• 2022’s U.S. Climate Disasters: A Tale of Too Much Rain – and Too Little

    By Shuang-Ye Wu

    The year 2022 will be remembered across the U.S. for its devastating flooding and storms – and also for its extreme heat waves and droughts, including one so severe it briefly shut down traffic on the Mississippi River.

  • Washington’s Semiconductor Sanctions Won’t Slow China’s Military Build-Up

    By Gary Clyde Hufbauer and Megan Hogan

    Advanced semiconductors underpin everything from autonomous vehicles to hypersonic weapon systems. Chips are imperative to the defense industry and technologies of the future. By targeting this critical input, the Biden administration aims to freeze China’s semiconductor suite at 2022 levels and impede its military development. Despite the bleak short-term outlook, it is wrong to assume that US controls will hobble China for years.

  • The Right Time for Chip Export Controls

    On Oct. 7, the U.S.-China tech competition heated up dramatically when the Biden administration imposed wide-ranging semiconductor-related export controls on China. Martijn Rasser and Kevin Wolf write that “There is no crystal ball that can divine the outcome, given how unprecedented and wide ranging these actions are.” They add: “The Biden administration made the right call by acting now, particularly if it is successful at getting allied cooperation on the essence of the rules soon.”

  • Energy, War, and the Crisis in Ukraine

    By Peter Dizikes

    Russia’s invasion of Ukraine is having a global impact on many areas of the world today, affecting the balance of power among states and creating a contest between democratic and authoritarian alliances. It is also having a major impact on the global energy supply. An expert panel examined the implications of energy use and energy policy during Russia’s invasion.

  • Record Low Water Levels on the Mississippi River in 2022 Show How Climate Change Is Altering Large Rivers

    By Ray Lombardi, Angela Antipova, and Dorian J. Burnette

    In 2022, water levels in some of the world’s largest rivers, including the Rhine in Europe and the Yangtze in China, fell to historically low levels. The Mississippi River fell so low in Memphis, Tennessee, in mid-October that barges were unable to float, requiring dredging and special water releases from upstream reservoirs to keep channels navigable.

  • The Global Race to Secure Critical Minerals Heats Up

    By David Uren

    The World Trade Organization last week ruled that Indonesia had no right to ban the export of nickel or to require that raw nickel ore be refined in Indonesia. Handing a comprehensive victory to the complainant, the European Union, the WTO decision highlights the clash between national security and global trade rules over critical minerals.

  • The World’s Insurance Bill from Natural Disasters This Year: $115 Billion

    By Lylla Younes

    Extreme weather events have caused an estimated $115 billion in insured financial losses around the world this year according to Swiss Re, the Zurich-based reinsurance giant. That’s 42 percent higher than the 10-year average of $81 billion.

  • Australia and Its Partners Must Do more to Avoid Dependence on China for Rare Earths

    By John Coyne and Justin Bassi

    Low labor costs, indifference to the environmental impacts of mineral processing, and the rest of the world dropping the ball while focusing on other issues allowed Beijing to achieve global dominance of critical-minerals markets, with almost 80% control of rare earths and up to 94% of other critical minerals like magnesium. The global markets for rare-earth elements and critical minerals are shaping to be the next economic hot zone for the Chinese Communist Party—and for the security of the world’s advanced economies.

  • New ‘Faraday Cage’ Research Facility to Help Combat Digital Crime

    University of Huddersfield installing a new facility named the ‘Faraday Cage’ which will help speed-up the development and testing of new digital forensic processes to help law enforcement meet the huge growth rate in digital crime.

  • Is Industrial Policy Making a Comeback?

    By Anshu Siripurapu and Noah Berman

    Industrial policy refers to government efforts to support particular industries that are considered strategically important, such as manufacturing. It has been employed in many countries, including the United States, though it fell out of favor in the 1980s. The Biden administration has pushed to support advanced manufacturing amid the COVID-19 pandemic, tumult in global supply chains, and the rise of China., in the process renewing the debate about the U.S. government’s role in shaping the economy.

  • Railroad Unions and Their Employers at an Impasse: Freight-Halting Strikes Are Rare, and This Would Be the First in 3 Decades

    By Erik Loomis

    The prospect of a potentially devastating rail workers strike is looming again. Strikes that obstruct transportation rarely occur in the United States, and the last one involving rail workers happened three decades ago. But when these workers do walk off the job, it can thrash the economy, inconveniencing millions of people and creating a large-scale crisis.

  • U.K. Removes China from Sizewell C Nuclear Plant as Tensions Grow

    London has stripped Chinese firm CGN of its stake in the nuclear plant. British lawmakers were visiting Taiwan and China’s London ambassador was summoned over the alleged assault of a BBC reporter as tensions mount.

  • With Climate Impacts Growing, Insurance Companies Face Big Challenges

    By Renee Cho

    The impacts of climate change are all around us: sea level rise, severe heat waves, drought, extreme rainfall, more powerful storms. These impacts are making natural disasters more intense and more frequent. Losses from each disaster—drought and wildfires in the southwest, severe storms in the Midwest, flooding in Kentucky and Missouri, and hurricanes in the southeast—have exceeded $1 billion, with the cumulative cost of disasters over the last five years reaching $788.4 billion.

  • Examining Vulnerabilities of Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure

    With electric vehicles becoming more common, the risks and hazards of a cyberattack on electric vehicle charging equipment and systems also increases. Reviewing the vulnerabilities of EV charging infrastructure would help prioritize grid protections and informs policy makers.

  • Germany’s China Policy: Has It Learned from Its Dependency on Russia?

    By Liana Fix

    The German economy remains heavily dependent on China, its largest trading partner, despite mounting geopolitical tensions between the West and Beijing.