Staff members of the Mongolian University of Science and Technology (MUST) and the Ministry of Energy (MoE) visited Germany from 12-16 June during a delegation trip within the scope of the BMZ-funded project with Mongolia titled “Improving quality infrastructure in the energy sector”. One component of the project, which ended in August, focused on raising awareness of the role of quality infrastructure (QI) in the energy sector.
Discussions and networking with the relevant interest groups involved in the topic of integrating quality infrastructure into academic education in Germany and in Mongolia were at the focus of the study visit.
A particularly interesting meeting took place with Prof Dr Knut Blind from the Technical University (TU) of Berlin and Dr Claudia Koch from the BAM Federal Institute for Materials Research and Testing and also included information about the “Quality Infrastructure Management” degree course that has been offered by the TU since 2016.
An additional dialogue took place with Prof Dr Meinhard Schilling from the Braunschweig International Graduate School of Metrology (B-IGSM) and Prof Dr Markus Ludwig with his staff from the Institute of Economics of the TU Braunschweig. During the meeting, the delegation was able to gain an impression of the diverse international QI-related research projects of the faculty.
Putting theories into practice
In addition to theoretical discussions on QI, the delegates also gained practical insight into the work of the German Institute for Standardization (DIN) and PTB, where they visited the Wind Competence Center’s torque standard facility. During the meeting with PTB’s Innovation Cluster for Energy, the delegates had the opportunity to discuss future possibilities for QI and the diverse interactions between fields of activity.
In Schöneberg (Berlin), the delegates learned about the practical implementation of modern QI aspects through a visit to the GASAG Solution Plus energy workshop and the battery storage of the automobile manufacturer Audi on the EUREF campus. Furthermore, Perschmann Calibration GmbH offered a glimpse into vocational training and career opportunities in the fields of testing, measurement and certification and emphasized the importance of QI and an understanding of quality in the curriculum of technical professions.
Starting this winter: The first QI study programme in Mongolia
The PTB project implemented in collaboration with the Mongolian Ministry of Energy successfully contributed to raising awareness of the significance of QI for the Mongolian economy. In turn, staff members of the MUST and the MoE actively committed to promoting QI-relevant contents in education. This is reflected in the successful implementation of numerous activities at the national level. These include the production of training videos and the implementation of a university competition on the topic of QI in the energy sector. Beyond that, the collaboration with Section 9.32 of PTB’s International Cooperation Group inspired the MUST to create the master’s degree course titled “Electrical energy quality infrastructure” and to write a course book on the topic of QI. The study programme will be officially offered for the first time in the coming 2023/2024 winter semester.
The multifaceted and successful study visit of the delegation led to various topics being actively discussed as well as to the establishment of a network for QI education. The study visit strengthened the desire of the MUST to serve as the academic QI knowledge centre of Mongolia and, in the long run, to actively contribute to QI education in order to train master’s degree students with high-quality expert knowledge.
Images © Mesopartner
