Environment & Climate Change

109 Items

Electricians install solar panels.

AP/Mary Altaffer

Report Chapter - Brookings Institution

Mexico’s Energy Reforms: A Blow to Realizing the Most Competitive and Dynamic Region in the World

| Feb. 28, 2022

In late 2017, Mexico made headlines as Italian company Enel bid what was then a world-record low price for renewable energy in the country’s third such energy auction. This development was possible due to the historical and sweeping energy reforms passed with broad support in Mexico in 2013. Then-President Enrique Peña Nieto had succeeded where previous Mexican presidents had failed, reversing decades of resource nationalism and overhauling the energy sector through constitutional reforms that gave the private sector a larger role and advantaged renewable energy in Mexico’s economy. The 2017 auction seemed to indicate Mexico’s bright future not only as a conventional oil producer, but also as a clean energy power.

John Kerry delivers a policy speech

AP/Matt Dunham

Analysis & Opinions - Project Syndicate

America's New Great-Power Strategy

| Aug. 03, 2021

During the Cold War, US grand strategy focused on containing the power of the Soviet Union. China's rise now requires America and its allies to develop a strategy that seeks not total victory over an existential threat, but rather managed competition that allows for both cooperation and rivalry within a rules-based system.

Sen. Lisa Murkowski, R-Alaska., speaks during a Senate Committee on Energy and Natural Resources hearing

Pool via AP/Leigh Vogel

Analysis & Opinions - The Hill

Why Biden's Interior Department isn't Shutting Down Oil and Gas

| July 23, 2021

Joel Clement describes the influence of U.S. Senators Lisa Murkowski and Joe Manchin over the Department of the Interior and advises that a forward-looking legislator in a fossil-fuel state would be wise to fight aggressively for financial commitments to make the people in their state part of the vanguard of the new clean energy economy, rather than set back the U.S. economy by fighting the inevitable energy transition itself.

President Joe Biden delivers a speech on voting rights

AP/Evan Vucci

Analysis & Opinions - Foreign Policy

Could the United States Still Lead the World if It Wanted to?

| July 15, 2021

Stephen Walt asks whether the United States is a good model for other liberal states and whether its policy judgments are ones that others should trust and follow, especially with respect to foreign policy.  He argues that—on balance—the answer to both questions is "no."

Xie Zhenhua, China's Special Envoy for Climate Change, is seen on big screens as he speaks

AP/Ng Han Guan

Analysis & Opinions - Project Syndicate

The Logic of US-China Competition

| May 06, 2021

The success of U.S. President Joe Biden's China policy will depend on whether the two powers can cooperate in producing global public goods, while competing in other areas. The U.S.-China relationship is a "cooperative rivalry," in which the terms of competition will require equal attention to both sides of the oxymoron.  Joseph Nye argues that it will not be easy.

Oil and gas drilling rig

Flickr CC/Mark Watson

Analysis & Opinions - Union of Concerned Scientists

Fossil Fuels and Public Lands: How the US Interior Department Can Act on Climate Right Now

| Apr. 06, 2021

Joel Clement describes some immediate opportunities—and emphasize specific recommendations—to establish the Interior Department as a purposeful catalyst for a fair and just transition to clean energy, healthy ecosystems, and thriving communities.

Audio - Right Rising

Ideology and Far Right Ecologism

| Feb. 16, 2021

Guest Balsa Lubarda joins Right Rising to walk us through the basics of what scholars mean by "ideology" and how it relates to far-right ecologism. Along with host Augusta Dell'Omo, Balsa takes us on a deep dive into the world of what he calls "far-right ecologism." He explains how various ideological threads of the radical right, far right, and Christian ecology intersect in far-right ecologism. In today's discussion, Balsa and Augusta consider some of the implications of the growth of far-right ecologism for the environmental justice movement and national green parties.