News & Announcements

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. 

While stating that climate change is a “huge problem” in need of innovative solutions, Louisiana Congressman Garret Graves (R-6th district) made the case for bridging political divides by aligning environmental sustainability with economic sustainability during a Virtual Forum (view recording here) on Thursday (March 10). The event was hosted by the Harvard Project on Climate Agreements (HPCA) and moderated by Robert Stavins, HPCA Director and A.J. Meyer Professor of Energy and Economic Development. 

Heather Williams, a nuclear expert at King’s College London and visiting fellow at the Harvard Kennedy School, said it was “totally ambiguous” but in keeping with a leader who has a history of being a “nuclear bully”. “It is classic Putin, creating ambiguity and uncertainty,” Williams said. “Putin is so good at that because he knows that it keeps people on edge.”

Noi che siamo spettatori dell’abisso, come dice Ian McEwan, a cosa dobbiamo ancora assistere? Alla conquista da parte di Vladimir Putin, per via della sua enorme supremazia, di tutte le centrali nucleari. Riuscirà anche a disarticolare i presidi logistici della difesa di Kiev.

Francesca Giovannini, the executive director of the Project on Managing the Atom at the Harvard Kennedy School’s Belfer Center for Science, believes that the nuclear option, while improbable, should not be completely ruled out. “The circumstances are very complex,” she argues. “And he [Putin] is under a huge amount of pressure.”

And then there are the extreme circumstances of the moment. “I think that he is under huge internal pressure,” says Giovannini. “He’s not crazy. I don’t think that he would launch a strategic bomb. But it worries me that he could consider the option of a tactical one. To send a message that he is prepared to do anything to defend Russian interests. Thinking that perhaps an attack with a tactical warhead in Ukraine would not trigger a military reaction from NATO against Russia.”

The initial stage of the war in Ukraine has confounded expectations. Russia’s military invasion failed in key objectives, upending predictions of a rout of Ukraine. Then, after years of avoiding direct confrontations with Moscow, Western nations are now directly punishing Russian President Vladimir Putin and his allies with truly devastating economic sanctions while openly supplying arms to Ukraine.

Though there were peace talks for the first time on Monday, there are no signs that the cycle of escalation will go down. Amid unprecedented global pressure, Putin is doubling down on a defensive posture that pits Russia against almost everyone else in the world. He has ratcheted up the levels of violence in eastern Ukraine, bombarding the city of Kharkiv with suspected cluster munitions, while putting the country’s nuclear arsenal on alert.

Professor Robert Stavins is profiled and interviewed by Ingmar Schumacher, Professor of Economics at IPAG Business School in Paris, France, at website, “Top Environmental Economists,” including a brief video interview, and a much more extensive written version.

Climate@HKSis a new online resource for navigating the full range of climate-related activity across Harvard Kennedy School's research centers, degree programs, and administrative departments.

This study group will explore the role of the private sector in evolving energy systems, and how corporations might change in a climate constrained world. 

Jos Delbeke, Professor at the European University Institute in Florence and at the KU Leuven in Belgium, recounted the evolution of carbon pricing and voiced his optimism for further international efforts to combat climate change in the newest episode of “Environmental Insights: Discussions on Policy and Practice from the Harvard Environmental Economics Program.”