In April of this year, Columbia University’s Center on Global Energy Policy reached its 10th anniversary. So this week, we’re bringing back the conversation between hosts Bill Loveless and Jason Bordoff about the special milestone.
With the help of some colleagues, Jason founded CGEP in 2013 to produce unbiased, evidence-based research that examines energy issues in economics, national security, environment, and climate.
Ten years later, CGEP is busier than ever addressing the world’s energy and climate challenges through research, education, and dialogue.
Jason is the founding director of the Center on Global Energy Policy. He previously served as a special assistant to President Obama, and senior director for energy and climate change on the staff of the National Security Council. He has held senior policy positions on the White House’s National Economic Council and Council on Environmental Quality. Earlier in his career, Jason was a scholar at the Brookings Institution, served in the Treasury Department during the Clinton administration, and was a consultant with McKinsey & Company.
He is also a co-founding dean emeritus of the Columbia Climate School.
Climate change is threatening human health across the globe. Extreme weather events like wildfires and heat waves are causing immediate and long-term health risks, with sometimes deadly results. According to this year’s Lancet Countdown report, which tracks the effects of climate change on human health, the impacts are getting worse.
To address this growing crisis, the recent UN Conference on Climate Change, or COP28, featured its first ever Health Day. Discussions there established the issue as a vital factor in climate negotiations. But the final agreement from the climate talks does not include the phasing out of fossil fuels, which is language many health experts were hoping to see included.
So, how do researchers track the connection between climate change and human health? What are the key indicators? And what do they warn will be the consequences of continuing to burn fossil fuels?
This week host Bill Loveless talks with Dr. Marina Romanello about the intersection of health and climate change.
Marina is the executive director of the Lancet Countdown, and a climate change and health researcher at University College London. She has also carried out research in the Buenos Aires Institute of Technology, University of Cambridge, and the Francis Crick Institute. From 2020-2021, Marina helped England’s National Health System develop net-zero commitments.
Averting the worst impacts of climate change requires rapidly reducing carbon emissions across all sectors. This is particularly challenging for some so-called “hard-to-abate” sectors like cement and steel manufacturing. Carbon management – which includes carbon transport; carbon utilization and storage; direct air capture; and point source carbon capture – seeks to trap or remove carbon emissions where they can’t be easily avoided.
Recent policies like the Inflation Reduction Act have given these technologies a boost. But major questions remain regarding their feasibility, cost, and scalability. As the climate crisis unfolds, these questions urgently need answers.
What is the role for carbon management in the energy transition? Who should be responsible for deploying these technologies? And can they be scaled quickly enough to play a role in meeting the world’s climate goals?
This week host Jason Bordoff talks with Dr. Julio Friedmann about the basics of carbon management and the regulatory landscape for this sector.
Julio is the chief scientist at Carbon Direct, a consulting and investment firm focused on carbon management and carbon removal solutions. He served as principal deputy assistant secretary for the Department of Energy from 2013 to 2016, where he was responsible for the Department’s research and development program across a variety of energy technologies. Until recently, Julio was a senior research scholar at Columbia University's Center on Global Energy Policy.
In 2022, the United States and the European Union consumed more than twice as much energy as Africa and Southeast Asia combined, despite having roughly a third of the population. At the same time, developing countries are experiencing the most severe impacts of climate change even though they’ve contributed the least to cumulative emissions.
Many of these regions are endowed with considerable clean energy potential as well as large deposits of oil and gas. Africa, for example, has the world’s greatest solar potential, 30% of the world’s mineral reserves, and large untapped oil and gas reserves. For the energy transition to succeed, the large and growing populations in emerging and developing economies must be able to meet their domestic energy needs affordably and sustainably and capitalize on their natural resources.
What is the outlook for clean energy development in emerging and developing economies? What can be done to ensure that the benefits of the energy transition accrue to historically disadvantaged communities? And what is Africa’s role in the growing market for clean energy?
This week host Jason Bordoff talks with Dr. Zainab Usman about the opportunities and challenges that lie ahead for Africa’s energy development.
Zainab is a senior fellow and director of the Africa Program at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace. Prior to Carnegie, she was a public sector specialist at the World Bank. She has written on energy and economic development in Africa, and was the lead author of the Carnegie Endowment’s recent report, “How Can African Countries Participate in U.S. Clean Energy Supply Chains?”