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372. Friendshoring the Lithium-Ion Battery Supply Chain: Final Assembly and End Uses
- Author:
- William Alan Reinsch, Meredith Broadbent, Thibault Denamiel, and Elias Shammas
- Publication Date:
- 06-2024
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- Policies surrounding the lithium-ion battery (LIB) supply chain lie at the intersection of trade, climate, and national security considerations. The LIB supply chain spans the globe, and yet some critical inputs are only produced in a handful of countries—in particular China, which is dominant at several key stages of the technology’s production. The Biden administration appears to have three central, yet misaligned, objectives regarding the LIB supply chain: de-risking away from China’s dominance, reshoring manufacturing capabilities, and accelerating the green transition. To spur the technology’s production and deployment, the United States must undertake several economic and trade policy changes to address gaps in its current approach.
- Topic:
- Innovation, Lithium, Supply Chains, Energy, and Friendshoring
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
373. Crafting a Robust U.S. Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism
- Author:
- Sanam Rasool, William Alan Reinsch, and Thibault Denamiel
- Publication Date:
- 08-2024
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- The introduction of a carbon border adjustment mechanism (CBAM) in the United States presents an intricate policy challenge at the intersection of climate action and international trade. With countries around the world integrating climate considerations into their trade policies, the United States is under growing pressure to develop and implement its own CBAM. This policy tool, already adopted by the European Union, is geared toward leveling the playing field for domestic industries while promoting global climate action and accountability. A future U.S. CBAM could serve as a vital instrument in the nation’s transition toward a net-zero economy, encouraging domestic carbon footprint reduction and driving trading partners to adopt cleaner practices. However, crafting and rolling out such a mechanism comes with knotty challenges, ranging from choosing optimal carbon accounting methods and pricing to warding off potential trade disputes and garnering global collaboration. As the United States charts its course through this complex policy landscape, it has the opportunity to shape global climate action while safeguarding its economic interests.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, International Trade and Finance, Economy, and Carbon Border Adjustment Mechanism (CBAM)
- Political Geography:
- North America, Global Focus, and United States of America
374. Defense Priorities in the Open-Source AI Debate
- Author:
- Masao Dahlgren
- Publication Date:
- 08-2024
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- Center for Strategic and International Studies (CSIS)
- Abstract:
- A spirited debate is taking place over the regulation of open foundation models—artificial intelligence models whose underlying architectures and parameters are made public and can be inspected, modified, and run by end users. Proposed limits on releasing open foundation models may have significant defense industrial impacts. If model training is a form of defense production, these impacts deserve further scrutiny. Preliminary evidence suggests that an open foundation model ecosystem could benefit the U.S. Department of Defense’s supplier diversity, sustainment, cybersecurity, and innovation priorities. Follow-on analyses should quantify impacts on acquisition cost and supply chain security.
- Topic:
- Defense Policy, Science and Technology, Regulation, and Artificial Intelligence
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
375. Economic Diplomacy in the Modern Geopolitical Context
- Author:
- Dmitry Birichevsky
- Publication Date:
- 12-2024
- Content Type:
- Journal Article
- Journal:
- International Affairs: A Russian Journal of World Politics, Diplomacy and International Relations
- Institution:
- East View Information Services
- Abstract:
- ON SEPTEMBER 7, 1944, an economic department was formed at the People’s Commissariat for Foreign Affairs of the USSR, marking the beginning of modern Russian economic diplomacy. Over the course of its existence, the current Department of Economic Cooperation (DEC) of the Russian Ministry of Foreign Affairs has undergone numerous transformations, gradually expanding its functions as the foreign economic agenda has expanded and become more complex. The DEC is celebrating its 80th anniversary amid radical geopolitical changes that will shape the configuration of the future world order. This is a period of significant challenges and great responsibility, as well as remarkable opportunities. The current historical phase is marked by significant turbulence in the international relations system, as the collective West’s claims to civilizational exceptionalism have proven untenable and Western regulatory mechanisms have failed to ensure sustainable development of the global economy. The Western powers are attempting to maintain their dominance by systematically weakening potential rivals and securing a generally subordinate position for countries of the World Majority.
