Kristina Bognar was born on March 3, 1983, in Budapest (Hungary).
She studied International Business at the University of San Francisco in 2002/03 and moved than to the Berlin Institute of Technology (TU Berlin) for completing her studies in the field of Industrial Engineering. In that period she studied also in Spain and Greece and joined the staff of Michael Cramer, Member of the European Parliament, in Brussels.
She wrote her diploma thesis about Sustainable Desalination based on Renewable Energies and received her diploma degree in 2008.
Since 2009 Kristina Bognar works at the Department of Energy Engineering (Chair of Energy Process Engineering and Conversion Technologies for Renewable Energy) as staff scientist. Her work is focused on self-sufficient energy infrastructure including seawater desalination for islands and remote areas based on renewable energies.
Complementing her studies and research Kristina Bognar played professional Volleyball in the USA and various European leagues. Her current team is the SC Potsdam in Germany's first division.
On islands and in isolated regions mainly diesel gensets generate electricity, which causes a high dependency on diesel imports. The key challenge is to replace a significant share of fossil-fuel based infrastructure with renewable energy technologies as wind energy converters, photovoltaic generators, solar thermal or geothermal energy, etc.
Various regions suffer fresh water scarcity due to the lack of natural water stocks. Seawater desalination can be a solution for such regions. The energetic integration of a desalination unit represents a significant challenge here. The interplay of energy storage systems, water production as deferrable load and fresh water storage will be based on extended simulations.
As research objects three islands of the SIDS (Small Island Developing States) with about 1000 to 5000 inhabitants are being investigated. An integrated energy and water supply system should be developed and investigated for the case studies based on regional conditions as well as economic and ecological analysis.
