In partnership with the Federal Institute of Education, Science and Technology of Rio Grande do Norte (IFRN), located in Natal/RN, and with the institutional support of the Ministry of Education (MEC), the PPE created the Interinstitutional Doctorate (DINTER) project offered to the IFRN in 2014 and still active.

This academic project qualifies the team of public servers of the IFRN and of partner institutions. This action is fostering and stimulating the academic-scientific production of these professionals, thus contributing to improve the history of education and of technological and professional teaching at the IFRN; it also contributes to the socioeconomic development of Rio Grande do Norte.

It was established that the doctorate program only offers the energy planning area of concentration, with the following lines of research:

• Energy Economy (institutional and investment models for the energy sector, public policies, grid industries, energy geopolitics, tariff policy.
• Energy Models (models of planning under uncertainty, econometric models, supply and demand forecast models, databases, fuzzy sets)
• Energy Technology (efficient energy use, new and alternative energy sources, technological evaluation)
• Energy and the Environment (climate change, environmental risk assessment, environmental impact assessment, environmental management, auditing and quality)

The students profile includes the universe of active servers linked to the IFRN and to partner institutions (universities, research centers and companies in the area of energy), with formation in related areas at an undergraduate or graduate level. The program focuses on the scientific and technological dimensions, with a political, economic, social and ecological analysis of the energy issue and of natural resource management, prioritizing those involving the activities of teaching, research or extension.

The course's academic plan comprises the following objectives and goals:

• Expanding the team of professors in the area of energy planning, its technological, political, economic, social and environmental connections, and natural resource management aiming to contribute to the improvement of teaching, research or extension activities related to the areas of concentration and lines of research of the Energy Planning Program - PPE/COPPE/UFRJ.
• Producing and recycling the knowledge of high-level human resources that are technically involved with management, operation or maintenance in the area of energy, and which form the economic environment of the Brazilian Northeast Region, with special emphasis on the state of Rio Grande do Norte
• Expanding the offer of graduate courses in the Northeast Region, especially in Rio Grande do Norte
• Training fifteen doctors in the interdisciplinary knowledge area of energy in mutual cooperation between the PPE/COPPE/UFRJ and the IFRN
• Consolidating and expanding the research lines and nuclei already active at the IFRN through the academic and scientific production created with the support received by the DINTER project
• Improving the quantity and quality of the scientific production of professors at the IFRN through the activities developed by the doctorate students participating in DINTER
• Involving the students of undergraduate and lato sensu graduate courses at IFRN in research activities through their involvement with the doctorate students participating in DINTER, thus contributing to the formation of new professionals in the area of energy
• Generating better conditions for the continuity of lato sensu graduate courses and for the proposal of Master Degree Program in the area of energy, exploring areas of concentration and lines of research developed in the DINTER project.

This course operates in conformity to what was established in the Regulation of PPE, considering its operationalization through the offer of mandatory and elective disciplines. The disciplines are offered on a quarterly basis.

Additionally, some disciplines are offered through distance education, carried out at the location of the offering institution, following its academic calendar. The IFRN has experience and adequate infrastructure in the offer and attending of courses/training/tutoring via distance education since 2001.

Advisory activities are being developed through regular meetings between advisor and student. This may occur both during the course of the disciplines and through a period of time that each student will have available to get in more direct contact with the academic activities of the advisor throughout the thesis seminars and during the six-month internship the student attends at the PPE.