On May 8th, the U.S. Department of Energy proposed ten new “national interest electric transmission corridors” – a designation that allows the federal government to accelerate projects in areas where consumers are harmed by lack of transmission. Days later, on the 13th, the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission released Orders 1920 and 1977. Both of the new rules aim to expedite the build out of the nation’s electric grid by tackling major issues such as cost allocation and long-term planning. So...
May 28, 2024•54 min
Industry accounts for one-third of global greenhouse gas emissions, a share that will only increase in the coming years. Other high-emission sectors, like electric power and transportation, are cutting emissions through renewables and electrification. But the pathways to reducing emissions from manufacturing materials such as iron, steel, chemicals, cement, and concrete are still unclear. A new book by Jeffrey Rissman, titled Zero-Carbon Industry: Transformative Technologies and Policies to Achi...
May 21, 2024•41 min
In April, the Environmental Protection Agency passed four new rules to reduce pollution from fossil fuel-fired power plants. One of the new rules requires many new gas and existing coal power plants to control 90 percent of their carbon pollution if they plan to operate beyond 2039. The other three rules specifically target coal, requiring the industry to clean up various parts of the value chain including toxic metal emissions from power generation, wastewater pollution, and coal ash management...
May 14, 2024•45 min
Indonesia’s economy is closely tied to its natural resources. It’s the world’s fourth largest producer of coal , and Southeast Asia’s largest gas supplier. But even with its connection to fossil fuels, the country’s population strongly supports climate goals. In this year’s presidential election, every candidate advocated for the energy transition and more renewables. At the same time, like many developing countries, Indonesia needs energy security, increased access to energy, and affordability....
May 07, 2024•48 min
Across the U.S., large scale renewable energy projects, transmission lines, and mining sites for critical minerals are built on or near tribal lands. For example, the federal government plans to loan billions of dollars to Lithium Americas to develop a lithium mine in Nevada at a location known as Thacker Pass, sacred to local Paiute and Shoshone people. With the tumultuous history of energy development on indigenous lands, many tribes are pushing back on citing new infrastructure on their land....
Apr 30, 2024•40 min
Geopolitics looms large over the global economy. A recent client survey by Goldman Sachs found geopolitics is the top investment risk of this year, overtaking inflation and the upcoming U.S. presidential election. The market impacts by the wars in Europe and the Middle East, and the rising tension between China and Taiwan, are hard to predict. And the rise of protectionism, economic fragmentation, and industrial policy are inflaming tensions in a new era of great power competition. So, how shoul...
Apr 23, 2024•33 min
Cleaner alternatives to the oil and gas that power vital industries are necessary for economy-wide decarbonization. E-fuels, or electrofuels, are touted as a carbon neutral solution for the hard-to-decarbonize sectors that rely on energy dense fossil fuels. E-fuels are made by combining hydrogen with carbon dioxide. Through the electrolysis process, water is split into oxygen and hydrogen atoms. The hydrogen is then combined with CO2 through a process called synthesis. The outcome is an energy-d...
Apr 16, 2024•46 min
From methane monitoring to integrating more renewables into the power mix, artificial intelligence has the potential to transform the energy transition. It can be used to reduce emissions from food systems, and hard-to-abate sectors, like steel and cement manufacturing. But the amount of energy AI will require is generating interest, uncertainty and concern. And this is in addition to the need for more electricity to help decarbonize multiple sectors. So what are the high potential opportunities...
Apr 09, 2024•55 min
On March 6, the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) adopted new rules to standardize climate-related disclosures for public business and public offerings. Hoping to provide investors with consistent and comparable information, the Commission’s new rules require companies to disclose emissions and the expenses and losses associated with climate risks in annual filings and reports. But critics immediately balked at the rules, questioning its legality and effectiveness. So, how does the S...
Apr 02, 2024•43 min
Methane leakage is one of many issues at the forefront today over how the oil and gas industry is engaging in the clean energy transition. Importantly, this industry includes not only some of the better-known energy companies, but also many national oil companies. Collectively they produce about half the world’s oil and gas. During last year’s COP28, these companies committed to cutting methane emissions and working towards decarbonizing the industry. But the energy transition for these companie...
