51 Items

Panelists on stage during hydrogen discussion at Rome Med 2022

Rome MED – Mediterranean Dialogue

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

Is Hydrogen Our Future?

On December 3, 2022, Nicola De Blasio, Senior Fellow with the Belfer Center’s Environment and Natural Resources Program (ENRP), chaired a panel discussion, “Is Hydrogen Our Future?,” at the Rome MED – Mediterranean Dialogue (Rome MED), an annual high-level conference on Mediterranean geopolitics. The panel discussion was part of ENRP’s Future of Hydrogen project’s ongoing engagement with global policymakers, who are increasingly viewing hydrogen as a solution to meeting their decarbonization and energy security goals. 

Antwerp, Belgium Industrial Plant

AP Photo/Virginia Mayo

Analysis & Opinions

The Sunset of an Industrial Plant and the Global Decommissioning Challenge

| Sep. 24, 2019

After many years of productive service, industrial plants reach the end of their useful life and must be dismantled. This complex and costly process, know as decommissioning (commissioning refers to the beginning of a plant useful life), is a confluence of economic, environmental, physical, and regulatory challenges.

President Barack Obama gets direction from his science advisor John P. Holdren during an event on the South Lawn of the White House to explore the stars with middle school students.

Reuters

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

Spotlight on John P. Holdren

| Fall/Winter 2016-2017

As assistant to the president for science and technology, director of the White House Office for Science and Technology Policy, and co-chair of the President’s Council of Advisors on Science and Technology (PCAST), Holdren has worked closely with Obama to reinvigorate America’s scientific capabilities on a range of policy fronts, from climate change and renewable energy to health care and nanotechnology.

China’s Nuclear Security: Progress, Challenges, and Next Steps

REUTERS/Kim Kyung-Hoon

Report - Managing the Atom Project, Belfer Center

China’s Nuclear Security: Progress, Challenges, and Next Steps

| March 28, 2016

In a new report from the Project on Managing the Atom, Senior Research Associate Hui Zhang finds that China has made important nuclear security improvements in areas ranging from its legal framework, to its approaches to physical protection and material accounting, to bolstering nuclear security culture. But China also faces ongoing threats. The possibility of insider theft of nuclear materials in China cannot be ruled out, espe­cially as China increasingly grows into a market-oriented society contending with corruption. Zhang also notes that Beijing faces a growing terrorism threat from separatists in China’s autonomous Xinjiang region.

Report - Managing the Atom Project, Belfer Center

The Cost of Reprocessing in China

| January 2016

Faced with the twin pressures of a still-quickly growing economy and unprecedented smog from coal-fired plants, China is racing to expand its fleet of nuclear power plants. As it does so, Beijing is considering making large capital investments in facilities to reprocess spent nuclear fuel and recycle the resulting plutonium in fast neutron reactors that breed more plutonium. This report outlines the enormous costs China would likely face if it decides to build large-scale plants for reprocessing plutonium from spent nuclear fuel and recycling the plutonium in fast neutron reactors.

Journal Article - Institute of Nuclear Materials Management Journal of Nuclear Materials Management

Securing China’s Nuclear Power Plants

| Winter, 2014.

Since September 11, 2001, China has substantially advanced its physical protection system, with a switch in focus from the traditional "guns, gates, guards" approach to an effective mixed approach, combining personnel with modern techniques. Then-Chinese President Hu Jintao emphasized at the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit that, "In the future, China will further take nuclear security measures, make sure the security of its own nuclear materials and facilities, improve the overall nuclear security." This paper examines the specific and detailed physical protection approaches that are currently applied to China's nuclear power plants, and recommends further steps to improve China's existing nuclear security system.

Report - Managing the Atom Project, Belfer Center

Advancing Nuclear Security: Evaluating Progress and Setting New Goals

In the lead-up to the nuclear security summit, Advancing Nuclear Security: Evaluating Progress and Setting New Goals outlines what was accomplished in a four-year effort launched in 2009 to secure nuclear material around the globe—and what remains to be done. The effort made significant progress, but some weapons-usable nuclear materials still remain “dangerously vulnerable." The authors highlight the continuing danger of nuclear and radiological terrorism and call for urgent action.