In The News

Korea Times: North Korea Shipment Tests US-South Korean Ties

Kim Bo-eun August 7, 2018
The United States, with the world’s largest military and economy, finds it challenging to encourage support among close allies for enforcing sanctions. The leaders of North Korea and the United States met in June to discuss initial steps on denuclearization. The US urges strict maintenance of North Korea sanctions until the country takes significant steps on denuclearization are made. South Korea...

BBC News: Global Boom in Hydropower Dams

August 6, 2018
Businesses depend on energy, but energy-related construction can disrupt businesses and communities, too. More than 3,500 hydropower dams – the world’s largest source of renewable energy – are being planned and constructed throughout the developing world. “Critics point to the inherent dangers of building too many dams, too fast and without sufficient consideration for the consequences,” reports...

Brookings: Africa’s 3 Deadly Deficits

Indermit Singh Gill and Kenan Karakulah June 21, 2018
Despite sub-Saharan Africa’s rapid population growth, the region’s income growth matches the global pace and was even negative in 2016. The Sustainable Development Goals pioneered by the United Nations in 2015 seem out of reach for the region as income inequality widens. Three factors for the region’s slow economic growth are low quality education, limited access to electricity and weak domestic...

The New York Times: Pope Tells Oil Executives to Act on Climate

Elisabetta Povoledo June 13, 2018
Three years after his urgent letter warning of the dangers of rapid climate change created by humans, Pope Francis has taken additional action by addressing the leaders of the world’s biggest oil companies. Oil and gas company efforts have been lackluster in transitioning away from limited fossil fuels to renewable energy sources, and the risks to the environment – including pollution, flooding,...

The Diplomat: Plans for South China Sea Nuclear Power Plants

Viet Phuong Nguyen May 11, 2018
Environmentalists express concerns about a floating nuclear power plant, the Akademik Lomonosov, dispatched by Russia in late April to the Arctic. China also plans as many as 20 floating nuclear reactors in the South China Sea: “In 2016, two major Chinese state-owned nuclear suppliers, the China National Nuclear Corp. (CNNC) and China General Nuclear Power Group (CGN), announced a plan to...

Harvard Gazette: Global Power Grid for Global Powers

Clea Simon April 20, 2018
Distributing power may be more challenging than discovering or producing power. State Grid Corporation of China is the world’s largest utility company, and its former Chairman and President, Liu Zhenya, describes how the company's work on transmitting power via ultra-high-voltage lines throughout China could be applied to a global energy grid, “effectively revolutionizing the practicality of...

Asian Age: EU to Ban Palm Oil in Biodiesel

Sudheer Mopperthy April 16, 2018
Palm oil transformed from an alternative energy that could reduce carbon emissions to an eco-nightmare and mass burning of rainforest habitat to make room for more plantations: “One of the biggest issues raised was that using palm oil for biodiesel is an inefficient use of agricultural land,” notes Sudheer Mopperthy for the Asian Age. Likewise the European Union went form a pledge that 10 percent...