Power Map

Did energy and climate play a role in the US midterm elections?  David Goldwyn and Joseph Majkut look at how the energy and climate agendas may have factored into specific elections and what the outcome means now for the U.S. domestic and international energy and climate agendas.  David Goldwyn is president of Goldwyn Global Strategies, LLC, an international energy advisory consultancy and chairman of the Atlantic Council Global Energy Center’s Energy Advisory Group. Mr. Goldwyn served as the U.S. Department of State’s special envoy and coordinator for international energy affairs from 2009 to 2011 and assistant secretary of energy for international affairs (1999-2001). Mr. Goldwyn is a member of the U.S. National Petroleum Council and the Council on Foreign Relations. Mr. Goldwyn holds a B.A. in Government from Georgetown University, an M.A. in Public Affairs from Princeton University Woodrow Wilson School of Public and International Affairs and a J.D. from New York University. 

This week Joseph Majkut talks with David Victor, professor with the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego and author, with Charles Sabel, of Fixing the Climate: Strategies for an Uncertain World.  David and Joseph look at how the process of global climate governance has shaped the climate community, providing examples for where leaders in government, civil society and the private sector can craft practices to move faster on global climate action. David Victor is a professor of innovation and public policy at the School of Global Policy and Strategy at UC San Diego. Victor is the co-director of the campus-wide Deep Decarbonization Initiative, which focuses on real world strategies for bringing the world to nearly zero emissions of warming gases. He is also an adjunct professor in Climate, Atmospheric Science & Physical Oceanography at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography.Learn More:Fixing the Climate: Strategies for an Uncertain WorldA Cleaner Future for Flight — aviation needs a radical redesign

This week, Joseph Majkut (CSIS) talks with Mike Catanzaro (CGCN) and Marcela Mulholland (Data for Progress) about the need for permitting reform to allow for new energy infrastructure to be built in the United States. Without significant reforms to the permitting process, energy security and the climate agenda in the U.S. could be at risk as new energy projects will see continued delays and struggle to be built.  Michael Catanzaro is President and Chief Policy Officer at the CGCN Group. Before joining CGCN, Catanzaro served as Special Assistant to President Trump for Domestic Energy and Environmental Policy at the White House National Economic Council. He previously served on the Senate Environment and Public Works Committee and on the Bush-Cheney re-election campaign as a top adviser on energy and environmental policy. Catanzaro was Associate Director for Policy in the White House Council on Environmental Quality and Associate Deputy Administrator of the EPA under former President George W. Bush. He also served as a senior adviser to then-Speaker John Boehner on energy and environmental policy.Marcela Mulholland is the Political Director at Data for Progress and a member of its senior leadership team. She represents Data for Progress’s work in progressive policy to the media, policymakers, and key partners in the environmental justice and labor movements. Previously, she worked as a Policy Entrepreneur at Next100 developing policy related to the Green New Deal and public housing. Prior to that, Marcela interned with the NAACP’s Environmental and Climate Justice Program and served as an organizer and national spokesperson for the Sunrise Movement. Marcela is a South Florida native and holds a B.A. in political science and sustainability studies from the University of Florida.

Gerassimos Thomas, the Director-General at the European Commission in charge of Taxation and Customs Union, spoke with Joseph Majkut about the energy challenges in Europe this winter, the future of energy security and climate measures, and the state of U.S.-EU cooperation.

Last month, climate and clean energy experts convened in New York for Climate Week 2022 and then Pittsburgh for the Global Clean Energy Action Forum. With ambitious agendas set out for each, we asked 3 people who participated in the formal and informal events which discussions caught their attention: Kartikeya Singh (Climate Imperative Foundation and a CSIS non-resident associate), Sandeep Pai (CSIS Global Just Transition Network), and Morgan Higman (CSIS Energy Security and Climate Change Program). They discussed state-level and federal climate agendas, clean energy technologies and just transitions, with an eye toward COP27 this fall and the G20 meetings next year.Learn More:New York Climate Week 2022Global Clean Energy Action ForumGCEAF Side Event: Repurposing coal infrastructure and diversifying local economies to enable a just transition in coal regions

