Brian Ó Gallachóir

Brian Ó Gallachóir is Professor of Sustainability at University College Cork and Director of the Sustainability Institute, overseeing the strategic direction of over 480 sustainability researchers at UCC. Brian is also Associate Vice-President of Sustainability, consolidating UCC's role as an internationally leading university of sustainability. In addition Brian is Director of MaREI, the €130 million Research Ireland centre for energy, climate and marine and Director of ERBE, the UK-Ireland centre for doctoral training in energy resilience in the built environment.

Brian established energy systems optimisation modelling as a new research field in Ireland. He is ranked in the top 0.04% of energy scholars globally by ScholarGPS and is the elected Chair of International Energy Agency Technology Collaboration Programme on energy systems modelling. Brian has also led research into the societal dimensions of the energy transition including the multi-award winning Dingle Peninsula 2030 partnership.

Brian has over 30 years experience of using his research to inform, underpin and co-produce Irish and EU energy and climate policies. He is a Co-Chair of the Ministerial National Mirror Group for the EU Mission Cities, a member of the Climate Action Modelling Group and the Advisory Group on Social and Behavioural Research for Climate Action.

Brian received the SFI Best International Engagement Award 2020, the inaugural SFI Engaged Research Award 2022, and the inaugural Irish Times Positive Impacts Award for Sustainability in 2024. Brian is an elected Fellow of the Irish Academy of Engineering has a B.Sc. from TCD and a PhD from UCC.