Ed Brown is the MECS Research Director. He is a Professor of Global Energy Challenges at Loughborough University with research interests in the fields of governance and international development issues with current research outputs focusing upon: questions of transparency and corruption; financial globalization and the financial needs of the poor; and energy access and low carbon energy transitions. Ed has also long had a particular interest in the Central American region where he has explored the political economy of state reforms as well as the broader impacts of neoliberal globalization. As well as being the MECS PI, Ed is the Co-Coordinator of the UK Low Carbon Energy for Development Network through which we are building bridges between the divergent branches of academia working on energy and international development issues. Through this he also leads the LCEDN’s involvement in DFID’s Transforming Energy Access initiative. He is (or has recently been) PI on three EPSRC/DFID-funded projects in this field. One involved networking the projects funded under the RCUK Understanding Sustainable Energy Solutions (USES Network) programme, whilst the other two were research projects, one exploring the implications of political decentralization for energy governance in Africa (READ) and the other exploring the potential of solar nano-grids in the contexts of Kenya and Bangladesh (SONG).

Simon Batchelor