Paolo Marocco Wins the “Best Researcher of the Year” Award
Paolo Marocco, a researcher at the “Galileo Ferraris” Department of Energy-DENERG at Politecnico di Torino, has been awarded the prestigious "Best Researcher of the Year" prize. This recognition, presented annually by Hydrogen Europe Research-HER – an international non-profit association comprising over 150 universities and research organisations active in the European hydrogen and fuel cell sector – is part of the Young Scientist Award competition. This initiative is designed to reward promising young researchers aged 35 or under affiliated with HER member organisations. Through this award, the association seeks to highlight the efforts of students, doctoral candidates, postdoctoral fellows, and young researchers, encouraging their participation in the Clean Hydrogen Partnership projects, which aim to contribute to the EU Green Deal and hydrogen strategy.
The Young Scientist Award focuses on four key pillars: hydrogen production, storage and distribution, applications, and cross-cutting activities. A winner is selected for each pillar, while an additional prize is granted to the researcher whose work is deemed particularly promising for the future of the field.
This last award, "Best Researcher of the Year," has been granted for the first time to a researcher from Politecnico di Torino. Paolo Marocco earned this recognition for his work since 2017 within the Synergies of Thermo-chemical and Electro-chemical Power Systems (STEPS) group at DENERG. The group explores thermochemical and electrochemical processes for hydrogen generation, synthetic fuels from renewable energy, CO2 recycling, and electricity production. Under the supervision of Professor Massimo Santarelli, Marocco specifically focuses on testing and characterising hydrogen-based technologies, such as electrolysers and fuel cells. He also develops methodologies for designing and optimising complex energy systems, with a particular focus on the entire hydrogen value chain: from production to storage and transport, up to its multiple end uses. Marocco’s contribution to numerous international projects and his collaborations with local organisations and companies were significant factors in the final decision to award him the prize.
“I am honoured to have received this award,” commented Paolo Marocco. “It serves as further motivation to continue my research on such a relevant and cross-cutting topic as hydrogen. I would like to share this achievement with everyone I collaborate with on these topics, especially the STEPS research group.”
The award ceremony took place on 20 November in Brussels at the Brussels Expo during the European Hydrogen Week 2024.