CLIMATE CHANGE
USGS Photo
February 10, 2012
Geoengineering Policy Fellowships Offered by Belfer Center's Energy Technology Innovation Policy Research Group at Harvard Kennedy School
Announcement
The Belfer Center's Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group will be offering research fellowships in geoengineering policy for 2012–2013. These fellowships are for postdoctoral scholars and Masters-level scholars with extensive experience. The purpose of these fellowships is to improve understanding of the options for governance of geoengineering—deliberate large-scale manipulation of the Earth's climate to partially offset the climate risks caused by greenhouse-gas emissions.
Applications for these fellowships for the 2012–2012 academic year will be accepted until April 12, 2012.
January 19, 2012
"Stopping the Clock"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"...[W]hen the smart scientists decided to add global warming and biological harms to the clock's matrix in 2007, their previous laser focus on nuclear Armageddon lost its impact. Their explanation of why things have gotten one minute worse is a laundry list that includes nuclear proliferation, Iran, Japan's nuclear disaster and its effects on nuclear power investments, carbon emissions, and virulent strains of viruses that can be used for lethal purposes."
AP Photo/Farah Abdi Warsameh
Winter 2011/12
"Climate Wars? Assessing the Claim That Drought Breeds Conflict"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 3, volume 36
By Ole Magnus Theisen, Helge Holtermann and Halvard Buhaug
Climate change will most likely impose great hardships on Africa’s agrarian societies in the coming years, but new research suggests that, despite current thought, it will not increase the likelihood of civil war. The concern that scarcity will breed conflict is understandable, but the data show that civil war is more highly correlated with other factors, such as high infant mortality, proximity to international borders, and high local population density. Climate shocks are certain to increase the suffering of marginalized societies in other ways, which makes it all the more important that we do not militarize the issue lest fear limit immigration and relief efforts.
December 15, 2011
"Profile: Calestous Juma"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Outreach
By Calestous Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development; Director, Science, Technology, and Globalization Project; Principal Investigator, Agricultural Innovation in Africa
"The Rio+20 process is an important reminder of the urgency to guide global production and consumption patterns with sustainability principles. Sadly, there is really no genuine global institution that is championing sustainable development. The vision that inspired Rio has been supplanted by two extreme positions. The first is a group that believes economic growth will have trickle-down benefits for the environment. The environmental camp has successfully replaced the spirit of Rio with a one-sided agenda that leaves little room for recognising the central role that human wellbeing plays in natural resource management."
December 5, 2011
"A Wave of the Future: International Linkage of Carbon Markets"
Op-Ed, Outreach
By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements
"...[I]t remains true that cap-and-trade is still the most likely domestic policy approach for CO2 emissions reductions throughout the industrialised world, given the rather unattractive set of available alternative approaches. This makes it important to think about the possibility of linking these national and regional cap-and-trade systems in the future. Such linking occurs when the government that maintains one system allows regulated entities to use allowances or credits from other systems to meet compliance obligations."
November 29, 2011
"Climate Change: Efficiency and Equity"
Presentation
By Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements
Harvard Project on Climate Agreements Director Robert N. Stavins delivered a presentation titled "Climate Change: Efficiency and Equity," at The Graduate Institute in Geneva, Switzerland, on November 29, 2011. The talk was one in the Geneva Environmental Dialogue Series of public keynote lectures that the Institute holds annually on a theme related to the international environment. The theme for the 2011–2012 term is "Justice and the Environment."
AP Photo
December 1, 2011
"Climate Change and the Kiribati Syndrome"
Op-Ed, Boston Globe
By Juliette Kayyem, Lecturer in Public Policy
"Nothing gets a nation like ours worked up more than the notion that people will try to desperately get here and seek humanitarian relief. Many Republicans who are seeking to run this nation may not put any stock in climate science, but they believe in immigration controls."
AP Photo
November 2011
The Promise and Problems of Pricing Carbon: Theory and Experience
Discussion Paper
By Joseph E. Aldy, Faculty Affiliate, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements and Robert N. Stavins, Albert Pratt Professor of Business and Government; Member of the Board; Director, Harvard Project on Climate Agreements
Because of the global commons nature of climate change, international cooperation among nations will likely be necessary for meaningful action at the global level. At the same time, it will inevitably be up to the actions of sovereign nations to put in place policies that bring about meaningful reductions in the emissions of greenhouse gases. Due to the ubiquity and diversity of emissions of greenhouse gases in most economies, as well as the variation in abatement costs among individual sources, conventional environmental policy approaches, such as uniform technology and performance standards, are unlikely to be sufficient to the task. Therefore, attention has increasingly turned to market-based instruments in the form of carbon-pricing mechanisms. We examine the opportunities and challenges associated with the major options for carbon pricing: carbon taxes, cap-and-trade, emission reduction credits, clean energy standards, and fossil fuel subsidy reductions.
AP Photo
November 24, 2011
"Preventing Hunger: Biotechnology is Key"
Journal Article, Nature, volume 479
By Calestous Juma, Professor of the Practice of International Development; Director, Science, Technology, and Globalization Project; Principal Investigator, Agricultural Innovation in Africa
If African countries can't plant genetically modified crops to produce more and healthier food, vulnerable populations will be at risk, argues Calestous Juma.
November 2011
Transforming U.S. Energy Innovation
Report
By Laura Diaz Anadon, Associate Director, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program; Director, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group; Adjunct Lecturer in Public Policy, Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom, Gabe Chan, Research Fellow, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, Melissa Chan, Former Research Fellow, Energy Research, Development, Demonstration & Deployment Policy Project, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, January 2009–December 2010, Charles Jones, Associate, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, Ruud Kempener, Former Research Fellow, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, 2009–2011, Audrey Lee, Former Research Fellow, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group, 2009–2011, Nathaniel Logar, Associate, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program/Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group and Venkatesh "Venky" Narayanamurti, Benjamin Peirce Professor of Technology and Public Policy; Professor of Physics, Harvard; Director, Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program; Co-Principal Investigator, Energy Technology Innovation Policy research group
The United States and the world need a revolution in energy technology—a revolution that would improve the performance of our energy systems to face the challenges ahead. In an intensely competitive and interdependent global landscape, and in the face of large climate risks from ongoing U.S. reliance on a fossil-fuel based energy system, it is important to maintain and expand long-term investments in the energy future of the U.S. even at a time of budget stringency. It is equally necessary to think about how to improve the efficiency of those investments, through strengthening U.S. energy innovation institutions, providing expanded incentives for private-sector innovation, and seizing opportunities where international cooperation can accelerate innovation. The private sector role is key: in the United States the vast majority of the energy system is owned by private enterprises, whose innovation and technology deployment decisions drive much of the country's overall energy systems.
