MSc RENE provides you with a holistic understanding of the renewable energy sector. Thanks to strong partnerships between individual universities, local innovation centres, established businesses, start-ups and local research projects, the content of all courses remains at the forefront of current engineering, industrial and business practice.

Four partner universities host the MSc RENE programme. They are:

• IST: Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisbon, Portugal
• KTH: Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
• École Polytechnique, Paris, France
• UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech, Barcelona, Spain
  
  

Throughout the programme, strong emphasis is placed on developing your research, innovation, entrepreneurship and leadership skills, in addition to your technical knowledge and your understanding of the business environment in which renewable energies are deployed.

The business and entrepreneurial elements of the programme are delivered by the international business school:

• ESADE Business School, Spain

Year 1

In the first year, you will study at one of our four university partners:

• IST: Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisbon, Portugal
• KTH: Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
• École Polytechnique, Université Paris-Saclay, Paris, France
• UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech, Barcelona, Spain

You will take core modules in advanced technology concepts and methods, as well as in the production and utilisation of sustainable energy.

MSc RENE covers the four sectors where the impact of renewables on costs, market volumes, CO₂ emissions, and network integration are greatest: wind, solar photovoltaic, solar thermal, and ocean energies. The programme also includes courses on the energy economy and markets, as well as energy and the environment, to give you a broad perspective on the potential of renewable energy.

All first-year students also participate in an Innovation Seminar at UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech alongside our industrial and business partners.

Winter School

At the end of the first semester, first-year students participate in a one-week ‘Winter School’ at the ESADE Business Schoolin Barcelona. Here you will undertake courses on the fundamentals of entrepreneurship and innovation, including:

• Creative thinking
• Innovation and strategy
• Entrepreneurial finances
• Marketing for start-ups
• Intellectual property (IP) protection

After completing this course, you should be able to tackle and prepare feasibility studies for innovation processes.

Summer School

At the end of the first year, you return to ESADE for a three-week ‘Summer School’ that covers business and management topics in greater depth, including:

• Personal and professional skills
• New venture creation
• New product development and service innovation
• Managing high-performance teams
• Operations management
• HR management
• Corporate entrepreneurship

After completing this course, you should be able to tackle and prepare a business plan, manage innovation in a company or even create your own start-up.

Year 2

The second year is your chance to focus on the areas that interest you most. Students can choose from modules on the following areas of specialisation:

• Solar photovoltaics
• Solar thermal electricity
• Wind energy
• Hydropower
• Ocean and offshore energy
• Biomass and biofuels
• Integration of renewable systems with the energy system

Your choice of specialisation will determine which university you attend in your second year between:

• IST: Instituto Superior Técnico, Lisbon, Portugal
• KTH: Royal Institute of Technology, Stockholm, Sweden
• École Polytechnique, Université Paris-Saclay, Paris, France
• UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech, Barcelona, Spain

Your year 2 university needs to be different from your year 1 university.

Your Master’s thesis

You complete your second year with your Master’s thesis in the fourth and final semester. We strongly encourage you to undertake your thesis as part of an internship at one of our industrial or start-up partners, or at a research centre. Currently, more than 90 per cent of our students carry out their thesis at one of our partner companies.

Your thesis will be supervised by a professor at your university and a researcher from your host industrial or research partner. The thesis is worth 30 European Credit Transfer and Accumulation System credits (ECTS). It should be aligned with research or technology projects in renewable energy, and should have a strong practical element. We discourage theses that are 100 per cent research focused.

InnoEnergy continually strives to improve the quality, structure and content of our Master’s School programmes. Therefore, some changes may occur as part of our quality control process.

One of the world’s leading Master’s programmes for renewable energy, MSc RENE takes you across Europe to explore the future of sustainable energy systems.

Giving you a unique education comprising industrial practice, innovation and entrepreneurship expertise, and advanced leadership skills, complemented by the active participation of InnoEnergy industrial partners MSc RENE enables you to launch your career in a wide range of renewable energy businesses or research settings.

