Professor V.K. Damodaran, Former Director, Director of the Department of Science and Technology and Environment, Kerala and former Ex-officio Secretary to Government in the Power Department of Kerala, is a winner of the IEEE Asia Pacific Region Historical Achievement Award in 2012 for his sustained efforts for promoting renewable energy worldwide and evolving a hybrid village energy centre model for the UNIDO in its sustainable energy efforts for the remote rural areas of Africa and South Asia. A former chair of IEEE Kerala Section and Executive Vice Chair of IEEE India Council, Prof Damodaran is the winner of the Joint APO-UNIDO Fellowship on Environmentally Friendly Energy Technologies in Germany and China (1992-93).
A science writer and communicator with more than twenty books to his credit, Prof Damodaran has a long academic career behind him and has led several research projects and programmes. He was also the founder-director of Energy management Centre-Kerala.