Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly – 17 July

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"Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly – 17 July", NAPSNet Weekly Report, July 17, 2014, https://nautilus.org/napsnet/napsnet-weekly/nautilus-peace-and-security-weekly-17-july/


190916528DETERRENCE: Russian Drills Aim at Potential Nuclear Disaster Response – Ministry, Nuclear waste disposal plant in Fokino (Russia’s Primorsky region), Ilya Gorbunov, RIA Novosti, July 14, 2014

Russian Eastern Military District will simulate a nuclear disaster July 14-17.  Command and staff drills plus nuclear materials aboard Pacific Fleet ships will test emergency  nuclear accident response.  Rosatom and Emergency Situations Ministry will also participate. Image: Russian warships hold nuclear defense drills in Indian Ocean, RIA Novosti, May 5, 2010 16:58 05/05/2010


DPRK: S. Korea to Provide 3 Billion Won in Aid to N. Korea, Qatar News Agency  (15 July 2014)

There are more mixed signals coming from both parties on the Korean peninsula.  As a whole, they can be interpreted as being mildly positive and a likely indicator of an inflection point sometime in the next few months.  North Korea has launched over 100 missiles this year that have been mostly ignored.  On the positive side, North and South are reaching out in tenuous ways: South Korea is sending aid to North Korea and re-extended invitations to North Korean Catholics to attend the Pope’s mass in Seoul, both sides are discussing their languages which have grown apart for over 50 years, and North Korea was discussed between the Presidents of China and the United States.


ENERGY SECURITY: The Big Green Test – Conservatives and Climate Change, Paul Krugman, New York Times (22 June 2014)

Current or future generations will not be saved by saddling them with yet more debt (if carbon tax is to be revenue neutral and non/low-carbon substitutes close the cost gap). Krugman deceives even as he fakes realism, “A carbon tax may be the best thing we could do, but we won’t actually do it.” If climate change doesn’t ravage us, the climate action mafia can simply say their tricks worked, the protection money had to be paid. Some economists carry a high social cost.


Source: ReutersGOVERNANCE AND CIVIL SOCIETY: China Trying to Restructure US-Japan-Centered Global Economy, Business Korea (8 July 2014)

The BRICS countries agreed to establish a multilateral development bank and reserve pool headquartered in Shanghai, considered to be the first major step in reshaping a Western-dominated international financial system. China is also seeking to set up an infrastructure bank focused on the Asia region, seen by many as a potential competitor to the heavily US and Japan-influenced ADB.


sealevel.climatecentral.org/maps/flood-risk-nationalCLIMATE CHANGE ADAPTATION: A Geospatial Dataset for U.S. Hurricane Storm Surge and Sea-level Rise Vulnerability: Development and Case Study Applications, Article in Press, Megan C. Maloney, Benjamin L. Preston, Climate Risk Management (April 2014) [Open Access]

Enhancing understanding of the implications of climate variability and change for coastal assets and communities is a high priority for researchers as well as coastal managers. Over the past decade, natural disasters at disparate points along the U.S. coast including Hurricanes Sandy, Katrina, and Irene have contributed billions of dollars in direct and indirect economic losses, displaced millions, and caused significant morbidity and mortality. Such discrete events, as well as a general upward trend in U.S. disaster losses, have highlighted the vulnerability of the U.S. coastal population and built environment to extreme weather events.


Alternative_EnergiesCLIMATE CHANGE AND SECURITY: Pathways to Deep Decarbonisation: Interim 2014 Report, Sustainable Development Solutions Network and the Institute for Sustainable Development and International Relations (July 2014)

A 4oC warmer world is increasingly likely for people alive today, with prospects of even a risky 2oC limit by mid-century now, a year before global climate talks, “way off track” (Jeffrey Sachs). Deep decarbonization pathways – technology shifts for steep declines in carbon intensity in all energy systems – for individual countries are not that complicated – just hard. But the UK MoD identifies GHG mitigation failure as a low probability but still foreseeable catastrophic outcome.


The Nautilus Peace and Security Weekly Report presents articles and full length reports each week in six categories: Austral security, nuclear deterrence, energy security, climate change and security, the DPRK, climate change adaptation and governance and civil society. Our team of contributors carefully select items that highlight the links between these themes and the three regions in which our offices are found—North America, Northeast Asia, and the Austral-Asia region.

 


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