Mar 26, 2024•53 min
To limit global warming to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels, emissions should already be decreasing and need to be cut by almost half by 2030. Although this target is just six years away, fossil fuels experienced continued demand and revenue growth in 2023. At CERAWeek by S&P Global, one of the world’s largest annual energy conferences, the energy transition is at the forefront of conversations. But energy security and different pathways to net-zero goals is also the theme of the conference...
Mar 19, 2024•53 min
For more than a century, extractive industry and capitalism have dominated the developed world’s economies. Some of the biggest companies in the world produce and sell oil and gas, and those commodities have made countries and people very wealthy. But they’re also a major source of pollution and contributor to the climate crisis. In response, many of these companies have started investing in renewable energy, others have completely shifted their focus to clean solutions. Akshat Rathi’s new book ...
Mar 12, 2024•41 min
Batteries are finding their way into everything – from cars to heavy equipment to the electric grid. But scaling up production to meet the demands of a net-zero economy is complicated and contentious. Season 4 of The Big Switch, a Columbia University podcast hosted by Dr. Melissa Lott, digs into the ways batteries are made and asks: what gets mined, traded, and consumed on the road to decarbonization? This is part one of “The Great Battery Boom,” a five-part series on global battery supply chain...
Mar 08, 2024•46 min
The success of the energy transition hinges on the availability of affordable capital to fund clean energy projects. The rise of green industrial policy in wealthy economies has mobilized public capital to fund clean energy projects, and attracted private capital through subsidies and tax incentives. But in emerging and developing economies, there are many more barriers to deploying capital for clean energy at the scale and speed needed. The International Monetary Fund projects that of the $5 tr...
Mar 05, 2024•47 min
In a new partnership with Google, the Environmental Defense Fund has developed a satellite that will orbit the Earth fifteen times a day and monitor methane emissions. The satellite, called MethaneSAT, will provide specific data on which parts of oil and gas infrastructure are the biggest methane emitters. Using artificial intelligence, MethaneSAT will overlay emissions data on oil and gas infrastructure maps to pinpoint the components that are responsible for methane leaks. So, what are the imp...
Feb 27, 2024•43 min
Brazil is in a strategic position when it comes to energy and climate issues. It holds the presidency of the G20 nations this year and the UN climate talks – or COP30 – in 2025. This comes as the nation sees a significant reduction in deforestation in the Amazon rainforest under President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva and new commitments to pursue low-carbon technologies, such as hydrogen, and establish a regulated carbon market. At the same time, Brazil, the biggest producer of oil in Latin America...
Feb 20, 2024•50 min
Against the backdrop of climate change, a global debt crisis is raising concerns about the cost of the energy transition. Countries in the Global South — which are trying to balance economic development and climate adaptation — are calling for reforms to the global financial system to get more access to cheaper capital. The World Bank, which provides loans and grants to emerging and developing economies, is a major financier of international development. Last year, it delivered $38.6 billion in ...
Feb 13, 2024•52 min
For more than three decades, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has prepared comprehensive scientific assessments about the drivers and risks of climate change. The assessments, released every five to seven years, also explain how mitigation and adaptation could reduce those risks. To confront the growing urgency of the climate crisis, governments around the world turn to the IPCC for guidance on emissions reductions strategies. That said, the organization makes clear that its re...
Feb 06, 2024•39 min
Within days of taking office, President Joe Biden signed an executive order to create the Justice40 Initiative. The policy aims to allocate 40% of the benefits of federal clean energy and climate investments to frontline communities. For the energy sector, it’s helping to shine a growing light on “energy justice.” Historically, the current energy system has negatively impacted disadvantaged communities the most – communities that often lack access to affordable energy, are excluded from potentia...
Jan 30, 2024•57 min
Around the world, new policies like the Inflation Reduction Act or the European Union's Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism aim to accelerate the pace of decarbonization. But these same policies have also fueled trade tensions and raised concerns about protectionism. A successful clean energy transition means much more trade in clean energy technologies and products, according to the International Energy Agency. A rules-based global trading system, governed by the World Trade Organization, underp...
