Science, Technology, and Public Policy en Can We Harness the Arctic's Methane for Energy? <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Sep 1, 2020</time> <p>The potent greenhouse gas is abundant in the Arctic. Capturing it for energy could power the region and prevent its release into the atmosphere.</p> Belfer Center Comparing Nuclear Accident Responses at Three Mile Island, Chernobyl, and Fukushima <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 31, 2020</time> <p>The viability of nuclear energy has long focused on concerns about nuclear safety. The government and industry responses to the three major nuclear reactor accidents—Three Mile Island (TMI), Chernobyl, and Fukushima—offer insights about how to prevent and respond to nuclear accidents. While there is no perfect strategy for prevention or response, past experience can and should inform decisions on regulating nuclear power in the future. The following comparison of three accidents reveals that independent oversight and a strong safety culture are paramount to rapid response, organized evacuation and repopulation, and clear communication to local publics during and after an accident at a nuclear power plant.</p> Belfer Center Why Greenland Needs to Plan for Future Climate-driven Immigration Now <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 27, 2020</time> <p>A history of colonialism means the nation will need to carefully integrating newcomers in ways that preserve its cultural heritage.</p> Belfer Center An Arctic Innovation Hub Could Help the Region Adapt to Climate Change <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 25, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Koshi Murakoshi proposes the creation of a "Global Arctic Innovation Hub." By bringing communities and scientists together, such a hub would prioritize local needs, but draw on global research.</p> Belfer Center A Call for Antiracist Action and Accountability in the US Nuclear Community <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 24, 2020</time> <p>As part of the ensuing <a href="">national racial reckoning</a>, institutions within the US nuclear community—academic departments, think tanks, advocacy groups, national laboratories, and others—have issued <a href="">statements</a> condemning systemic racism. (Several institutions within the nuclear community, at the time of writing this article, had still not produced a statement.) But the nuclear community must go beyond acknowledgement alone if it genuinely aims to dismantle long-standing structural inequalities. For these institutions, the true work of becoming antiracist still lies ahead: accepting and rectifying their own complicity in the problem.</p> Belfer Center Why Engaging the Private Sector is Critical to Cleaning up Arctic Ocean Plastic Pollution <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 20, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Rumaitha Al Busaidi argues for an Arctic Plastic Partnership that could highlight the business advantage to solving the region's marine plastic crisis.</p> Belfer Center Testing for the Pathogen During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Future Ones <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 18, 2020</time> <p>The United States has failed to deploy adequate testing for the presence of the coronavirus SARS-CoV-2 during the Covid-19 pandemic and has been unable to avoid continued spread of the virus. In this report, the authors explain why such testing is an essential factor in efforts to control the pandemic, why adequate testing has been difficult to achieve, and why the United States has not met the challenge. They conclude by recommending ways to provide more extensive testing in this and future epidemics.</p> Belfer Center To Relocate Alaska Villages, We Need to Reexamine the Costs <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 18, 2020</time> <p>Harnessing technological innovations such as 3D-printed housing can help alleviate financial constraints of resettlement.</p> Belfer Center Book Review Roundtable: Tempting Fate <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 17, 2020</time> <p>Why would a state that lacks nuclear weapons choose to fight a state that has them? In this roundtable, four scholars evaluate Paul Avey's explanation for this phenomenon.</p> Belfer Center How Online Learning is an Opportunity for the Arctic <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 13, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Abby Conyers writes that Greenland stands to benefit from a shift to online education — and to lead the way for the rest of the region.</p> Belfer Center Two Key Steps Greenland Should Take to Make Sure Mining Benefits All its Citizens <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 11, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Samuel Gant writes that by adopting world-class environmental and safety standards and creating a sovereign wealth fund, Greenland can ensure mining serves its best interests.</p> Belfer Center The Other Global Power Shift <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 6, 2020</time> <p>Joseph Nye writes that the world is increasingly obsessed with the ongoing power struggle between the United States and China. But the technology-driven shift of power away from states to transnational actors and global forces brings a new and unfamiliar complexity to global affairs.</p> Belfer Center Center Experts Reflect on 75th Anniversary of Hiroshima Bombing <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 6, 2020</time> <p>On August 6, 1945, the United States dropped an atomic bomb on Hiroshima, Japan, launching the nuclear age. On the 75th anniversary of that somber event, Belfer Center experts reflect on the event and its aftermath. </p> Belfer Center The Arctic Needs Better Cross-sector Crisis-related Collaboration <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 6, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Jenna Stark recommends closing the crisis-related collaboration gap in the polar region. Greater communication between emergency response specialists is needed both for the Arctic to weather the current coronavirus crisis and also to prepare for and mitigate future disasters, such as assuring food security for remote communities in the event of a wildlife disease outbreak.</p> Belfer Center Listening to Atomic Bombing Survivors' Stories is More Important Than Ever <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 6, 2020</time> <p>Rebecca Davis Gibbons writes that having a full appreciation of the consequences of nuclear weapons and their place in society means learning from the stories of the survivors of Hiroshima and Nagasaki—but also from the stories from other survivors of nuclear explosions: those who lived and worked adjacent to testing sites in Algeria, French Polynesia, Australia, the United States, France, the Republic of the Marshall Islands, Western China, and Kazakhstan.</p> Belfer Center 75 Years after Hiroshima, Here are 4 Things to Know about Nuclear Disarmament Efforts <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 6, 2020</time> <p>Rebecca Davis Gibbons and Stephen Herzog provide an update on current efforts to eliminate nuclear weapons. </p> Belfer Center Reimagining the Future of Habitation in Greenland <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 4, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Innovator Bert de Jonghe, a landscape architect, proposes a virtual innovation platform that seeks to capture Greenland's public imagination to start a critical discussion that propels the future of habitation in Greenland.</p> Belfer Center The Arctic is Melting <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Aug 2, 2020</time> <p>Arctic Initiative Postdoctoral Fellow Sarah Mackie gave a presentation to Girlguiding Newcastle (the equivalent of Girl Scouts in the UK), where she is a Ranger leader, about the Arctic, how climate change is affecting it, and what everyone (particularly children) can do to help.</p> Belfer Center Why a Warming Arctic Needs an Investment Review Mechanism <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Jul 30, 2020</time> <p>Increased investment into the Arctic over the coming decades is inevitable. To respond to this, the Arctic's present international governance structures can be improved to help steer the region through these impending changes.</p> Belfer Center Why Arctic Nations Should Invest in a Network of Green Ports <time datetime="00Z" class="datetime">Jul 28, 2020</time> <p>Climate change is opening Arctic sea lanes. With timely investment in green infrastructure, that could mean fewer — not more — emissions. Electrified ports would catalyze the greening of global shipping by supporting electric ships, a technology already benefiting from innovation.</p> Belfer Center