GridForge

Team

GridForge runs on a rolling cohort model — a new group of students joins each year, supervised by Cassidy Flynn with collaboration from Reza Razzaghi.

Leadership

Cassidy Flynn

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Monash University

Project lead and primary supervisor. PhD in electrical engineering. Research focus: LV network topology estimation and smart meter analytics. Oversees all GridForge student cohorts and the unified platform.

LV Topology Smart Meters Project Lead

Reza Razzaghi

Senior Academic Collaborator, Monash University

Senior academic collaborator contributing to research direction and oversight, with expertise in power systems analysis and distribution network engineering.

Power Systems Distribution Networks

Cohorts

The students who have built and extended GridForge, organised by year.

2026 Cohort

Current

Three groups active in 2026: a four-person Digital Twin group, a solo AI Topology Evaluation project, and a five-person masters research group working on topology comparison methods.

Digital Twin Group

Jason Zheng

Currently completing his degree in Electrical Engineering, with an interest in power systems, LV distribution networks, and renewable energy integration.

Ethan Chuen

Currently completing a Bachelor of Software Engineering at Monash University, with an interest in full-stack development, data pipeline engineering, and the software infrastructure supporting the transition to renewable energy and increased EV uptake.

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AI Topology Evaluation

Advay Kumar

Topology Comparison & Metrics (Masters)

Jiachang Liu

Currently working on Grid Forge, with an interest in power systems.

Haowei Ding

Currently studying Electrical Engineering at Monash University, with interests in power systems, renewable energy integration, and digital twin applications for low-voltage distribution networks.

Binqi Gao

Currently completing a Master of Professional Engineering (Electrical) at Monash University, with a background in renewable energy and an interest in power systems, LV distribution networks, and digital twin technologies.

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2025 Cohort

Founding year

One student focused on pilot-building the platform: Streamlit GUI, OpenDSS simulation backend, synthetic data generation, and initial Python component integration, with implementations of phase grouping.

GridForge Prototyping

Ammanuel Woldemicael

Completed his degree in Electrical Engineering at Monash University, with a focus on low-voltage systems, solar hosting capacity, and a particular interest in data visualisation.