• Countering Coercion: Australia Must Engage with Allies on Critical Minerals Supply

    China’s use of coercion to control critical mineral mining and processing projects, their output and even whole supply chains has motivated several countries to take increasingly strong measures to secure alternative supply chains. Meanwhile, China’s state-linked companies continue to use multiple channels to manipulate markets at scale.

  • ‘Time for a Reckoning.’ Kansas Farmers Brace for Water Cuts to Save Ogallala Aquifer.

    in this region of Kansas where water is everything, they’ll have to overcome entrenched attitudes and practices that led to decades of overpumping. After decades of local inaction, Kansas lawmakers are pushing for big changes in irrigation.

  • ‘Doom Spiral’ a Risk for Public Transit in Post-Pandemic Era

    A new study warns that cutting public transit service could lead to a “doom spiral” resulting in a collapse of the system. The researchers describe a vicious circle in which service cuts brought on by budget deficits drive transit users away; this drop in ridership triggers additional service cuts, which lead to further declines in usage.

  • Before “Superstorm” Sandy, Investors Underestimated Risk, Impact of Hurricanes

    Weather experts are warning that this year’s Atlantic hurricane season could be among the most active on record. Hurricanes and other extreme weather events cause millions of dollars in damage , but they also create spikes in uncertainty that can linger in financial markets for affected firms for months.

  • Can Europe Secure Its Own Critical Raw Materials?

    With the EU’s Critical Raw Materials’ Act coming into force, the 27-nation bloc is looking to diversify its supplies of minerals away from China. But can it source enough of it at competitive prices?

  • Fool’s Gold: Overhyped Tech Startups Distract from Military Innovation

    Technology startups almost never live up to all the hype they generate. Much of this innovation is fool’s gold. Often, these solutions are not developed beyond an initial concept. It’s a missed opportunity for the U.S. military. Startup companies often present the Pentagon with more cost-effective, swift, and adaptable solutions compared to the weapons systems typically provided by the handful of major contractors the Pentagon usually turns to.

  • States Beg Insurers Not to Drop Climate-Threatened Homes

    In the coming years, climate change could force Americans from their homes, not just by raising sea levels, worsening wildfires and causing floods — but also by putting insurance coverage out of reach.

  • How Secure Is Gene Synthesizing Research?

    Critics warn that the benefits of gene synthesizing research are undermined by security measures which are not sufficiently tight to prevent such research form being used by bad actors to do harm. One expert writes: “The problem is that governments don’t mandate security across the industry — and even though it’s a crime to ship DNA sufficient to generate the entire infectious 1918 influenza, there’s no law against shipping pieces of it.” The International Gene Synthesis Consortium disagrees.

  • China’s Control and Coercion in Critical Minerals

    Markets for critical minerals are no longer shaping up to be the next components of the global economy to be dominated by China. They already are. While Western nations were sleeping, China built vertically integrated supply chains for several critical minerals vital to the energy transition and high technology applications, including defense equipment.

  • Removing Cuba from List of Countries ‘Not Fully Cooperating’ Over Terrorism May Presage Wider Rapprochement – If Politics Allows

    The U.S. State Department removed Cuba from its list of countries “not fully cooperating” with anti-terrorism efforts in mid-May 2024, but you would be forgiven for not noticing. Despite the low-key nature of the announcement, taking Cuba off the list is a big deal. The move is a potential step toward a rapprochement between Washington and Havana.

  • Why Did the U.S. Open Up Banking to Cuba's Private Sector?

    As Cuba faces a social and economic crisis, the United States has enabled more financial support for private businesses in the country in a boost to Internet-based services and financial services.

  • Video Games Might Matter for Terrorist Financing

    Every day, billions of dollars flow across international borders among millions of people on a public online market, with functionally no government oversight or regulation. The market? Virtual currency and digital assets in video games. Moshe Klein writes that “as terrorists seek new methods of conducting financial activity, governments must remain one step ahead and consider how they can proactively investigate and close extant avenues for terrorist financing.”

  • ARPA-H Announces Program to Enhance and Automate Cybersecurity for Health Care Facilities

    The Advanced Research Projects Agency for Health (ARPA-H) announced the launch of the Universal PatchinG and Remediation for Autonomous DEfense (UPGRADE) program, a cybersecurity effort that will invest more than $50 million to create tools for information technology (IT) teams to better defend the hospital environments they are tasked with securing.

  • U.S. Announces Measures to Help Over 11,000 Cuban Small Businesses

    The administration unveiled regulatory changes to increase support for the Cuban people and independent private sector entrepreneurs. The changes will enable more U.S. financial support for small private businesses in Cuba, enhance internet-based services on the island and broaden access to financial services.

  • O-RAN Is Overhyped as Avoiding Chinese 5G Influence

    In recent years, countries have faced a stark choice between Chinese and Western suppliers to develop their 5G cellular network infrastructure. While Chinese suppliers such as Huawei and ZTE are not trusted because of their ties and legal obligations to China’s party-state, Western suppliers have struggled to compete on cost. The emergence of Open Radio Access Network (O-RAN) technology has some promised, but the idea that O-RAN is a viable alternative to Chinese suppliers seems hollow.