The ChallengeIn an industrial context that is becoming increasingly digitized, human-centered, and sustainable, information and data related to sustainability need to be collected, assessed, and shared across the entire European railway sector.
Two perspectives can be identified. One perspective is the management of environmental data and information across the EU railway sector. To enable the collection and sharing of this data, it is first necessary to develop common criteria, a common language and recognizable goals for the sector. It also requires the collection of life cycle data, including environmental impacts and material use, e.g. as collected in material passports.
Another perspective is that of eco-labels, which are instrumental in making informed inter-organizational decisions about the current and future state of railway systems and their components across Europe. Eco-labels are accessible collections of information that concisely describe the key environmental impacts of various products, goods and services over their entire life cycle. Despite the existence of international standards, ecolabels need to be developed, maintained and managed by different organizations, and their principles and procedures need to be tailored to specific applications.
Overall, the PhD research project focuses on the design and evaluation of (1) Environmental information management methods and tools, and (2) Environmental indicators for specific applications in the railway sector (e.g., Ecolabels for infrastructure or rolling stock), for the European railway infrastructure. The research is supported by the
European Joint Rail Undertaking of the European Union, which allows for an international knowledge exchange with international railway partners.
Job descriptionAs a PhD candidate, you will be responsible for carrying out an independent, full-time, 4-year research project that requires the integration of several research areas at the interface between engineering and management. As part of the research project, you will have the opportunity to evaluate your developed methods and tools in practice, together with several partners in the European railway sector. You will be assigned to the Asset Management & Maintenance Engineering (AMME) group, which is part of the Department of Design, Production and Management (DPM) of the Faculty of Engineering Technology (ET). Together with our (inter)national partners and contacts, our group strives to develop state-of-the-art solutions to fundamental and practical challenges in the field of Asset Management and Maintenance Engineering.