- Topic:
- International Cooperation, Geopolitics, Integration, Economic Diplomacy, Multipolarity, and Russia-Ukraine War
- Political Geography:
- Russia and Global Focus
376. The Biological Weapons Convention: Challenges and Opportunities
- Author:
- Jaroslav Krasny
- Publication Date:
- 06-2024
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- Amid geopolitical challenges that have led to the weakening of international arms control and disarmament efforts, the Ninth Biological Weapons Convention (BWC) Review Conference (RevCon) provided a “glimmer of hope” for control and disarmament regimes. Delegates at the Non-Proliferation Treaty RevCon in 2022 and the Chemical Weapons Convention RevCon in 2023 were unable to reach a consensus on these conferences’ respective final documents. By contrast, the Ninth BWC RevCon held from 28 November to 16 December 2022 successfully adopted the final document. While conflicting positions on how to reflect recent allegations that some states are undertaking biological-weaponsrelated research prevented agreement on the article-by-article review, the final document included a forward-looking section that established a Working Group on the Strengthening of the BWC. This Working Group is designed to “strengthen the effectiveness and to improve the implementation of the Convention” and generate recommendations for enhancing and institutionalising it across a number of important areas, including confidence-building measures (CBMs), transparency, compliance and verification, and the national implementation of the BWC. The Working Group's sessions, therefore, provide a long-awaited opportunity to address several critical issues related to the Convention, including international cooperation and a verification mechanism. The Working Group also presents a valuable opportunity to advance work on national implementation under Article IV and interlink obligations. The recent convening of the Working Group from 4 to 8 December 2023 and the subsequent meeting of states parties from 11 to 13 December offer pertinent insights into progress made in strengthening the BWC. Ahead of the next session of the Working Group scheduled for August 2024, this Policy Brief seeks to outline some of the security challenges presented by biological weapons and lay out some of the policy implications and recommendations that flow from these challenges.
- Topic:
- Arms Control and Proliferation, International Cooperation, Geopolitics, and Biological Weapons
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
377. Strengthening a Rights-Based Approach to United Nations Peace Operations
- Author:
- Charles T. Hunt and Adam Day
- Publication Date:
- 02-2024
- Content Type:
- Policy Brief
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- During a July 2020 open debate the United Nations (UN) Security Council highlighted the crucial roles human rights play in peace operations, including by providing early warning of issues or problems, supporting good offices, improving the protection of civilians, strengthening national rule-of-law capacities, ensuring due diligence/compliance for military operations, leading a range of protection-related activities and supporting efforts to protect political space in fragile settings. Despite this recognition of the important role of human rights, there has been relatively little research into how human rights support the implementation of the mandates of a range of peace operations, leaving the evidence base for understanding the contribution of human rights to peace operations very thin. The purpose of this policy brief is to chart out key complexities linked to operationalising a rights-based approach to peace operations. It identifies and introduces critical challenges to mandate implementation through specific themes, including the contribution of human rights to the protection of civilians, stabilisation mandates, smaller-footprint field offices, the political work of special envoys and mission transitions. The paper examines both theoretical and operational aspects of human rights in peace operations. In line with the High-Level Independent Panel on Peace Operations report (2015), it discusses human rights considerations in relation to a range of UN peace operations, including peacekeeping and special political missions, regional prevention offices, and special envoys. The first section locates human rights components and concerns across a spectrum of UN peace operations, comparing how human rights contribute to a wide range of peace and security engagements. The second section highlights several challenges to realising human rights aims and objectives in field missions. The final section proposes a series of questions that warrant further discussion to elucidate and support a rights-based approach to peace operations that could help to respond to the call in the New Agenda for Peace for a reflection on the limits and future of UN peacekeeping and other ongoing policymaking within the UN system. The paper illustrates that in order to support the UN’s recommitment to its core principles and human rights pillar, there is a need for greater attention to the ways that human rights can support the analysis and strategic positioning of UN peace operations.
- Topic:
- United Nations, Peacekeeping, and UN Security Council
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
378. Geopolitical Features, Common Interests and the Climate Crisis: The Case of the Arctic
- Author:
- Lassi Heininen
- Publication Date:
- 05-2024
- Content Type:
- Working Paper
- Institution:
- The Geneva Centre for Security Policy
- Abstract:
- In the 1990s an inspiring sense of a “new North” became apparent in Arcticrelated ideas and innovations that indicated the end of the Cold War period. This included arms control initiatives, cross-border cooperation and sustainability “to decrease military tension and increase political stability”, an emerging environmental awakening among peoples and societies, knowledge-building by indigenous peoples and the scientific community, and new forums for opening up discussions on regional development. The Arctic seemed to be in a state of constant transformation (geo)politically, economically, culturally and environmentally. Some of the outcomes of these processes were impressive, transforming the Arctic from a site of military tension to one reflecting geopolitical stability. When analysing this transformation and the ways in which the Arctic states reconstructed their geopolitical reality prior to 24 February 2022, the main conclusion is that this would not have been possible without key features of Arctic geopolitics, security and governance creating suitable conditions for cross-border cooperation, which correspondingly