Chania
albert
Albert Thomas, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Department of Civil Engineering
IIT Bombay
Powai, Mumbai – 400 076, Maharashtra, INDIA
Specialization:

Construction Technology And Management

Major Research Areas:

Sustainable Construction
Building Energy Simulation
Life Cycle Analysis
Lean Construction

Personal Info:

Email: albert@iitb.ac.in
Phone No:022 25767347
Fax No:022 25767302
Google Scholar
Research Gate

Welcome

Dr. Albert Thomas is an associate professor at the construction technology and management (CTaM) group of civil engineering at IIT Bombay. Dr. Thomas obtained his PhD from the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, and M-Tech in construction technology and management from IIT Madras. Through his PhD dissertation, he developed a lightweight and adaptive building life cycle energy simulation framework for analyzing various dynamic energy influencing factors and its energy impacts. During his years as a graduate research assistant, he was also involved in several projects aimed at incorporating sustainability and life cycle based thinking in various infrastructure and built facilities. His research articles are published in various peer reviewed and highly rated international journals and conference proceedings.

On a professional experience level, Dr. Thomas possess a unique mix of teaching, research and industry experience in various domains such as business strategic planning, management information systems, construction project scheduling and earned value analysis, simulation analytics and building energy modeling, life cycle analysis, and project management consulting. Some of the highlights in his professional career in India and USA include, project planning and monitoring experience for the construction of a mega project such as the Chennai underground metro, involving in the development of a lifecycle analysis software tool for a water utility industry in the USA, and designing and implementing lean construction based toolkits (last planner system) for electric utility projects across four states in the USA. Dr. Thomas is the recipient of Build India Scholarship for the M-Tech program at IIT Madras, top performance awards from L&T, editor’s special mention on one of the journal papers at ASCE’s journal of computing, and recently the young faculty award from IIT Bombay.

Education

    Ph.D. in Civil Engineering – University of Michigan (2017)
    M-Tech in Construction Technology and Management – Indian Institute of Technology Madras (2008)
    B-Tech in Civil Engineering – College of Engineering Trivandrum (2006)

Professional Experience

    Associate Professor, IIT Bombay, India (2024-Present)
    Assistant Professor, IIT Bombay, India (2018-2024)
    Senior Consultant, Pyramid Consulting International, USA (2017-2018)
    Graduate Research Assistant, University of Michigan, USA (2014-2017)
    Assistant professor, National Institute of Construction Management and Research, India (2012-2013)
    Assistant Manager, Larsen and Toubro Construction, India (2008-2012)

Recent Group News

OPPORTUNITY: There are few openings in my group for postodoctoral and research fellow based positions. Please write to me if you are interested

July 2023- Prof Thomas delivered an invited talk during the workshop at Mumbai on "Market Potential for Energy-Efficient Passive Housing Projects, Energy Efficient Housing Program (EEHP)" conducted by State Bank of India in association with EY and AEEE, on the topic Sustainable Construction Techniques for Housing Sector

June 2023- Ann Francis defended the Ph.D. thesis and earned the doctorate degree with five very good journal publications. Ann is the first PhD graduate from the SIM group. Congratulations, Dr. Francis and wish you all the best

June 2023- Prof Thomas delivered an invited keynote lecture on the topic "Academia - Industry Collaboration towards Sustainable Construction" at SECON-23, FISAT, Kerala. SECON-23
June 2023- SIM group recieves funding for a colloborative sponsored project from Indian National Science Academy. The project envisages to monitor the air quality parameters of heritage structures through a combination of IoT and modeling techniques

May 2023- Congratulations to Omprakash R R for getting the journal titled "A Community Building Energy Modelling – Life Cycle Cost Analysis framework to design and operate net zero energy communities", getting accepted for publcation at Sustainable Production and Consumption, Elseiver

May 2023- SIM group recieves INR 12 Million funding under the sponsored joint research grant from DST and IC-Impacts, an Indo- Canada joint research project with Carleton University, Canada. The project is centred aroud the the theme of Net-Zero Energy Buiding Retrofit. DST: IC-Impacts

Apr 2023- Prof Thomas delivered an invited lecture on the topic "Decarbonising the built environment,Status and Way forward" at Saint Goban Research India, Chennai. SGRI - IITB

Apr 2023- Dr. Vishal Sharma from Norther Alberta Institute of Technology, Edmonton, Canada visited SIM group for a two week colloboration effort funded through Shastri Institute. Dr. Sharma co-taught with me in the course CE 723 - Construction Enquipment and Personnel Management. Thank you, Dr. Sharma

Mar 2023- Prof Thomas delivered an invited lecture on the topic "Building Information Modeling" at the faculty development program at Government Engineering College BartonHill, Trivandrum

Mar 2023- Congratulations to Tripti and Omprakash for securing the First R S Subramanian felowships awards from Glazing society of India. R Subramanian Fellowship Award This award supports performing a research project to understand various aspectc of glass used in the enevelope of buildings

Mar 2023- Prof Thomas delivered an invited keynote lecture on the topic "Sustainable Construction Practices" at the one day symposium titled "Role of Science and Technology in India’s Journey to Net Zero Emissions", at IIT Palakkad IITP - Essence

Mar 2023- Ms. Ann Francis submitted the PhD thesis with the title "Modeling and benchmarking the dynamic sustainability interactions of buildings using a fused approach of system dynamics simulation and multi-criteria decision making". Congratulations Ann!

Jan 2023- Congratulations to Ann Francis for getting the journal titled "Sustainability Assessment and Benchmarking (SAB) framework for buildings using a system dynamics modeling and simulation approach", getting accepted for publcation at Journal of Computing in Civil Engineering, ASCE

Nov 2022- Prof Thomas featured in the University of Michigan Youtube channel- Michigan Engineering

August 2022- Congratulations to Ann Francis for securing a competetive conference travel grant from Science and Engineering Researrch Board India, to travel to ARCOM-22 and present the paper