New correspondent: Meng Ba from Stockholm, Sweden

Today our team was joined by an ambassador – Meng Ba – from the Swedish KTH  School of Industrial Engineering and Management. He shares this position with Luyao Yuan from KTH Royal Institute of Technology. Meng Ba is master student from the “Mechatronics Program” and at the moment busy with improving vehicle fuel efficiency. Meng Ba is very much motivated to join Cool Down The Planet and help unroll our video platform. This means: help us find suitable subjects to be featured in his country. But first we asked him to answer some questions.

Meng Ba, can you introduce yourself?

My name is Meng Ba. I’m a second year master student of Mechatronics Program at KTH, School of Industrial Engineering and Management , after I obtained the bachelor’s degree in the same field. In the last year, I participated in Shell Eco-Marathon competition as a team member on behalf of KTH. This competition aims to alleviate the contradiction between human need and energy crisis to some extent by improving vehicle fuel efficiency. Currently, I’m building a test rig to conveniently test the fuel consumption of an Hybrid Electric Vehicle (HEV) prototype that is used for the race.

What motivated you to choose for this study?

I’m full of enthusiasm on finding possible combinations and applications of the newest theory and technology, especially in the field of vehicles, the most typical mechatronics systems. Motivated by this great interest, I have been majoring in Mechatronics for more than 5 years, obtaining solid background knowledge and abundant practical experience. However, traditional vehicles can not satisfy new demands with respect to resource and environment. Current researches focus on power-management of hybrid cars, commercialization of electric vehicles and automatic drive technique.

What are your ambitions? How would you like to develop your future career?

My ambition is to make contributes to vehicles’ development as a professor at a university or a researcher in a company. For now, I’m seeking a Ph.D. position to acquire more knowledge. And in the meanwhile, I’m also working as a teacher assistant to facilitate my future career.

Do you see any consequences from climate change in your region? If yes, can you give an example?

Sweden is a pretty sustainable country where energy is managed in a decent way. Even though, climate change is still influencing this beautiful place by generating more extreme weather. In 2016, Sweden met the coldest December in 100 years. Besides, the summer of Sweden is not as comfortable as before because of higher temperature.

What do you consider is a strong quality of the Cool Down The Planet formula? 

”Cool Down The Planet”​ is a rather promising platform for its great openness, which is the most significant quality in my opinion. The issue of climate change needs the effort from the whole mankind. I hope this formula will engage more and more people in making devoted career decisions, which will give them limitless possibilities.