Atlantic Council

We are seeing a familiar pattern repeating itself. A dispute between Naftohaz and Gazprom leads to an interruption in Ukraine's gas supply. Deliveries to Europe are affected. Russia is criticized for its use of "the energy weapon". Then, everything is patched up, the gas flows again and the West loses interest in the matter until the next dispute flares up.

A smart energy policy is one that successfully integrates energy security (adequate, reliable supplies of energy at reasonable prices), national security and climate change policies so that they are not pulling in opposite directions.

It emerged last night that President-Elect Barack Obama will “likely” name physicist Steven Chu as the next Secretary of Energy. This is one of the most significant appointments the President-Elect has made yet, due to both the nature of the position and the unique background of the appointee.

As the world gears up for the UN Climate Change extravaganza (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change or UNFCC) in Copenhagen in December 2009, achieving a serious accord to establish post-2012 commitments that could slow or halt global warming increasingly appears a mirage. This was foreshadowed in the failure of last week's preparatory meeting in Poland.

The National Intelligence Council’s “Global Trends 2025: A Transformed World” report considers likely scenarios for nearly all strategic global issues, including nuclear proliferation, terrorism, and climate change.  Climate change in particular is an issue that we will be faced with on a daily basis two decades from now.

Oil prices have plummeted in recent weeks, hitting a 20-month low of $59 per barrel, a 60 percent drop-off from its summer high of $147.  One might reasonably think that this would be crippling to a country like Russia, which relies so heavily on energy exports to stake its claim to major power status.  The Troika Dialog team, though, argues that it's much more complicated than that.

The landmark pipeline deal recently signed between Russia and China connecting the Siberian oil fields with Daqing should send cold chills up Europeans’ spines.  It may very well mean they will be literally cold in the foreseeable future.

As the world gears up for the UN Climate Change extravaganza (UN Framework Convention on Climate Change or UNFCC) in Copenhagen in December 2009, achieving a serious accord to establish post-2012 commitments that could slow or halt global warming increasingly appears a mirage.

Since Russia’s August invasion and occupation of Georgia, the short and long term implications have been much debated.  Is Russia reasserting itself in an attempt to become the global power that its predecessor the USSR

The persistence of poverty and extreme deprivation in developing countries prevents the spread of freedom and democracy as certainly as any other factor. Starting points to alleviate that poverty are developing countries’ ability to obtain the clean energy and water supplies that are necessary to promote economic growth and public health. This paper attempts to create a new paradigm for U.S. foreign policy, taking advantage of the vast (as yet untapped) resources of the U.S. technical capabilities in our research institutions to better understand the cause and effect of energy-water-agriculture interdependencies on national and regional instabilities, as well as the potential for transformational technological impacts on future development and stability.