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PhD researcher in Urban Agriculture and Life Cycle Assessment 

Ref: 2024DILIFRUA196

 

Job Position

PhD Researcher

Realization of the first doctoral thesis.

The person chosen will support the line of research in urban agriculture of the Sostenipra group, in the aspects of life cycle analysis through, mainly, the Foodcityboost project, Binafet, Focuse, WEF4Build and the strategic projects in which the group participates, to carry out their first doctoral thesi-

The projects to which the candidate will be linked have as their objective the use of the life cycle tool (LCA), applied more specifically to the sustainability of both urban and peri-urban agricultural systems as well as those systems that reuse residual flows for food production. Among the planned tasks, the candidate is expected to:

Collection of data from both urban and peri-urban agricultural plots

• Selection of indicators of different types of urban exploitation with LCA-based approaches (attributional and consequential methods) from Living Labs in Europe.
   
• Environmental analysis, based on the LCA methodology of five farms. Each farm is devoted to a different type of cultivation: vines, horticulture, apple trees and pasture. In addition, each farm has land managed conventionally and another under regenerative agriculture practices.
   
• Calculation of the carbon footprint, the calculation of the water footprint, as well as the environmental and social footprint, of the analyzed agricultural plots.
   
• Determine tools and methods to ensure urban food production using local resources (eg struvite and urine) and CO2 intensification of human generation indoors.
   
• Assess life-cycle impacts, resource efficiency, site-specific emissions and micro-scale socio-economic implications (e.g. building integration, specific solutions, etc.) based on case studies generated by the group.
   
• Attend meetings and training sessions related to and/or relevant projects.
   
• Update of the Life Cycle inventories ensuring the maintenance of the LCADB database.
   
• Write peer review articles with main findings.
   
• Elaborate a doctoral thesis.
   

Job position requirements (skills/languages/required experience)
 

Studies

• Master's degree that gives access to the doctorate in Environmental Science and Technology of the UAB in; Environmental and Environmental Engineering; Chemical Engineering; Environmental sciences, agricultural engineer, horticultural sciences, agricultural and forestry sciences and technologies, biotechnology, plant biology, studies I nterdisciplinary in environmental, economic and social sustainability, applied pharmaceutical sciences or other related areas.
• A Master's degree that includes life cycle analysis content will be valued, and especially if it is applied in horticulture, or urban agriculture or equivalent

Computer

• Strong IT and database skills for life cycle assessment. Experience with LCA software (eg SimaPro, GaBi) will be valued.

Languages

• Excellent spoken and written English
• Spanish/Catalan
• Other languages are a plus.

Work Experience

• Mobility between countries
• Studies in different universities
• Experiences in citizen participation and co-creation processes
• Knowledge of urban agriculture

Other requeriments

• Studies in agronomy and economics
• Good knowledge of LCA software such as GaBi, Simapro and LCIA methods
• Good knowledge of Excel
• Demonstrated ability to carry out technical writing tasks.

Benefits

• Annual Gross Salary: 23.500€

Eligibility criteria  

• Academic record – 40 points
  Studies in the required specialty: Studies in life cycle analysis, agronomy Master in Environmental Studies, urban agriculture, agronomy or equivalent Research plan that includes some of the points of the tasks to be developed (life cycle analysis) 100%; Other studies: 20%; Doctoral thesis started or completed and its activities 0%
   
• Computer skills: 10 points
  All necessary: ​​100%; Not all necessary: ​​0%
   
• Linguistic competence: 10 points
  Native English or Catalan or Spanish: 50%; Level C1 (non-native) of English, or Catalan or Spanish or equivalent: 50%; B1 level of English, Catalan or Spanish or equivalent: 20%
   
• Experience: 10 points
  All necessary: ​​100%; Not all necessary: ​​0%
   
• Interview: 30 points

Candidates who score at least 50 points in this first phase will be invited for an interview. The interview will include an oral presentation of a recent research project related to the topic of this job offer (master's thesis or similar)

Minimum score required to pass the selection process: 70
 

Selection process:

• Candidates who score at least 50 points in this first phase will be invited for an interview. The interview will include an oral presentation of a recent research project related to the topic of this job offer (master's thesis or similar).

  The selection committee reserves the right to not fill this position if no suitable candidate is identified.The interview will include an oral presentation of a recent research project related to the topic of this job offer (master's thesis or similar).

  To validate this request, you must validate the form that is accessed at the URL https://seleccio.uab.cat/ 

  Any application that is not submitted in this way will not be included in the selection process.

