission society’, Gerd makes Norway proud. All power to «Women in Power»!

About Vijay Venu Vadlamudi

Vijay pursued his M.Tech. and Ph.D. education at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Bombay, India, in 2006 and 2011, respectively. Currently, he works as an Associate Professor in Electric Power System Operation and Reliability Analysis at the Department of Electric Energy at the Norwegian University of Science and Technology – NTNU. He also holds a position at The Norwegian Smartgrid Center as a specialist in electrical power grids.

Since 2016, Vijay has been a member of the editorial board for the journal IET Generation, Transmission & Distribution, and has served as a Subject Editor in the field of Power System Reliability since 2018. In 2021, Vijay was promoted to the status of Senior Member – IEEE.