Project Description

Farhad Rachidi (IEEE Fellow, EMP Fellow, Electromagnetics Academy Fellow) was born in Geneva in 1962. He received the M.S. degree in electrical engineering and the Ph.D. degree from the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, in 1986 and 1991 respectively.

He worked at the Power Systems Laboratory of the same institute until 1996 and had several short stays at the University of Florida and the NASA Kennedy Space Center. In 1997, he joined the Lightning Research Laboratory of the University of Toronto in Canada and from April 1998 until September 1999, he was with Montena EMC in Switzerland. He is currently the head of the Electromagnetic Compatibility Laboratory at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology, Lausanne, Switzerland.

Farhad Rachidi was an Associate Editor of the IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility (2007-2012), Editor-in-Chief of the Open Atmospheric Science Journal (2011-2012). He served as the Chairman of the 2008 European Electromagnetics International Symposium. He was the convener of the CIGRE-CIRED joint Working Group C4.402 “Protection of MV and LV Networks against Lightning”, the Vice-Chair of the European COST Action P18 ‘The Physics of Lightning Flash and its Effects’ (2005-2009), the Chairman of the subcommittee Lightning of the Technical Committee TC5 of IEEE EMC Society, and a member of various IEEE, CIGRE and CIRED working groups dealing with lightning. He is a member of the Scientific Committees of various International Symposia in the field of Electromagnetic Compatibility and Lightning. He has served as Keynote speaker, session chairman/moderator/organizer at various international conferences in the field of Electromagnetic Compatibility and Lightning. He was also the guest co-editor of the IEEE Trans. on Electromagnetic Compatibility (2009), of the Journal of Electrostatics (2004 and 2006), and special reporter for CIGRE (2004). In 2005, he was the recipient of the IEEE Technical Achievement Award for outstanding contributions to the understanding of lightning discharge and its electromagnetic effects. He was also awarded with the 2005 Technical Committee Award of the CIGRE (International Council on Large Electric Systems). Farhad Rachidi was awarded the 2006 Blondel Medal from the French Association of Electrical Engineering, Electronics, Information Technology and Communication (SEE). In 2012, he was elected as the President of the Swiss National Committee of the International Union of Radio Science. From June 2008, he serves as the President of the International Conference on Lightning Protection (ICLP). He is presently the Editor-in-Chief of the IEEE Transactions on Electromagnetic Compatibility (2013-). He is the author or coauthor of over 100 scientific papers published in peer-reviewed journals and over 300 papers presented at international conferences.