Energy & Environment

Addressing instability in Central America: Restrictions on civil liberties, violence, and climate change

By María Fernanda Bozmoski, María Eugenia Brizuela de Avila, Domingo Sadurní

Citizens across Latin America and the Caribbean are rising up in protest. Political frustration and economic stagnation are fueling social discontent exacerbated by the continued COVID-19 pandemic and the slow health response. In Central America, restrictions on civil liberties, high rates of gender-based violence and extortion, and worsening climate change are compounding the lack of economic opportunities and pervasive corruption seen in El Salvador, Guatemala, and Honduras.

Heat is killing us—and the economy too

Most people know the knock-on effects of global warming by now: rising sea levels, mass extinction of plants and wildlife, worsening floods, fires, and hurricanes. But heat itself is too often overlooked as a destructive force in its own right.

Extreme heat: The economic and social consequences for the United States

By Adrienne Arsht – Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center

A new report produced by the Atlantic Council’s Adrienne Arsht-Rockefeller Foundation Resilience Center with analysis conducted by Vivid Economics—quantifies the impacts of heat under current and future conditions.

Ukrainian leaders to Biden: Standing with the world’s democracies means changing course on Nord Stream 2

By a group of Ukrainian lawmakers, leaders, civil society activists, and experts

In a letter to President Joe Biden, more than 50 Ukrainian policymakers, leaders, experts, and civil society activists call for the United States to change course on support for the Nord Stream 2 pipeline.

Putin’s pipeline poses an “existential threat” to Ukraine

By Diane Francis

The CEO of Ukraine's energy giant Naftogaz, Yuriy Vitrenko, has branded Vladimir Putin's Nord Stream 2 pipeline project an existential threat to Ukraine and a security threat to Europe as a whole.

Reimagining a just society pt. 5: “Is this working as intended?” — Global trends amid contested futures

By Carol Dumaine

The question of ‘is this working as intended’ is applicable to contemporary concepts of national and international security as well as of economic value, growth, and development. Given how our world is being reshaped by new technologies, data capabilities, and geopolitics, leaders in both the public and private sector need to pause and consider if governance and geopolitics in today’s world are actually working – or not.

COVID-19 lockdown highlights policies to reduce pollution in Saudi Arabia

By Faisal Algosair and Abdulmohsen Almuhaisen

In March 2020, the Saudi government instituted a national lockdown for three months to prevent the proliferation of the coronavirus. These extraordinary circumstances provide the perfect experiment for policymakers and researchers to investigate whether daily human activities significantly affect pollution levels in an oil-exporting country like Saudi Arabia.