PhD in Data Science

This PhD scholarship is offered by the EPSRC CDT in Offshore Wind Energy Sustainability and Resilience; a partnership between the Universities of Durham, Hull, Loughborough and Sheffield. The successful applicant will undertake six-month of training with the rest of the CDT cohort at the University of Hull before continuing their PhD research at Hull. Offshore wind is vital to the UK’s transition to net zero, but as the industry scales, understanding and managing its environmental and socio-economic impacts becomes increasingly important. This PhD will develop explainable predictive AI models to assess and forecast how offshore wind farms influence marine ecosystems, seabed mobility, and local industries such as fishing. Unlike traditional “black-box” AI, these models will focus on explainability, ensuring that predictions are transparent and trustworthy for regulators, developers, and local communities. The research will integrate diverse datasets from ecological monitoring, geospatial surveys, and socio-economic sources (including DEFRA and MMO datasets) to build models that capture both environmental and human dimensions of offshore wind. By combining machine learning with physics-informed modelling, the project will deliver predictive tools that remain consistent with scientific principles while being interpretable to non-specialists. This will allow stakeholders to better anticipate biodiversity changes, manage seabed risks, and understand socio-economic trade-offs. The student will join a dynamic research environment at Hull and Loughborough Universities, working closely with other PhDs in the cluster on sustainable offshore wind. They will also engage with industry partners and policymakers, ensuring that research outputs have direct real-world impact.