11 Items

Dave Johnson coal-fired power plant is silhouetted against the morning sun

AP/J. David Ake

Magazine Article - Fair Observer

Sacrificing Nature Is Not an Option

    Author:
  • Kourosh Ziabari
| Feb. 27, 2019

In this edition of "The Interview," Fair Observer talks to Professor John Holdren, former science adviser to President Barack Obama and director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy from 2009 to 2017 about the impacts of global warming on the United States and the government's strategies to combat climate change.

Report - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

Commercializing Second-Generation Biofuels: Scaling Up Sustainable Supply Chains and the Role of Public Policy

The promise, prospects, and public policy trade-offs related to the greater use and production of second-generation biofuels were addressed in an executive session convened by the Harvard Kennedy School on November 13 and 14, 2014. The session attracted more than 25 of the world's leading experts from the fields of policy, science, and business for an intensive two day session. The agenda consisted of three sessions focused on (i) the sustainability of cellulosic supply chains, (ii) government policy options to attract investment and (iii) government policy options to ensure that environmental objectives are met.

News - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

DOE Budget Authority for Energy Research, Development, & Demonstration Database

| February 29, 2012

This document contains February 2012 updates to our database on U.S. government investments in energy research, development, demonstration, and deployment (ERD3) through the Department of Energy. The database, in Microsoft Excel format, tracks DOE appropriations from FY 1978–2011 and the FY 2012 and 2013 budget requests and includes funding for ERD3 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. It also includes several charts.

- Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School Quarterly Journal: International Security

Belfer Center Newsletter Spring 2011

| Spring 2011

The Spring 2011 issue of the Belfer Center newsletter features recent and upcoming activities, research, and analysis by members of the Center community on critical global issues. This issue highlights the Belfer Center’s continuing efforts to build bridges between the United States and Russia to prevent nuclear catastrophe – an effort that began in the 1950s. This issue also features three new books by Center faculty that sharpen global debate on critical issues: God’s Century, by Monica Duffy Toft, The New Harvest by Calestous Juma, and The Future of Power, by Joseph S. Nye.

The world's first grid-scale, flywheel-based energy storage plant is being built in Stephentown, N.Y. The plant is being built by Beacon Power Corporation (NASDAQ: BCON) & is supported by a $43 million loan guarantee from DOE.

Beacon Power Corp. Photo

Report - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

Transforming the Energy Economy: Options for Accelerating the Commercialization of Advanced Energy Technologies

"The focus of the workshop was on the demonstration stage of the technology innovation cycle. Current policies do not adequately address the private sector’s inability to overcome the demonstration "valley of death" for new energy technologies. Investors and financiers fear that the technology and operational risks at this stage of the cycle remain too high to justify the level of investment to build a commercial-sized facility."

Conceptual drawing of a single B&W mPower™ nuclear reactor module inside its own independent, underground containment.

Babcock & Wilcox Photo

Report - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

Tranforming the Energy Economy: Options for Accelerating the Commercialization of Advanced Energy Technologies—Framing Statement

"There is broad political consensus that the current energy system in the United States is unable to meet the nation's future energy needs, from the security, environment, and economic perspectives. New energy technologies are required to increase the availability of domestic energy supplies, to reduce the negative environmental impacts of our energy system, to improve the reliability of current energy infrastructure (e.g., smart grid, energy storage), and to increase energy efficiency throughout the economy."

- Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs, Harvard Kennedy School

Belfer Center Newsletter Winter 2010-11

| Winter 2010-11

The Winter 2010/11 issue of the Belfer Center newsletter features recent and upcoming activities, research, and analysis by members of the Center community on critical global issues. This issue highlights a major Belfer Center conference on technology and governance, the Center's involvement in the nuclear threat documentary Countdown to Zero, and a celebration of Belfer Center founder Paul Doty.

 

Report - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

DOE FY 2011 Budget Request for Energy Research, Development, Demonstration, and Deployment: Analysis and Recommendations

This analysis provides an overview the Department of Energy's fiscal year 2011 energy research, development, demonstration, and deployment (ERD3) budget proposals, and lays out actionable recommendations to strengthen the effort.  Overall, the report concludes that the 7 percent requested increase in applied energy research, development, and demonstration funds, while welcome in a time of budget stringency, remains well short of the sustained investment likely to be needed to meet the energy demands of the 21st century.

Presentation - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

Expert Elicitation of Cost, Performance, and RD&D Budgets for Greenhouse Gas Reducing Strategies

| October 14, 2009

Melissa Chan and Laura Diaz Anadon of the Energy Research, Development, Demonstration & Deployment (ERD3) Policy Project presented at the 2009 Annual Meeting of the Institute for Operations Research and the Management Sciences (INFORMS).

Book Chapter

Acting in Time on Energy Policy: Foreword

    Author:
  • David T. Ellwood
| May 2009

"The question of whether we can "act in time" on energy and climate change poses one of the most profound challenges facing the world today. No human activity, other than the wide-scale use of nuclear weapons, has greater potential to reshape and harm our planet and our species than the rapidly expanding generation of greenhouse gases. What is so frustrating about the issue is that even though the dangers are widely accepted in the scientific community, and even though failing to act in time could set off a chain of events that would be all but irreversible, action to date has been weak at best."