On this week’s Power Hour, I interview Vijay Jayaraj, an up and coming energy/environment researcher based in India. Vijay has experienced the reality of poverty, including energy poverty, firsthand--as well as India’s rapid rise from poverty using fossil fuels. Some topics we discussed included: Why Vijay decided to study energy and environmental issues professionally. Vijay’s experience at the University of East Anglia during the “Climategate” scandal. What life in the unempowered world is like for women. What sanitation is like in the unempowered world. Hunger challenges in the unempowered world. How international investment revolutionized India. How coal revolutionized India. How the less-developed world can tell its energy story. Toward the end of the episode we began what I hope is an ongoing discussion about how the unempowered/less-developed world can tell its energy story and advocate for its right to use more fossil fuels. Vijay mentioned at the end of the episode that he’s available to do research and write papers. If you’d like to reach him his email is [email protected].