increased stability. In the same way, cooperation, mostly in terms of fields of low political interest, was made possible because the eight Arctic states shared similar interests. But now this transformation, which is also called the “Arctic model”, is threatened by a new transformation from a state of high geopolitical stability to one characterised by the uncertainties of the climate crisis and new East-West tensions, resulting in a pause in pan-Arctic cooperation during which the Arctic Council has not been able to return to business as usual. The focus of this Geneva Paper, based on the author’s previous studies and personal observations after the Russian invasion of Ukraine in February 2022, is this new transformation and its influences on cooperation. The aim is to assess whether the fundamentals of the previously applicable common interests are still valued, and to what extent they could be used as the means for confidence-building in the region. Similarly, if the fundamentals of the special features of Arctic geopolitics, security and governance are in place, the question then becomes to what extent they could be interpreted as prerequisites for more widespread cooperation and geopolitical stability. Finally, if the search for stability that was the original ultimate aim of the Arctic states and Arctic indigenous peoples were still valued, would it motivate the Arctic states’ governments to more effectively align their policies when facing the climate crisis. This could be done by integrating cooperation on environmental protection, climate change mitigation, and science into their climate and foreign policies. Much is clearly at stake, for if we lose the region’s human-made peace dividend that was consciously built during the 35 years before February 2022, then the multiple crises and world disorder that are looming and threatening the entire world community would be much more difficult to resolve.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, International Cooperation, and Geopolitics
- Political Geography:
- Arctic and Global Focus
379. Triggering Investment in First-of-a-Kind and Early Near-Zero Emissions Industrial Facilities
- Author:
- Chris Bataille, Seton Stiebert, and Jonas Algers
- Publication Date:
- 08-2024
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP), Columbia University
- Abstract:
- Among the most significant challenges to achieving the Paris Agreement goal of global net-zero CO2 emissions by 2055–2075 is addressing the so-called “hard-to-abate” heavy industrial sectors such as iron and steel, cement and concrete, ammonia, methanol, and high value feedstock chemicals like olefins. These sectors accounted for 7.5 Gt CO2 or 20.4 percent of global emissions in 2021, and global demand for their products will only rise until broad development goals are met everywhere. Moreover, nearly all heavy industrial plants being planned or in construction today are fossil based, with the exception being a handful of small-scale pilot facilities. Given that plants tend to operate for at least 20 years before their first deep renovation, and 40–80+ years overall, these new ones will likely still be in operation by the time global CO2 emissions must be net-zero (~2050–2060), after which heavy industry players that are still emitting will likely need to pay for CO2 removal (CDR) from the atmosphere. The cumulative CO2 emissions between now and then and the likely very high cost of CDR are driving society, governments, and firms to make near-zero emissions the default minimum standard for all new and retrofit facilities by the end of the 2020s. However, fulfilling that standard is no easy task. The main bottleneck is less technological in nature than financial and market based. At the current state of the art, near-zero emissions plants simply cost more than fossil-based plants, and meanwhile, no demand pull or market exists for lower-emission industrial products. Given the urgency of the task at hand amid the global climate crisis and the current lack of a business case to undertake it, strong policy signals can be used to incentivize early investment in near-zero-carbon heavy industry. This report, part of the Carbon Management Research Initiative at the Center on Global Energy Policy at Columbia University SIPA, explores financial policy instruments that can make first-of-a-kind (FOAK) near-zero emission industrial facilities viable. The report finds that such FOAKs can then be used as low-risk, replicable models for rapidly transforming the “hard-to-abate” sectors and ultimately facilitating a transition to full net-zero emissions for industry as a whole.
- Topic:
- Climate Change, Investment, Industry, Carbon Emissions, Net Zero, and Abatement
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus
380. Using New Marginal Emissions Data to Improve State Renewable Portfolio Standards
- Author:
- Devan Samant, Abraham Silverman, and Zachary A. Wendling
- Publication Date:
- 05-2024
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Center on Global Energy Policy (CGEP), Columbia University
- Abstract:
- The majority of US states use a renewable portfolio standard (RPS) to achieve clean energy targets. RPS programs typically set annual clean energy production levels, but they ignore the significant variations in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions intensity of the grid at different times of the day and at different locations. Newly available locational marginal emissions (LME) data, which are collected at thousands of physical locations and updated every five minutes, provide insights into where and when the electricity sector produces the most and least GHG emissions. Incorporating LMEs into RPSs would allow states to identify and reward “high impact” clean energy production: that which replaces the dirtiest generation. This report examines the impact that incentivizing clean energy production at high LME times and locations could have on reducing emissions in RPS programs. In five scenarios based on data from four states in the PJM grid (Illinois, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and Virginia), the authors examine hypothetical shifts in energy production from times and geographic areas with differing clean or dirty generation mixes. The proof-of-concept exercises the authors ran found that shifting clean energy production into the three dirtiest hours of the day resulted in approximately 10% less emissions than the baseline case. Geographically shifting production to displace energy at a dirtier locale resulted in 9%–20% less emissions, depending on the LME makeup at the given location versus the baseline.
- Topic:
- Regulation, Electricity, Carbon Emissions, and Energy
- Political Geography:
- Global Focus