Gian Carlo Montanari

Born in Bologna on 8 November 1955, he received his Dr. Eng. degree in Electrical Engineering from the University of Bologna with the maximum rank and honours.

From 14 May 1983 to 15 June 1987 he joined the University of  Bologna, Institute of Industrial Electrotechnic, as an Assistant Professor.

On June 1987 and October 2000 he became Associate and Full Professor of Electrical Technology, respectively, at the Department of Electrical Engineering, and still teaches Technology and reliability courses at the University of Bologna.

He has worked since 1979 in the field of aging and endurance of solid insulating materials and systems at the department of Electrical Engineering, where he is responsible for the Material Engineering and High-Voltage Laboratory. He is also engaged in the fields of power quality and power systems design, power electronics, statistics, new materials for electrical applications (superconductors, nanomaterials, piezoelectrics), diagnostics of electrical assets and asset management.

He won the 1987 Committee Prize Paper Award of the Industrial  and Commercial Power System Department of IEEE on Industry Application for the paper "Voltage-Distortion Compensation in Electrical Plants Supplying Static Power Converters". In 1988 he was awarded by the prize "Faletti-Nosari" from AEI (Associazione Elettrotecnica Italiana) for the paper "Voltage and current distortion compensation in electrical plants supplying static converters" (in Italian). In 1995 he won the prize "Asea Brown Boveri" given by AEI for the paper "New statistical techniques for the identification of partial discharge phenomena" (in Italian).

In 2006 he was awarded by IEC with the 1906 Award, and by IEEE DEIS with the Ziu-Yeda Memorial Lecture (given at the ICPADM conference).

In 2008 he was awarded by IEEE DEIS with T.W. Dakin Award and the Silver Certificate Award form the Wire Association International.

In 2010 he was awarded by IEEE DEIS/CEIDP with the Whitehead Memorial Lecture.

Since 1987 he is member of the working group 1 of Committee 15E (now TC 112) IEC, becoming convener in 1996. He is also member of various WG of TC 112. He is member of WGs of  IEC TC2. He is Italian representative in TC 112.

From 1996 to 2003 he was the Italian representative in CIGRE' (TC15, now D1). He is President of the Italian Chapter of the IEEE DEIS.

From 1995 to 1999 he was AdCom member of the IEEE DEIS and member of the board of the conference IEEE CEIDP (Conference on Electrical Insulation and Dielectric Phenomena). From 2004 to 2008 he was again AdCom member of IEEE DEIS. He is member of the Advisory Committee of the conferences IEEE ISEI (International Symposium on Electrical Insulation) and IEEE ICPADM (International Conference on Properties and Applications of Dielectric Materials), IEEE ICSD (International Conference on Solid Dielectrics). He is also member of the Scientific Committee of the conference IEEE CSC (International Conference on Space Charge in Solid Dielectrics) and of the International Advisory Committee of the conference IEEE ISEIM (International Symposium on Electrical Insulating Materials), IEEE CATCON, IEEE INSUCON and POWERCON. From 1988 to 1999 he was also member of the Scientific Committee of the IEEE International Conference on Harmonics in Power Systems (ICHPS; ICHQP since 1996). From 1998 to 2002 he has been member of the Scientific Committee of the conference IEEE ISE (International Symposium on Electrets).

He organized the 1994 IEEE ICHPS VI and the 1995 EAEEIE Conference. He has been session chairman and organizer of several conferences, among them ICHQP, ISEI, ISEIM, EIC, Powercon, ICSD, ICPADM, CEIDP. He has been also program chairman of the IEEE International Conference on Conduction and Breakdown in Solid Dielectrics (June 1992). He has been asked for several invited papers in international conferences and workshops.

He has been convener of the Statistics Committee, which developed the IEEE 930, Guide for the Statistical Analysis of Electrical Insulation Breakdown Data, and member of the Space Charge, Multifactor Stress and Meetings Committees of IEEE DEIS. He has contributed to develop the IEEE 519 standards on harmonics and power quality. As IEC WG convenor in the TC 2, TC 112 and TC 33 committees, he brought to issue standards as IEC 60216 (Guide for the determination of thermal endurance properties of electrical insulating materials),  IEC 61642 (Industrial a.c. neworks affected by harmonics – Application of filters and shunt capacitors), IEC 62068 (Electrical insulation systems (EIS). Electrical stresses produced by repetitive impulses - Part 1: General methods of evaluation of electrical endurance), IEC 61934 (Electrical insulating materials and systems - Electrical measurement of partial discharges (PD) under short rise time and repetitive voltage impulses).

Since 2001 he is Associate Editor of IEEE Transactions on Dielectrics and Electrical Insulation.

He is referee of several IEEE Transactions journals, as well as  Journal of Applied Physics, Journal of Physics D: Applied Physics, Journal of Electrostatics and others. He is international referee for the Foundation for Research, Science and Technology of New Zealand , for the National Research Council of Norway and for the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council, UK..

He founded and leads the LIMAT (High Voltage and Material Engineering Lab) of the Department of Electrical Engineering of the Bologna University.

He is founder and  President of TechImp, spin-off of the university of  Bologna, established on September 1999.

He has been responsible of national and international research projects, involving public institutions (as the Ministry of University and Research of Italy and the European Community) and private organisations (e.g. Pirelli, Borealis, ENEL, CESI, TERNA, EDF, Pfisterer, Nexans). He has also coordinated, as local responsible, three major European projects (ARTEMIS: Ageing and Reliability Testing and Monitoring of power cables: diagnosis for Insulation Systems), DURASMART and  HVDC).

He is  IEEE Fellow and member of AEI and The Dielectrics Society.

He has been member of the managing board of College of Excellence and of the Institute of Advanced Studies of the University Bologna .

From 1997 to 2002 he was the President of the Council of the Course in Electrical Engineering of the University of Bologna.

He is author of 708 scientific papers; 139 of these papers were published in IEEE Transactions (on 11 different Journals), 85 in major international scientific journals, while more than 400 papers were presented at international conferences. He also filed more than 15 patents.

His major contributions to the scientific activity go from the investigation of HT superconductors, nanomaterials, electro-active polymers, various types of polymeric insulating materials, to the development of innovative space charge detection systems (also high speed, different frequencies), of partial discharge, dissipation factor and dissolved gas analysis measurement systems, global diagnostic and smart grid approach for electrical assets. He has been active in statistics and reliability algorithms applied to electrical apparatus, power electronics and power quality. Thanks to Techimp, most of the ideas were transformed into commercial products and then checked in on-field applications.