Dr. Bartocci Pietro, Marie Curie International Fellow at the Spanish National Research Council (CSIC) and researcher at Perugia University (Italy), has been among the first batch of EU visiting professors contributing to ICARE’s course teaching and student supervision. Here, he will share his story of how he has established many beautiful relationships with HUST and how he has benefited from ICARE collaboration.

How to make a summary of the nice relationship we have built at ICARE during at past 10 years of continuous visiting and collaboration in HUST? We have made many things together and established many friendly relationships. If we think about work, I came in HUST in 2012, when I was a post-doc, as a tutor in an LCA course. I then became fascinated by China, its traditions which were mixed with high level technology and great opportunities to study and improve. I also liked the happy mood I saw among the people, as well as the assistance I gave through my teaching. I also learned much from this exchange experience: knowledge, pedagogy, and on how to behave in an international work environment.

So, I taught several courses ranging from Energy Economics, LCA, to energy policy. I also collaborated with very skilled Chinese colleagues, who transmitted a lot of information to me,  along with important methods and approaches to use in the research environment. The opportunity to work at HUST has provided me the chance to grow and enhance my curriculum and the possibility to achieve great success also in Europe - since I won a Marie Curie grant which has 4% success rate, also because of the help and professional growth I had in China. I think I would really not have achieved all the professional success I have had up to now without the help of my colleagues in HUST.

During my experience I had the chance not only to learn how to build a course and improve my teaching activity and pedagogic skills, but also improve in tutoring. I have supervised 19 students in my collaboration with HUST, 5 internships in Italy, 1 internship in Spain (right now when I am writing), 2 PhD students (one in China and one in Italy). All the students followed have achieved great professional success and top placements in multinational companies and research institutes at the international level. I am sincerely convinced that year by year through training, hard work and faithful cooperation we have achieved top levels of training and education in ICARE, and we are really preparing the young Chinese students for their future challenges. First of all, teaching them critical thinking and to compete for opportunities and the will to affirm themselves and achieve leadership roles, based on sincere confidence on their means.

It would not be possible to speak about my experience in HUST without speaking of my colleagues. My first relationship was with the State Key Laboratory on Coal Combustion. When we first shared our research experience, I was sincerely impressed by the state of advancement of knowledge in the institute, and I think that it was the first time in which I realized I was not only coming to China to teach - but also to learn much. I established a long collaboration with the staff, especially Prof. Haiping Yang, who is a renowned professor with important international networks. She has helped me a lot in improving my knowledge. I think it is thanks to the help given by this collaboration that I could be inserted in the editorial board of FUEL journal, which is for me the most important and traditional scientific journal on the fuel and energy sector, founded in 1920. With prof. Haiping Yang we have published more than 10 papers indexed in Scopus together.

Then I collaborated with prof. Qing Yang who has helped me achieving great results as well. For example, we have launched a golden open access journal named ENERGY NEXUS, which is currently published by Elsevier. We collaborate daily on paper reviewing and also on shaping results and developing new projects in this sector, for more than one year. Not only this, we have also realized a publication with Harvard University which could not have been possible without the help of prof. Qing Yang. This has also promoted my career in Italy, where I received many congratulations from my colleagues at the University of Perugia. Besides this we have collaborated in teaching LCA and Energy Economics and we are creating a mix which is very interesting where I provide theory and knowledge on the subjects, while prof. Qing Yang trains the student to apply the knowledge to the Chinese situation, using data collected in the field.

I want to thank also:

- prof. Alain Thorel director of ICARE, who helped in shaping the current course offering and is doing breakthrough research on key topics such as hydrogen and fuel cells;

- prof. Luo Xiaobing, Chinese dean of ICARE for having an enlightened managing capacity - always thinking how to expand and make the center more competitive;

- prof. Michel Farine for helping with every need I had, as my first contact point when I arrived in ICARE in 2012. But also, for continuous support in teaching and research activity and also for good moral support in the many difficulties I had;

- prof. Hu Song, research director of ICARE, he really opened the doors of what was the high-level research of ICARE, he introduced me to prof. Yan Yunjun and to many other important professors, always giving good advice and support;

- prof. Hong Yao who I remember with great happiness, when he helped me to connect with all the staff of the State Key Laboratory on Coal Combustion, when I said I wanted to learn more about pyrolysis. He gave me great help.

Special greetings go to PhD students like Hewen Zhou who was an intern in Italy and now is a PhD student in HUST, or PhD students like Eid Gul, who was an ICARE student and now is a PhD student in Perugia University, Italy. Hoping the best for their future career and wishing they have a beautiful life and many successes.

I conclude this short summary of many memories thanking again all the administrative staff in ICARE who are doing a great, great job. Special greetings go to Sally, Liu Yang, Sonia, Lili, Jason, Aviva and many others.

I conclude saying that yes, I am losing some sleep in collaborating with my Chinese colleagues when I am in Italy, due to different time zones, and also I made some sacrifices flying to China to teach during Christmas holidays or during some particular periods where my presence was needed in Italy, but these little sacrifices have brought me to achieve great results, of which I am very proud.

Source: China-EU Institute for Clean and Renewable Energy(ICARE), HUST

Edited by: Xie Chunhua, Scott, Jiang Jing