Center for a New American Security

According to The Los Angeles Times, the Air Force Real Property Agency has agreed to lease 3,288 acres of land at Edwards Air Force Base to Fotowatio Renewable Ventures to stand up a massive solar array project that is estimated to have a production capacity of up to 500 megawatts. The project would be the largest energy Enhanced Use Lease for the Department of Defense, and the largest solar project in the United States. Construction is slated to begin in 2013. 

Photo: Edwards Air Force Base. Courtesy of the U.S. Air Force.

Last night President Obama delivered his first State of the Union address before a joint session of Congress. (A full transcript and video of the speech are available, courtesy of the White House.) While watching last night, I was curious how the president would mention energy and climate change, given that the major theme of last night’s speech, as one would suspect, was the economy.  

It was interesting, though not at all unexpected, that the president discussed energy and climate change in the context of creating new jobs and building a clean energy economy. With jobs to top the president’s agenda in 2010, he emphasized that “We should put more Americans to work building clean energy facilities and give rebates to Americans who make their homes more energy-efficient, which supports clean energy jobs.”

“We need to encourage American innovation,” the president said, “And no area is more ripe for such innovation than energy.” President Obama even made the case by highlighting last year’s investments in clean energy: “the North Carolina company that will create 1,200 jobs nationwide helping to make advanced batteries; or in the California business that will put a thousand people to work making solar panels.”  Additional investments to help shore up our independence from foreign oil included “opening new offshore areas for oil and gas development…continued investment in advanced biofuels and clean coal technologies.” President Obama even declared that building a clean energy economy meant “passing a comprehensive energy and climate bill with incentives that will finally make clean energy the profitable kind of energy in America.” This kind of federal investment in energy innovation is important to increasing energy security to be sure, but implementation is going to be key here (see our 2009 workshop report on just that). And much of that implementation will be up to market conditions and individuals that may not be acting in concert with the president’s bold plans.

The full CNAS team attended our awesome colleague Abe Denmark’s event yesterday at the Newseum that focused on his just-released edited volume, Contested Commons. The event featured Chief of Naval Operations Admiral Gary Roughead, USN; Vice Chief of Staff of the U.S.

The tragedy of human suffering in the wake of the recent earthquake in Haiti generated an outpouring of public and private support (PDF). In short order the movement to the ports and airfields of Haiti began, as relief workers and multinational troops surged the western front of the Island of Hispaniola with aid.  What soon became apparent was that Haiti, already plagued by poor infrastructure, had become a logistical nightmare: Even with the influx of aid, hospitals vital to the relief effort(including those left standing and those erected in the field) have been virtually paralyzed due to an electrical grid that is in some places only temporarily functional, and in other places non-existent.

Securing adequate energy has been paramount for workers responding in Haiti, a priority driven home by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton as she declared in Port-au-Prince on January 16 that she and Haitian leaders “discussed the priorities of restoring communications, electricity and transportation.”  Without reliable access to electricity, the effectiveness of additional aid for medical treatment and recovery operations can suffer. So I decided to scan the news for indications of how energy is being provided.
Efforts to restore electricity in Haiti have been largely executed through an influx of gas-powered generators.  Engineers have already attempted to triage energy distribution, providing what they could for the most pressing needs.  In an effort to provide the fuel necessary to keep the generators running, the UN World Food Programme has shifted focus from foodstuffs to securing “an estimated 10,000 gallons, or nearly 38,000 liters, of fuel per day,” according to a recent U.S. Agency for International Development (USAID) report (PDF). However, according to that document, USAID workers soon found that the fuel feeding the generators can raise other concerns:

as additional gasoline becomes available, roads have become more congested, hampering delivery of relief items. In addition to resulting in delays, the USAID/DART notes that traffic congestion increases security concerns, necessitating trucks to increase speeds and ensure that contents are not visible.

The relief effort’s current appetite for fuel has been somewhat staved off as solar panels and other self-sustaining sources of energy find their ways onto Haitian soil amongst the mountains of food and medical supplies.

Christine Parthemore and Will Rogers released their working paper, Promoting the Dialogue: Climate Change and the Quadrennial Defense Review, this morning. The working paper provides observations on how the Department of Defense incorporated climate change into the 2010 QDR and some possible outcomes of that process. "When the Quadrennial Defense Review (QDR) is sent to Congress on February 1st, it will offer an unusual opportunity to shift how the national security community views climate change," write Parthemore and Rogers.

To learn more about the "Promoting the Dialogue" project, click here.

Yesterday, CNASer Commander Herb Carmen and I were lucky to witness Navy Secretary Ray Mabus and Secretary of Agriculture Tom Vilsack singing a memorandum of understanding on biofuels and renewable energy. Citing national security, economic and environmental rationales for increasing domestic energy production and innovation, the two departments agreed to cooperate to advance the president's energy and climate agenda. Loved the symbolism. Loved the explicit linking of security, environment and economy.  Loved the corncob pen from Iowa that Sec. Vilsack gifted to Sec. Mabus. We'll be watching for news of how this partnership is working in practice. Have a great weekend everyone!

Peter Gleick and associates at the Pacific Institute released a report last week, Understanding and Reducing the Risks of Climate Change for Transboundary Waters, that explores how climate change could impact shared water resources and what the implications could mean for governance structures – principally existing peace agreements over shared water resources. (Peter Gleick is one of the foremost experts on conflicts over water resources, and, in fact, spoke on the Natural Security panel last June at our annual conference.)

