Research Library

"With the pressures of climate change and the urgency to incorporate alternative energy resources like wind and solar, the fixation on the purported benefits of energy transition technologies overshadows the glaring reality — an absence of strategy around identifying and quantifying other life cycle externalities, such as waste disposal or environmental impacts," write fellow Rachel Meidl and research assistant Mathilde Saada. Read more on the Baker Institute Blog.

Recycling solar panels is an expensive, complicated and energy-intensive process, writes energy fellow Rachel Meidl. But with cumulative solar waste projections expected to rise globally over the next few decades, she argues that it is vital to design a more circular and sustainable management system for end-of-life panels.

President Biden's foreign policy is colored by both decisiveness and a realism that falls short of his idealism, with a result that draws elements of Trump's and Obama's approaches together, writes fellow Joe Barnes. Read his post on our blog.

By subsidizing only electric vehicles and EV batteries produced by union labor in the U.S., the auto industry could face trouble in valuable trade partnerships with Canada and Mexico, writes fellow David Gantz.

In October the UAE declared a goal of reaching net-zero emissions by 2050. That goal seems incredibly lofty for an oil-dominated economy, but the UAE's particular advantages may uniquely suit the task, energy fellow Jim Krane explains in this week's Forbes post.

This year's Nobel Prize in Physics broadens the traditionally defined scope of the discipline, writes Kenneth Evans, demonstrating how discoveries in physics play a crucial role in addressing global issues like climate change.

The first step to reducing methane, Agerton and Gilbert argue, is to directly measure it. Their new Forbes post explains why inventory-based incentives that merely estimate emissions must give way to direct methane monitoring.

In this report, the authors outline the U.S. federal budget process for scientific R&D, discuss trends in federal R&D funding and provide an outlook for federal scientific R&D funding during the Biden administration.

Despite the frozen status of Israeli-Palestinian negotiations and the considerable obstacles to restart them, a U.S.-led effort could help to gradually forge a “Framework Agreement for an Israeli-Palestinian Permanent Peace.” This policy brief outlines the principles that such a framework might embody, with the essential objective of two states for two peoples.

Methane emissions are both "extraordinarily bad" and "easy to fix," so why not address them now? A federal tax of $1,500 per metric ton emitted could curb and counter the impact of U.S. methane emissions, argues this commentary piece.