146 Items

Vice President Joe Biden talks with staff at the National Renewable Energy Lab's Process Development and Integration Laboratory, which brings together technical experts from NREL, the solar industry, & universities for collaborative research, 4 June 2012.

Dennis Schroeder

Journal Article - Risk Analysis

Quantifying the Effects of Expert Selection and Elicitation Design on Experts' Confidence in Their Judgments About Future Energy Technologies

| 2016

Expert elicitations are now frequently used to characterize uncertain future technology outcomes. However, their usefulness is limited, in part because: estimates across studies are not easily comparable; choices in survey design and expert selection may bias results; and overconfidence is a persistent problem. The authors provide quantitative evidence of how these choices affect experts' estimates.

News - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

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

| March 2016

This document contains March 2016 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 1978–2016 and the 2017 budget request and includes funding for ERD3 from the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. It also includes several charts.

teaser image

Journal Article - Climatic Change

Expert Views — and Disagreements — About the Potential of Energy Technology R&D

| June 2016

In order to make R&D funding decisions to meet particular goals, such as mitigating climate change or improving energy security, or to estimate the social returns to R&D, policy makers need to combine the information provided in this study on cost reduction potentials with an analysis of the macroeconomic implications of these technological changes. The authors conclude with recommendations for future directions on energy expert elicitations.

Announcement - Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program, Belfer Center

Science, Technology, and Public Policy Fellowships, 2015–2016

December 12, 2014

Each year, the Science, Technology, and Public Policy (STPP) Program at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School welcomes new pre- and post-doctoral fellows and visiting researchers to a select team of scholars exploring the critical role that science and technology play in everyday life.

Discussion Paper - Energy Technology Innovation Policy Project, Belfer Center

Energy Technology Expert Elicitations for Policy: Workshops, Modeling, and Meta-analysis

| October 2014

Characterizing the future performance of energy technologies can improve the development of energy policies that have net benefits under a broad set of future conditions. In particular, decisions about public investments in research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) that promote technological change can benefit from (1) an explicit consideration of the uncertainty inherent in the innovation process and (2) a systematic evaluation of the tradeoffs in investment allocations across different technologies. To shed light on these questions, over the past five years several groups in the United States and Europe have conducted expert elicitations and modeled the resulting societal benefits. In this paper, the authors discuss the lessons learned from the design and implementation of these initiatives.

A coal mine near Hailar, northeastern Inner Mongolia Autonomous Region, China, 13 August 2005.

Herry Lawford Photo

Analysis & Opinions - The South China Morning Post

China's Coal Addiction a Threat to Its Energy Security

| May 14, 2014

"...[U]ntil now, Beijing's response to unmet energy demand has focused primarily on securing resources overseas, and building infrastructure for imports. China now generates more electricity from imported coal than from nuclear, wind and solar combined. Without a strong, coordinated policy shift, the country will depend on fuel imports for most of its energy consumption by the time it becomes a developed country."

Announcement - Science, Technology, and Public Policy Program, Belfer Center

STPP Fellowships, 2014–2015

November 25, 2013

Each year, the Science, Technology, and Public Policy (STPP) Program at the Belfer Center for Science and International Affairs at the Harvard Kennedy School welcomes new pre- and post-doctoral fellows and visiting researchers to a select team of scholars exploring the critical role that science and technology play in everyday life.

Journal Article - Environmental Research Letters

The Future Costs of Nuclear Power Using Multiple Expert Elicitations: Effects of RD&D and Elicitation Design

| July-September 2013

Characterization of the anticipated performance of energy technologies to inform policy decisions increasingly relies on expert elicitation. Knowledge about how elicitation design factors impact the probabilistic estimates emerging from these studies is, however, scarce. We focus on nuclear power, a large-scale low-carbon power option, for which future cost estimates are important for the design of energy policies and climate change mitigation efforts. We use data from three elicitations in the USA and in Europe and assess the role of government research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) investments on expected nuclear costs in 2030.

Steel mills, Benxi, China, Feb.12, 2013. Steel mills and other heavy industries amplify carbon emissions where they are located while the products are consumed in more affluent parts of China.

Photo by Andreas

Analysis & Opinions - Nature

A Low-carbon Road Map for China

    Authors:
  • Dabo Guan
  • Douglas Crawford-Brown
  • Qiang Zhang
  • Kebin He
  • Jianguo Liu
| August 8, 2013

"First, China must move away from coal and boost recycling and renewable energies. Second, emissions-mitigation indicators, such as energy-efficiency targets, should be set relative to physical output (such as tonnes of steel production) rather than to economic growth. Third, regional energy supply and demand must be balanced. Fourth, energy prices should be linked to market mechanisms rather than set centrally by authorities. And fifth, China must reduce air pollutants alongside CO2 emissions."

Nuclear Fuel Rod Assembly

NEAMS/DOE Photo

Journal Article - Environmental Science and Technology

Expert Judgments about RD&D and the Future of Nuclear Energy

| 2012

Probabilistic estimates of the cost and performance of future nuclear energy systems under different scenarios of government research, development, and demonstration (RD&D) spending were obtained from 30 U.S. and 30 European nuclear technology experts. The majority expected that such RD&D would have only a modest effect on cost, but would improve performance in other areas, such as safety, waste management, and uranium resource utilization. The U.S. and E.U. experts were in relative agreement regarding how government RD&D funds should be allocated, placing particular focus on very high temperature reactors, sodium-cooled fast reactors, fuels and materials, and fuel cycle technologies.