Energy & Environment

State of the Order: Assessing July 2023

The State of the Order breaks down the month's most important events impacting the democratic world order.

New FERC order to accelerate grid transition—but planning reform still needed

By Ken Berlin, Frank Willey

With Congress unable to adequately address permitting reform, FERC has taken the lead. FERC's new interconnection rule is a good first step to ramp up US decarbonization efforts but should be supplemented with transmission planning reform to optimize future infrastructure deployment.

Transforming Ukraine into a European energy hub

By Richard L. Morningstar, András Simonyi, Olga Khakova, Paddy Ryan

In this issue brief, Global Energy Center experts explore the potential for Ukraine’s energy sector to strengthen European energy security and decarbonization objectives. The brief explores how Ukraine can reform its energy sector to attract investment and create new revenue streams, and how transatlantic partners in government and the private sector can support Ukraine’s clean energy transformation.

There’s something odd about where China is building solar power

By Joseph Webster

Beijing’s solar deployment has been wasteful from an economic and environmental perspective, but the shape of its solar build may be influenced in part by security considerations.

A new Black Sea natural gas project could be a game changer for the region—and a challenge for Putin

By Arnold C. Dupuy

Romania's efforts to develop Black Sea gas can weaken Moscow's influence. Here's how.

Is ‘friendshoring’ really working?

By Niels Graham and Mondrita Rashid

The Biden administration has identified around 2,400 critical goods and materials that fall under its efforts to move supply chains out of China. Check out what the data reveal so far.