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President Donald Trump has said the U.S. is taking over Venezuelan oil production “to benefit the people” of both countries. But there’s already an oversupply of oil on the global market. Adding more won’t do much to prices, writes energy industry analyst Amy Myers Jaffe, who teaches at New York University and Tufts University.
Work is only just beginning on a massive project that might allow for Venezuela’s first-ever natural gas exports. Natural gas is a key fuel in the U.S. for both heating and generating electricity – but there’s also a global glut of it, drawing into question the need to produce more.
Even if Venezuela does have oil reserves as large as it has claimed, significant increases in production won’t be quick or cheap. And the effects on U.S. oil refineries and fracking operations will be slow to develop, Jaffe writes.
Jaffe notes that the real question of the significance of U.S. intervention in Venezuela is not about energy, but rather geopolitics.
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Jeff Inglis
Environment + Energy Editor
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A sculpture of a hand holding an oil rig stands outside the headquarters of Venezuela’s national oil company.
Pedro Mattey/AFP via Getty Images
Amy Myers Jaffe, New York University; Tufts University
Political chaos, sanctions and technical mismanagement of the oil industry may have taken a heavy toll on the industry.
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Politics + Society
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Eduardo Gamarra, Florida International University
There is no evidence that US intervention in Venezuela will lead to a meaningful reduction in drugs flowing into the United States.
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Ian Savage, Northwestern University
Railway safety has vastly improved for motor vehicles, but reducing the risk of collisions with pedestrians is much trickier.
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Science + Technology
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Bruce Schneier, Harvard Kennedy School; Nathan Sanders, Harvard University
AI companies are gearing up to follow the social media model of monetizing their platforms through advertising. The danger for consumers with AI goes beyond data privacy to covert manipulation.
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Grant Tremblay, Smithsonian Institution
The US, China, India, Europe and Japan all have exciting missions on the horizon in 2026. Many of them are collaborative feats.
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Education
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Austin Sarat, Amherst College
Restricting academic freedom is often thought of in terms of universities telling professors what they can and cannot do or teach. But that isn’t the only scenario.
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Environment + Energy
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Paul Bierman, University of Vermont
History also shows that many of the fanciful engineering ideas for Greenland failed because they misjudged the island’s harsh climate and dynamic ice sheet.
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International
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Shukriya Bradost, Virginia Tech
The demands of Iran’s ethnic minorities differ from many of those in Tehran, and they have reason to fear the return of the Pahlavi monarchy.
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Mahmood Mamdani, Columbia University
Museveni came to power with the sense that violence is critical to politics, and especially critical to liberation politics.
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Health + Medicine
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Layla Bouzoubaa, Drexel University
Chatter in social media communities sheds light on a hidden population of substance users.
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Arts + Culture
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Geoffrey Propheter, University of Colorado Denver
Rarely are sports stadiums financed entirely with private funds.
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Ethics + Religion
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Hana Green, College of Charleston
Some women adopted non-Jewish identities to support the resistance. For most, though, it was simply a strategy for survival – one with constant risk of exposure and execution.
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Economy + Business
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John Hawkins, University of Canberra
It’s unusual for central bank leaders to issue such a statement. But the reason is simple: what happens in the US matters worldwide.
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