Joseph Webster is a senior fellow at the Atlantic Council’s Global Energy Center and a nonresident senior fellow with the Council’s Indo-Pacific Security Initiative, as well as editor of the independent China-Russia Report. Webster’s research focuses on the national security-energy nexus, especially the US–PRC strategic competition.
Webster’s energy work spans the sector but focuses especially on how the artificial intelligence–energy nexus, the military applications of advanced batteries, and Taiwan’s energy security vulnerabilities shape national security outcomes. On national security, Webster examines China–Russia relations and a potential Taiwan contingency. He catalogs China-Russia economic interactions and parses authoritative Chinese-language statements for signals and indicators; his Taiwan analysis emphasizes possible contingencies and their energy dimensions. Previously, Webster worked on trade policy at US trade agencies, examining TPP and China-Russia trade issues, and led LNG market analysis at a Houston-based energy consultancy.
Webster’s work has been published by War on the Rocks, The Interpreter, and Politico Europe. His analyses have been cited by the New York Times, Wall Street Journal, Financial Times, Bloomberg, Politico, and Axios, as well as by the US–China Economic and Security Review Commission and other government bodies. He has appeared on Bloomberg Television, DW’s The Dip, CNBC, The Energy Gang, Power Vertical, and Ukraine: The Latest. Webster holds a master’s degree in international relations from Johns Hopkins University’s Paul H. Nitze School of Advanced International Studies, where he was a Mount Vernon Fellow, and a bachelor’s degree in economics from the University of Maryland. He reads Mandarin Chinese for primary-source research and hails from Salisbury, Maryland.