In particular, you will gain:

• Broad knowledge of sustainable energy systems and sources, and the ability to judge the technical, economical, social, and environmental impacts of each.
• Deep understanding of individual renewable energy technologies, as well as energy management, planning, economy and market contexts.
• Analytical capabilities, enabling you to formulate and manage technical problems from a system perspective and to solve problems around energy conversion, transportation, storage and utilisation.
• Interpersonal skills, including leadership, project management, team working, business management, and communication.
• The ability to think beyond boundaries and to generate new ideas and create new or significantly improved products, services, processes, and businesses.
• An understanding of cutting-edge research and innovation methods, business management, and business creation principles.

The MSc RENE programme requires you to study at two separate universities in two different countries. The programme gives you the opportunity to start building your international network by working closely with fellow students from around the world, while the business-focused elements of the curriculum explore how to work in and manage multi-cultural teams.

You spend your first year at one of the following institutions, and your second year at another:

• IST: Instituto Superior Técnico, in Lisbon, Portugal
• KTH: Royal Institute of Technology, in Stockholm, Sweden
• École Polytechnique in Paris, France
• UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech, in Spain

You will also attend courses at the ESADE Business School in Barcelona, Spain.

After successfully completing the programme, you will receive a degree from each of your chosen universities:

• IST: Master of Energy Engineering and Management
• KTH: Master of Science, fromKTH: Royal Institute of Technology, Sweden
• École Polytechnique: Graduate Degree Programme in Energy Environment: Science Technology and Management (STEEM)
• UPC: Master of Energy Engineering

You also receive a diploma from ESADE.

The EIT Label is a quality seal awarded by the European Institute of Innovation and Technology (EIT) to a KIC educational programme that has been assessed positively by the EIT on the implementation of the EIT Quality Assurance and Learning Enhancement (EIT QALE) system and the application of specific quality criteria with focus on the EIT Overarching Learning Outcomes (EIT OLOs), robust entrepreneurship education, highly integrated, innovative ‘learning-by-doing’ curricula, international mobility and outreach. For more information please check here.

The RENE Master’s programme gives you plenty of chances to meet and engage with our industrial partners, business experts, fellow students, recent graduates and thriving start-ups throughout your two years of study.

Specific opportunities to engage directly with industry partners include:

Students discuss successful examples of innovation with our industry partners at this two-day event at UPC: Universitat Politècnica de Catalunya · BarcelonaTech. You will also have the opportunity to meet with industrial experts in an informal setting, while getting your first taste of the role of innovation in the renewable energy sector.

A core part of the MSc RENE programme, the engineering and business case programme consists of three modules that you undertake over two years of study. This is the principle method for real-life interaction between students and companies in the renewable energy sector on the MSc RENE programme. Full details can be found here.

The Iberdrola Energy Challenge is a competition for students and alumni, designed to encourage and promote a sustainable and energy-efficient society. Working individually or in a group of 2 to 4 people, you can develop innovative, disruptive ideas in topics such as global affordable energy, new digital models in energy, and social economy for affordable energy. The winners are those with the most commercially viable potential for large-scale development.

“In line with our strategy to boost innovation, Iberdrola is looking for outstanding leaders who can improve corporate performance and drive competitive advantage in a rapidly changing economy. In this sense, our Company invests in disruptive technologies and businesses that will ensure the sustainability of the Energy System. On that regard, Iberdrola launched the “Iberdrola Energy Challenge”, a unique initiative addressed to students of InnoEnergy, based on three main topics related to the energy sector: Global Affordable Energy, New Digital Models in Energy and Social Economy for Affordable Energy. After reviewing all the proposals from the different participants, we can say that every project fulfilled our expectations according to the Iberdrola strategy to boost innovation: We received
48 projects (167 participants) coming from 32 countries, with an average age of 26 years old”.

– Augustin Delgado, Innovation Director at Iberdrola

More than 25 companies are currently involved in MSc RENE, including: Total, Electricité de France (EdF), Energias de Portugal (EDP), Iberdrola, Gas Natural Fenosa, Meyer Burger, COMSA Corporación, Alstom Wind, AEInnova, CorPower Ocean AB, EOLOS, Principle Power Inc, Siarq, Smalle Technologies, and Tecnoturbines.