Carnegie Mellon University

Rahul Tongia

Rahul Tongia (E 1998)

Senior Systems Scientist, School of Computer Science; Adjunct Professor, Carnegie Mellon University Fellow, Brookings India / Brookings Institution, Engineering & Public Policy; ISR (School of Computer Science); Associate Director, TechBridgeWorld

  • Wean 5319
Address
5000 Forbes Avenue
Pittsburgh, PA 15213

Bio

Tongia's work focuses on sustainable energy technology, policy, and economics, especially for developing regions.  Prime areas of efforts have been Smart Grids (where he is Advisor to the Govt. of India's Smart Grid Task Force) and Political Economy of Reform.

Education

He has a doctorate in Engineering and Public Policy from Carnegie Mellon, and an Sc.B. in Electrical Engineering from Brown University.  

Research

  • Infrastructure – Analysis, Development, and Planning [especially for developing communities]
  • Information and Communications Technology (ICT) for Sustainable Development [ICTD]
  • Telecommunications technology and policies (especially access technologies)
  • Digital divide issues and telecom leapfrogging
  • Telecom, Power and Information sectors finance, restructuring, and (de)regulation
  • IT for power sector management, control, and demand response (e.g., Smart Metering)
  • Energy technologies, pricing, and evaluation
  • Energy security and cooperation
  • Information security, privacy, and education
  • Disaster Response
  • Issues of Technology Transfer and Implementation

Rahul Tongia is a faculty member at Carnegie Mellon University, and his research focuses on infrastructure and technology for sustainable development, especially for underserved regions such as India or Africa.  Using quantitative policy and decision analysis, he has focused on the Information and Communications as well as the energy/power domains.  In addition to engineering-economic analyses, his work also deals with broader policy issues such as security, international collaboration (especially US-India), and technology analysis and transfer.

His current work covers the broad areas of Digital Divide, ICT for Sustainable Development, Smart Metering for Electricity Networks, and Energy for Developing Regions.  Being at Carnegie Mellon, an institution renowned for interdisciplinary research, he has been able to pursue these diverse topics through appointments in the School of Computer Science (Program in Computation, Organizations, and Society) and the Dept. of Engineering and Public Policy.