Additional Information

• Reference Offer: 2024DILIFRUA196 
• Programmes: HEU-101132315-FOODCITYBOO.
• You will find the bases of the call in the following link:  https://tauler.seu.cat/pagDetall.do?idEdicte=529293&idens=11 
• To validate your request, please complete the form available at https://seleccio.uab.cat/. Applications not submitted through this link will not be considered in the selection process.

Postdoctoral Researcher in GHG monitoring in the URBAG project

Ref: 2024DILIFRUA160

 

Job Position

The postdoctoral fellow will be working alongside the URBAG research team (visit www.urbag.eu to learn more about our research and the team) and will be responsible for the GHG monitoring network that has recently been developed (visit https://urbag.eu/ghg/) and for developing a line of research that includes several of the following objectives, to be further defined by the candidate:

• Explore how various land uses of the urban region such as agriculture, parks, urban forest, and built areas affect the budget of CO2 in the city, while understanding the role of atmospheric processes in the transport and distribution of CO2.
   
• Develop services, tools, and datasets based on the needs of cities, for processing and analyzing the observation data to determine efficacy of GHG reduction strategies; raising awareness and engaging citizens.
   
• Collaborate with other SOMMA centers in the exploitation of this data, such as BSC, IS Global, CREAF and others with whom we have already established collaboration for the use of this data.
   
• Provide an exemplary urban GHG monitoring system in Europe and contribute to the European ambitious climate strategy to meet the targets of the Paris Agreement.
   
• Validate GHGs inventory accounts determined by the city administration as well as urban GHGs modeling efforts and to create repositories of atmospheric C distribution in cities. 
   
• Intervene with schools in the city of Barcelona, so that climate culture forms part of the schools' curricula and transversal projects.
   
• Supporting the core Maria de Maeztu challenges of ICTA-UAB (oceanic and land-use systems, cities, production and consumption patterns, and transformative policies) with pertinent data for their projects; i.e., modeling GHG changes due to "transformative policies", analyzing land-atmosphere CO2 exchange for urban land uses for "cities").

Furthermore, the candidate will be responsible for carrying out the tasks of the recently awarded EU project GASPOF " Pervasive gas sensing using optical fibers, as part of the communication network of the future", in which he/she will be dedicated to do the following tasks:

• task 1)   This task will focus on identifying and categorising stakeholder groups related to GASPOF developments and collecting their requirements. Focus will be placed on the GASPOF case studies’ application domains (pervasive greenhouse gases monitoring, indoor air quality monitoring, volcanic activity monitoring, pipelines monitoring).
   
• task 2)   Acquire an understanding of how the different system components will be tested and validated. This will require a definition of validation procedures which will include concentrations, frequency and method for sampling, golden standard techniques used for comparisons etc.
   
• task 3)   Define the technical requirements/targets for the GASPOF system components. The technical specification requirements will cover: a) the spectroscopic setups and target performance indicators, b) the optical sources to use and target wavelengths for the sensing operations, c) the requirements for the operation of the telecommunications infrastructure in combination with the sensing elements, d) the integrated versions of the prototypes (including sub-modules such as the processing units).
   

Contract duration:  24 months

Benefits

• Annual Gross salary: 43.000 €

Eligibility criteria  

PhD in environmental science, preferably atmospheric chemistry, physics, chemistry, modeling; Proficient in python, useful to have skills in fortran;  Experience with atmospheric models is preferable, especially biosphere, chemical transport models and urban canopy models. Such as WRF, WRF-Chem, SUES, VPRM, Hysplit; English – C1;

Experience: Science background preferable; expertise and experience with implementing, maintaining, and managing gas analyzers for GHG such as picarros, licor, los gatos; knowledge in atmospheric chemistry; experience with atmospheric models preferable.
 

• Academic record – 20 points
  Studies of the required specialization: 100%; Other studies: 20%

• Languages – 10

• Scientific curriculum 30 (publications, projects)

• Experience - 40
   

Minimum score required to pass the selection process: 70

Selection process:

• A single curricular phase.

• To validate this request, you must validate the form that is accessed at the URL https://seleccio.uab.cat/ 

• Any application that is not submitted in this way will not be included in the selection process.

Additional Information

• Reference Offer: 2024DILIFRUA160
• Programmes:  NUTRISOIL- 101138151 -HOR . 101189654-GASPOF
• You will find the bases of the call in the following link: https://tauler.seu.cat/pagDetall.do?idEdicte=524875&idens=11
• To validate your request, please complete the form available at https://seleccio.uab.cat/. Applications not submitted through this link will not be considered in the selection process.

Application Deadline: 8 Jan 2025 - 23:59 (Europe/Madrid)

ICTA-UAB participates in INPhINIT 'la Caixa' Fellowship Programme

Find all the information here