According to the report:

A growing number of disputes over allocations of water across local borders, ethnic boundaries, or between economic groups have also led to conflict. The good news is that water disputes are generally resolved diplomatically, and shared water resources are often a source of cooperation and negotiation. An estimated 300 agreements have been developed between riparian States – those States that border a shared river. But the long history of violence associated with transboundary water resources highlights the challenges associated with managing shared water resources. 

As the authors note, future trends – ranging from population growth to economic growth to climate change – could place significant strain on these water resources and the existing institutional bodies and shared agreements that govern them. Understanding these potential risks, the authors ask a very important question: "To what degree can existing transboundary agreements or international principles for sharing water handle the strain of future pressures, particularly climate change?" (emphasis mine)

Last month marked the 65^th anniversary of the Battle of the Bulge’s beginning. This battle proved to be a defining event of the western front of World War II, and about 19,000 U.S. soldiers were killed in action (the British lost about 1,400 and the Germans had about 100,000 killed, wounded, or missing). Since much of the battle focused on threats to Allied supply lines, including operational fuel, I decided to commemorate the battle by reviewing an old article about the key Allied position in the Belgian town of Bastogne.

Collie Small wrote “Bastogne: American Epic” in the February 17, 1945 edition of the Saturday Evening Post, when memories of the battle were still achingly fresh. The battle took place in the Ardennes forest of Belgium, where Germany launched its final major offensive against the Allied front. German armor pressed hard against the thinly-held Allied line in Belgium, creating a bulge in the line that gave the battle its name. Eventually the Allies recovered their ground, but at the beginning the outcome was far from assured. Some of the fiercest fighting took place in and around Bastogne, where the 10th Armored Division and the 101st Airborne engaged with German armor divisions. (The actions of one 101st company are detailed in Band of Brothers; for a visceral experience, be sure to rent the miniseries on DVD).

CSIS Senior Fellow and energy über-analyst Sarah Ladislaw released a short policy paper last week, “A Post-Copenhagen Pathway.”  (Our colleague Dan covered CSIS’s related event, “Post Copenhagen Outlook” with Jonathan Pershing, for the blog last week.)

She breaks down the basics of the Copenhagen agreement’s agreed-to measures into about three pages. Next she explores the institutional barriers to a global agreement through the UN, including this morsel:

…the inclusive role of the UN process, which is excellent for giving a voice to all sorts of causes and considerations that deserve recognition and global attention, only serve to exacerbate the differences between developed and developing countries and raise expectations for an agreement to such a large extent that the perfect really becomes the enemy of the good. The management of the UN process has to be responsive to all of these outside concerns and promote transparency and fairness in the process, which makes leading effective negotiations nearly impossible. All of these challenges would be surmountable if it was clear that the vast majority of countries were really willing to compromise and move forward. The Copenhagen meeting, however, indicates that this is not necessarily the case.

Later, she outlines three possible futures for the process set out for this cycle of climate change negotiations: “Brazil, India, China and South Africa… decide to hold-fast with the developing country block in the UN and insist negotiations continue to take place under the UN process as planned”; “Support for the UN process wanes and major emitters choose another venue for working together”; or “Fragmented multilateralism prevails.”

Ladislaw emphasizes that the United States is not about to completely give up on climate negotiations through the UN, but does a great job of explaining the utility of the Major Economies Forum (MEF) and G20 for the purposes of emissions reductions negotiations.  One of the best parts of this paper is a great table on page 7 that charts G20 members, which are MEF members, and each country’s contribution to world greenhouse gas emissions, which gives you a clear picture of what possibilities might lie in those arenas.

The author also poses just the right question, and I’d dare to say just the right answer: “So which alternative forum is the right one? The most obvious answer is: the one in which the most major players are willing to negotiate” (italics mine). A toast to this pragmatic approach. I’m not an adherent to any single international relations approach, especially for confronting mega-challenges such as climate change. Results matter most. Ladislaw did the heavy lifting for us all on breaking down post-Copenhagen results and issues into 10 pages. Give it a read – you’ll be glad you did.

We're taking the day off the blog to observe the holiday. Thank you, Dr. King.

Photo of Martin Luther King, Jr. courtesy of the National Park Service.

• The Navy Times reports that the U.S. Navy plans to sign a deal with the Department of Agriculture to develop biofuels.
• The New York Times Dot Earth blog details how the Department of Defense is increasingly responding to natural disasters as part of its national security efforts.
• Climate change is exacerbating conditions in volatile states such as Yemen, states that could be a breeding ground for terrorism, The Philadelphia Inquirer reports.
• The United States threatens to drop energy assistance to Pakistan if it does not abandon plans for an Iranian pipeline, The Nation reports.
• Fuel shortages hinder U.S. military operations in Haiti, accoring to Stars and Stripes.

• The U.S. Navy receives its first award for energy efficiency and "green" construction, reports the Ventura County Star.
• Bill Clinton names agriculture and clean energy as priorities in rebuilding the Haitian state in an article in The Washington Post.
• The United States pushes Pakistan to allow India access to Afghan agricultural goods, according to RTT News.
• The New York Times reports on private contracts to repair the Iraqi oil industry and state.
• A recent study shows China's oil imports to be alarming to the state's energy security, China Daily News says.