Sample of Technical and Strategic Projects

Energy–Macro–Policy Pulse

For my EMBA at Ivey Business School, I built an "Energy–Macro–Policy Pulse" for the UK and Europe using public data. The goal was to create a compact, scenario-ready view of how energy markets translate into inflation, rates, and industrial competitiveness. The output is an Excel dashboard with four linked charts that update from a structured data tab, supported by cleaned series and simple derived metrics such as indexed levels and standardised z-scores. This project is designed to look and feel like the weekly or monthly macro-energy intelligence note a Chief Economist's office would use to ground scenario thinking and keep senior stakeholders aligned and updated.

What I built

I assembled and cleaned long-run energy and macro series across oil, gas, power, coal, inflation, and rates. I then structured the workbook to produce two complementary "lenses" on the same story:

1. Indexed charts that show direction, co-movement, and turning points across series with different units.
2. Z-score charts that show shock intensity and how unusual a given period is relative to history.

The dashboard is anchored by a simple composite measure of energy pressure (EPPI) and by cross-country European power prices to capture the competitiveness angle of the transition.

Chart 1: Energy Pressure vs Macro Response (Indexed to Jan 2015 = 100)

This chart provides a simple macro overlay of EPPI, UK CPI, and the UK 10Y yield, all rebased to a common starting point. Because everything is indexed, it becomes easy to compare direction and timing without getting stuck on unit differences. The core intelligence here is that when energy pressure rises sharply, inflation and longer-term rates reprice. The 2021–2022 period stands out as an example of the sequence: energy shock, inflation risk and tightening financial conditions. This chart is therefore a compact way to link energy volatility to macro risk pricing.

Chart 2: European Power Price Competitiveness (Germany vs France vs Spain)

This chart compares monthly wholesale electricity prices across three major European economies. It provides a direct read on relative industrial cost competitiveness in a region where decarbonisation and energy security are increasingly intertwined. The 2021–2022 spike is most visible as a shared European stress event, but the differences between countries matter just as much as the level. The chart reinforces that the transition is not only about emissions reduction; it is also about who can maintain resilient, affordable power as the basis for long-run industrial strength and investment.

Chart 3: Energy Markets Stack (Indexed, Jan 2000 = 100)

This chart offers a long-run, cross-commodity comparison of Brent, EU gas (TTF), EU power (Germany), and coal, all indexed to a common base. The purpose is to show relative cycles across fuels and to highlight the magnitude of the European energy shock in a historical context. The main insight is that the 2021–2022 episode was disproportionately a gas-and-power-led crisis, with moves that dwarf oil's relative swing over the same period. This helps anchor a more precise narrative of what actually drove Europe's macro volatility in that window. Because this is an indexed chart, the appropriate y-axis label is an index label rather than a currency.

Chart 4: Energy Price Pressure vs Macro Response (Standardised Z-Scores)

This chart uses z-scores to convert energy prices and UK CPI into deviations from their historical norms. It is a shock-intensity lens that makes different series directly comparable. The chart makes the 2021–2022 period visually clear as an outlier. Pairing the UK CPI z-score against energy z-scores shows the timing and intensity of the energy-to-inflation transmission in the UK. It is a simple but powerful way to illustrate that the inflation episode was not just a generic macro cycle, but one rooted in abnormal energy conditions.

Why it matters

Energy is no longer a background variable for European macro outcomes. It is a central driver of inflation risk, financial conditions, and industrial competitiveness. A structured, repeatable dashboard like this helps decision-makers avoid reacting to isolated headlines and instead track whether the system is moving toward stability, renewed stress, or a new equilibrium. This project also provides a clean base for scenario development. The same framework can be extended into short scenario briefs by adding qualitative policy assumptions and simple sensitivity estimates for how energy shocks map into inflation and growth.

Tech stack

I built this in Excel, using a structured "data-to-dashboard" layout, time-series cleaning, indexed rebasing, and standardised z-score construction. The charts and summary views are designed to remain reusable as new data is appended.