NUCLEAR POWER, NUCLEAR WASTE
Winter 2008-09
"Managing the Atom's Matthew Bunn Named Associate Professor of Public Policy"
Newsletter Article, Belfer Center Newsletter
The Belfer Center's Matthew Bunn has been appointed associate professor of public policy at the Harvard Kennedy School. Bunn, co-principal investigator for the Belfer Center's Project on Managing the Atom and lead author of the Securing the Bomb series of reports, brings extensive experience and research on nuclear issues to the position.
September/October 2008
"A Nuclear Revival Needs New Cooperation"
Op-Ed, Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, issue 4, volume 64
By Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom and Martin B. Malin, Executive Director, Project on Managing the Atom
In an Op-Ed in The Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, Matthew Bunn and Martin B. Malin argue that a reinvigorated IAEA and new approaches to cooperation on nuclear safety, security, and nonproliferation are required for nuclear energy to make a significant contribution to mitigating climate change without creating undue risks.
Summer 2008
"Divining Nuclear Intentions: A Review Essay"
Journal Article, International Security, issue 1, volume 33
By William C. Potter and Gaukhar Mukhatzhanova
Although projections of nuclear proliferation abound, they rarely are founded on empirical research or guided by theory. Even fewer studies are informed by a comparative perspective. The two books under review—The Psychology of Nuclear Proliferation: Identity, Emotions, and Foreign Policy, by Jacques Hymans, and Nuclear Logics: Alternative Paths in East Asia and the Middle East, by Etel Solingen, are welcome exceptions to this general state of affairs, and represent the cutting edge of nonproliferation research. Both works challenge conventional conceptions of the sources of nuclear weapons decisions and offer new insights into why past predictions of rapid proliferation failed to materialize and why current prognoses about rampant proliferation are similarly flawed. While sharing a number of common features, including a focus on subsystemic determinants of national behavior, the books differ in their methodology, level of analysis, receptivity to multicausal explanations, and assumptions about decisionmaker rationality and the revolutionary nature of the decision. Where one author emphasizes the importance of the individual leader’s national identity conception in determining a state’s nuclear path, the other explains nuclear decisions primarily with regard to the political-economic orientation of the ruling coalition. Notwithstanding a tendency to overinterpret evidence, the books represent the best of contemporary social science research and provide compelling interpretations of nuclear proliferation dynamics of great relevance to scholars and policymakers alike.
May 5-6, 2008
"Safety, Security, Safeguards: Enabling Nuclear Energy Growth"
Presentation
By Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom
Matthew Bunn presented "Safety, Security, Safeguards: Enabling Nuclear Energy Growth" to the Global Nuclear Future Workshop at the American Academy of Arts and Sciences Cambridge, Mass.
November 14, 2007
"Risks of GNEP’s Focus on Near-Term Reprocessing"
Testimony
By Matthew Bunn, Associate Professor of Public Policy; Co-Principal Investigator, Project on Managing the Atom
Matthew Bunn's testimony for the Committee on Energy and Natural Resources, U.S. Senate, Full Committee Hearing on the Global Nuclear Energy Partnership (GNEP).
Some elements of GNEP could make important contributions to reducing proliferation risks. Unfortunately, GNEP's heavy focus on building a commercial-scale reprocessing plant in the near term would, if accepted, increase proliferation risks rather than decreasing them.
October 19, 2007
Report on Discouraging a Cascade of Nuclear Weapons States
Report
By Dr. Ashton B. Carter, Co-Director, Preventive Defense Project, Harvard & Stanford Universities, Dr. Gordon Oehler, Dr. Michael R. Anastasio, VADM Robert Monroe (USN Ret), Dr. Keith B. Payne, Dr. Robert Pfaltzgraff, Dr. William Schneider and Dr. William Van Cleave
This report of the International Security Advisory Board (ISAB) offers nineteen recommendations for discouraging a cascade of nuclear weapons states.
Fall 2007
"Professor John P. Holdren Moderates the Energy & Climate Panel at the 2007 Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting"
Media Feature
By John P. Holdren, Director and Faculty Chair, Science, Technology and Public Policy Program
John P. Holdren, director of the Belfer Center's Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program, moderated the Energy & Climate panel "Stabilizing the Climate: Pathways to Success" at the Clinton Global Initiative Annual Meeting in New York on September 27, 2007.
September 4, 2007
"The Other Energy Crisis"
Magazine or Newspaper Article, Strategy + Business
By Debra Decker, Associate, International Security Program/Project on Managing the Atom and Erwann O. Michel-Kerjan
As nuclear energy becomes a viable alternative to carbon-based fuels, security is a vital concern. Here’s how private markets might be able to help.
Autumn 2007
The Day After: Action Following a Nuclear Blast in a U.S. City
Journal Article, The Washington Quarterly, issue 4, volume 30
By Dr. Ashton B. Carter, Co-Director, Preventive Defense Project, Harvard & Stanford Universities, Dr. William J. Perry, Co-Director, Preventive Defense Project and Dr. Michael M. May
Failure to develop a comprehensive contingency plan, such as the one proposed here, and inform the American public, where appropriate, about its particulars will only serve to amplify the devastating impact of any nuclear attack on a U.S. city