Jesse Burton (University of Cape Town) and Joey James (Downstream Strategies) join Sandeep Pai (CSIS) to discuss progress and challenges in creating and implementing Just Transition policies in Coal communities in the United States, South Africa and India. They look at local remediation efforts, and state policies and frameworks, look forward to how these countries may further integrate just Transition Planning into broader, global climate policies. Joey James is Principal at Downstream Strategies, an environmental and economic development consulting firm based in West Virginia. Jesse Burton is a senior associate at E3G in London, and a researcher in the Energy Systems research group at the University of Cape Town.  Read more:  GOT FIVE ON IT: Economic Impacts and Observations of the Abandoned Mine Land Economic Revitalization Program Five Years In Moving forward at warp speed: Abandoned mine reclamation over the coming years A Framework for a Just Transition in South Africa: A Presidential Climate Commission Report Understanding Just Transitions in Coal Dependent Communities: Case Studies from Mpumalanga, South Africa, and Jharkhand, India Just Transition Finance Roadmap 

This week, Paul Farnan, Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army Installations, Energy and Environment, and Allison Riley, Assistant Professor in the School of Engineering at the University of Maryland, join Morgan Higman, Fellow in the Energy Security and Climate Change program, to discuss climate preparedness strategies of the U.S. Army and state and local governments. GuestsPaul W. Farnan is Principal Deputy Assistant Secretary of the Army for Installations, Energy and Environment. In this role, he is the principal deputy advisor to the Secretary of the Army and Chief of Staff of the Army on all matters related to Installation policy and oversight and the coordination of energy security and management. He is also responsible for policy and oversight of sustainability and environmental initiatives and resource management. Dr. Allison Coffey Reilly is a civil engineer specializing in risk and resilience of infrastructure systems. She is Assistant Professor at the University of Maryland A. James Clark School of Engineering.Her work focuses on characterizing the interplay between the resilience of infrastructure and individual decision-making. Her recent projects include examination of investment decisions by managers of interdependent infrastructure systems and the Evolution of vulnerability of communities facing repeated hazards.

This week, Dr. Sarah Burch (University of Waterloo, Canada) talks with Joseph Majkut (CSIS Energy Security and Climate Change Program Director) about key findings from the latest report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) - Climate Change 2022: Mitigation of Climate Change, which provided an updated assessment of global climate change mitigation progress and pledges. Dr. Sarah Burch holds a Canada Research Chair in Sustainability Governance and Innovation and is an Associate Professor in the Department of Geography and Environmental Management, University of Waterloo, Canada. She is an expert in transformative responses to climate change at the community scale, innovative strategies for making progress on sustainability, and the unique contributions that small businesses can make to this solving this complex challenge. She is currently a Lead Author of the Sixth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.  Listen to our previous episodes:Making Sense of the IPCC Report with Dr. Robert Kopp, October 11, 2021Making Sense of the IPCC Report, Climate Change 2022 Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability with Dr. Maarten van Aalst, March 21, 2022

This week, Kevin Book (ClearView Energy Partners and CSIS) joins Joseph Majkut (CSIS) to discuss how energy issues are at play in the upcoming U.S. midterm elections and what it may mean for the future of the U.S. energy and climate agenda.

In this special episode, Joseph Majkut (CSIS) talks with Kyle Danish (Van Ness Feldman) and John Larsen (Rhodium Group) about the future of U.S. climate policy following the news that Senator Joe Manchin rejected the proposed energy and climate investments that were part of the budget reconciliation package and the recent Supreme Court decision limiting the Environmental Protection Agency’s ability to regulate carbon emissions at existing power plants.Further ReadingThe Climate Change Agenda can Survive the Supreme Court’s EPA rulingU.S. Supreme Court Constrains EPA’s Climate AuthoritiesTaking Stock 2022: US Greenhouse Gas Emissions Outlook in an Uncertain World