Vijay V. Vaitheeswaran is an award winning Correspondent for The Economist

The Economist

The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...

, covering energy and healthcare.

Vaitheeswaran was born in Madras, India

India

India , officially the Republic of India , is a country in South Asia. It is the seventh-largest country by geographical area, the second-most populous country with over 1.2 billion people, and the most populous democracy in the world...

 and grew up in Cheshire, Connecticut

Cheshire, Connecticut

Cheshire is a town in New Haven County, Connecticut, United States. The population was 28,543 at the 2000 census. The center of population of Connecticut is located in Cheshire. In 2009 Cheshire was ranked 72 in Money Magazine's 100 Best Places to Live.Likewise, in 2011 Cheshire was ranked 73 in...

. He graduated from MIT with a degree in mechanical engineering. He started working at The Economist as an intern. After a year as a correspondent, he opened the publication's first office in Latin America

Latin America

Latin America is a region of the Americas where Romance languages  – particularly Spanish and Portuguese, and variably French – are primarily spoken. Latin America has an area of approximately 21,069,500 km² , almost 3.9% of the Earth's surface or 14.1% of its land surface area...

, in Mexico City

Mexico City

Mexico City is the Federal District , capital of Mexico and seat of the federal powers of the Mexican Union. It is a federal entity within Mexico which is not part of any one of the 31 Mexican states but belongs to the federation as a whole...

. He now lives in New York City

New York City

New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...

, from 1998 to 2006 he was the Environment and Energy Correspondent for The Economist and from 2007 to 2011 he covered innovation and health issues.

In 2003 he published a book Power to the People, How the Coming Energy Revolution will Change our Lives, and maybe even Save the Planet. The book pays particular attention to alternative fuel sources, such as those used in the Tesla Roadster

Tesla Roadster

The Tesla Roadster is a battery electric vehicle sports car produced by the electric car firm Tesla Motors in California. The Roadster was the first highway-capable all-electric vehicle in serial production available in the United States. Since 2008 Tesla has sold 2,024 Roadsters in 30 countries...

 and plug-in hybrids. The book also examines the benefits of distributed power and smart grids.

He is a frequent commentator on science-policy issues on television and radio

In 2007, he co-authored ZOOM": The Global Race to Fuel the Car of the Future, with Iain Carson.
Vijay Vaitheeswaran talks about his book ZOOM in this interview with Charlie Rose. ZOOM was nominated as a finalist for the Financial Times Business Book of the Year . His new book on the future of global innovation, titled "Need, Greed & Speed", will be published by Harper Collins in early 2012.

He teaches part time at NYU .

External links

• Power to the People official website
• Profile at The Economist
  The Economist
  The Economist is an English-language weekly news and international affairs publication owned by The Economist Newspaper Ltd. and edited in offices in the City of Westminster, London, England. Continuous publication began under founder James Wilson in September 1843...
  
  
• Author profile at Macmillan Publishers
  Macmillan Publishers
  Macmillan Publishers Ltd, also known as The Macmillan Group, is a privately held international publishing company owned by Georg von Holtzbrinck Publishing Group. It has offices in 41 countries worldwide and operates in more than thirty others.-History:...
  
  
• Profile at The Lavin Agency
  The Lavin Agency
  The Lavin Agency is a North American speakers bureau with offices in Boston, Toronto and Vancouver. The company was founded by David Lavin in the late 1980s.The Lavin Agency represents speakers in the fields of business, politics, arts and science.-History:...