Jan 23, 2024•57 min
The Department of the Interior is a key player in the energy transition in the U.S.. The federal government owns about 28% of the 2.3 billion acres of land in the country. The Department is responsible for permitting oil and gas drilling, renewable development, and mining on its vast land holdings. At the same time, the DOI is tasked with protecting America’s national parks and wilderness holdings for future generations. As the urgency of the climate crisis grows, the agency is at the heart of t...
Jan 16, 2024•52 min
As 2024 kicks off, energy and climate policy discussions loom large in Washington. With the added complexity of the November presidential elections in the U.S., it remains uncertain what will happen regarding the increasingly partisan issues of environmental regulation and green industrial policy. The Biden administration plans to continue implementing the Inflation Reduction Act, but Republicans in Congress could take action to hinder further progress. And government agencies, like the Federal ...
Jan 09, 2024•46 min
The passage of the Inflation Reduction Act last year marked not only significant climate action but efforts to shape industrial policy. Through billions of dollars of subsidies, the IRA aimed to quicken the pace and scale of the energy transition and also bolster domestic manufacturing and the economy. While providing an infusion of capital to America’s clean energy economy, the legislation heightened trade tensions around the world, with other countries vying to capture their share of clean ene...
Jan 02, 2024•53 min
In April of this year, Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy reached its 10th anniversary. So this week, we’re bringing back the conversation between hosts Bill Loveless and Jason Bordoff about the special milestone. With the help of some colleagues, Jason founded CGEP in 2013 to produce unbiased, evidence-based research that examines energy issues in economics, national security, environment, and climate. Ten years later, CGEP is busier than ever addressing the world’s energy and...
Dec 26, 2023•57 min
Climate change is threatening human health across the globe. Extreme weather events like wildfires and heat waves are causing immediate and long-term health risks, with sometimes deadly results. According to this year’s Lancet Countdown report , which tracks the effects of climate change on human health, the impacts are getting worse. To address this growing crisis, the recent UN Conference on Climate Change, or COP28, featured its first ever Health Day. Discussions there established the issue a...
Dec 19, 2023•45 min
Averting the worst impacts of climate change requires rapidly reducing carbon emissions across all sectors. This is particularly challenging for some so-called “hard-to-abate” sectors like cement and steel manufacturing. Carbon management – which includes carbon transport; carbon utilization and storage; direct air capture; and point source carbon capture – seeks to trap or remove carbon emissions where they can’t be easily avoided. Recent policies like the Inflation Reduction Act have given the...
Dec 12, 2023•1 hr 4 min
In 2022, the United States and the European Union consumed more than twice as much energy as Africa and Southeast Asia combined, despite having roughly a third of the population. At the same time, developing countries are experiencing the most severe impacts of climate change even though they’ve contributed the least to cumulative emissions. Many of these regions are endowed with considerable clean energy potential as well as large deposits of oil and gas. Africa, for example, has the world’s gr...
Dec 05, 2023•58 min
This week, climate leaders, scholars, and activists from around the world will travel to the United Arab Emirates for the annual United Nations conference on climate change known as COP. Many highly debated topics will take center stage at this year’s COP28, including the role of fossil fuels in meeting future global energy demands, the follow through on loss and damage commitments from last year’s meeting, and rising international trade tensions over clean energy economics. Even the location of...
Nov 28, 2023•52 min
When it comes to energy and climate, Canada is a key player and a land of contrasts. It gets more than 80% of its electricity from low-carbon sources and has a hefty carbon tax. It’s also a major oil and gas producer, and has resources for the metals and minerals needed for a clean energy transition. As the urgency of the climate crisis grows, the Canadian government has committed to accelerate its climate goals. At the same time, the importance of oil and gas to the Canadian economy, along with...
Nov 21, 2023•56 min
Three months ago, deadly wildfires swept across the western shore of Maui. It was the deadliest environmental disaster in Hawaii’s history. Now the community is rebuilding, and around the state residents are preparing for more extreme weather events. Elemental Excelerator , a Honolulu-based non-profit investor in climate technology, relies on local knowledge to create a wide range of climate solutions. The organization pairs technology startups with local nonprofits, which have a deep understand...
Nov 14, 2023•45 min
