‘Energy and Climate Policies’ – the title immediately aroused the curiosity of the Engineering, Decision and Public Policies students who filled the Abreu Faro Amphitheatre, at Alameda campus on 23 October. Ana Fontoura Gouveia, Secretary of State for Energy and Climate from 2023 to 2024, was invited to give a lecture within the Engineering, Decision and Public Policies curricular unit (another session led by Adalberto Campos Fernandes, former Minister of Health, had already taken place the week before).

Working in public policy for around 20 years, Ana Fontoura Gouveia emphasised the need to avoid the debate around public policy turning ‘into something dogmatic, where there is a “right” and a “wrong”’. Instead, using practical examples such as London’s Ultra Low Emission Zone (where more polluting vehicles are subject to charges), she showed how it is necessary to identify advantages and disadvantages when making decisions.

Another example that was brought up for discussion was the closure of coal-fired power stations. Given the negative impact of these facilities on the environment, Ana Fontoura Gouveia mentioned the case of Poland, where the closure of these power stations would jeopardise the livelihoods of many families that depend on this type of infrastructure both for work and energy.

The researcher emphasised the need to ensure that public policies are capable of safeguarding environmental interests and, at the same time, guaranteeing the functioning of the economy. ‘We’re not going to get it right the first time, no matter how much we’ve discussed it with experts, associations, the public administration…’ she recalled.

Concepts such as pumping to refill dams were also discussed. It’s a process that harnesses unused wind and solar electricity at a certain point to pump water downstream from a dam back into the basin, ‘storing’ it for future use in hydroelectric power production, in what resembles a ‘water battery’.

‘It was nice to have a change of scenery and not always have economists in the audience in front of me’, she joked at the end of the lecture. Confident in the abilities of the Técnico students, she left them an invitation – ‘if you want to experiment and do different things in public policies, we need people with critical thinking and organised mind.

This curricular unit is part of the ‘Humanities, Arts and Social Sciences’, and aims to develop students’ critical thinking about how engineering and decision-support systems—including risk assessment, data analysis, decision analysis, statistical analysis, optimisation, participatory modelling, communication, and scenario planning—can improve political analysis and decision-making in a real context.