To compete and thrive in the 21st century, democracies, and the United States in particular, must develop new national security and economic strategies that address the geopolitics of information. In the 20th century, market capitalist democracies geared infrastructure, energy, trade, and even social policy to protect and advance that era’s key source of power—manufacturing. In this century, democracies must better account for information geopolitics across all dimensions of domestic policy and national strategy.
China's trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative will have major implications for the global energy sector and climate change. While China is increasingly promoting clean energy domestically, coal-fired power plants are a large part of China's overseas investment portfolio. There is increasing media scrutiny of coal power plants and their climate impacts. This presentation will bring empirical data and analysis to the debate about China's role in coal power around the world by examining the environmental performance of China's overseas coal plants and investigating the uniqueness of Chinese investment.
Cecilia Han Springer is a postdoctoral research fellow with the Harvard Kennedy School in the Belfer Center’s Environment and Natural Resources Program and the Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program. Cecilia studies the economic and environmental impacts of energy policies in Asia from an interdisciplinary perspective. Previously, Cecilia spent time in China as a visiting researcher at Tsinghua University and a Fulbright research fellow in Tianjin. She has also consulted for Climate Advisers, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, and Global Efficiency Intelligence on industrial energy analysis. Cecilia holds a PhD and MS in Energy and Resources from the University of California, Berkeley, and a BS in environmental science from Brown University.
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