PESD has concluded a two year collaborative study on the Indian natural gas market with three India research groups- A.T. Kearney, Indian Institute of Management - Ahmedabad, and Integrated Research and Action for Development (IRADe). The study explores gas demand to the year 2025 in the three main gas consuming sectors within India - electricity generation, nitrogenous fertilizer production, and industrial applications - under a range of different policy and economic scenarios.

The study concludes that coal is likely to remain the dominant fuel in the power sector, but opportunities exist for gas in reducing regional air pollution and providing peaking power. For the fertilizer sector, significant opportunities exist to import cheap fertilizer, thereby reducing domestic gas demand, but political constraints will likely buoy gas demand. Industrial consumers will benefit from increased supplies from LNG to displace expensive liquid fuels, but cheap coal remains the dominant fuel for many industrial applications.

Regional air pollution constraints in the power sector - already underway in certain parts of India could reduce carbon dioxide emissions by over 100 million tonnes per year. Reforms underway in the Indian coal sector, however, could bring a surge in new supplies, which would undermine the opportunities for gas in the power sector.

From an international supply standpoint, India doesn't appear able to guarantee the offtake of a proposed large natural gas pipeline from Iran within the next 10-15 years, making the project very difficult to justify from a financial risk standpoint.

UNAFF, which is now completing its first decade, was originally conceived to celebrate the 50th anniversary of the signing of the Universal Declaration of Human Rights. It was created with the help of members of the Stanford Film Society and United Nations Association Midpeninsula Chapter, a grassroots, community-based, nonprofit organization. The 10th UNAFF will be held from October 24-28, 2007 at Stanford University with screenings in San Francisco on October 17 and 18, East Palo Alto on October 19 and San Jose on October 21. The theme for this year is "CAMERA AS WITNESS."

UNAFF celebrates the power of films dealing with human rights, environmental survival, women's issues, protection of refugees, homelessness, racism, disease control, universal education, war and peace. Documentaries often elicit a very personal, emotional response that encourages dialogue and action by humanizing global and local problems. To further this goal, UNAFF hosts academics and filmmakers from around the world to discuss the topics in the films with the audience, groups and individuals who are often separated by geography, ethnicity and economic constraints.

Over three hundred sixty submissions from all over the world have been carefully reviewed for the tenth annual UNAFF. The jury has selected 32 films to be presented at this year's festival. The documentaries selected showcase topics from Afghanistan, Bolivia, Canada, Chile, China, Croatia, Cuba, France, Haiti, Kenya, Kosovo, Iceland, India, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Iran, Israel, Italy, Lesotho, Macedonia, Mongolia, Nigeria, Norway, Palestine, Peru, Romania, Russia, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Spain, Sudan, Uganda, the UK, Ukraine, the US, Vietnam and Zambia.

The Comprehensive Nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT) is a pivotal litmus test to determine a nation's "walking-the-walk dedication" on nonproliferation matters. The September Article XIV conference to obtain Entrance-Into-Force was attended by delegations from Iraq, Iran, Pakistan, China, Russia, and 101 other nations, but not the United States, North Korea, and India (1). The views of key global diplomats on the purpose and direction of the CTBT will be cited, followed by an analysis of funding and regional acceptance.

Official proceedings were adjourned for a two-hour session with three non-diplomats and Ambassador Jaap Ramaker (UN Conference on Disarmament chief CTBT negotiator) (2). The technical presentation on CTBT monitoring progress (2005-6 CISAC study) will be summarized (3). Monitoring has advanced since the 1999 Senate defeat by lowering the monitoring threshold from 1 kt to 0.1 kilotons (1-2 kt in a cavity), and by improvements in regional seismology (results of 2006-DPRK test and other data), correlation-wave seismology, interferometric synthetic aperture radar, cooperative monitoring at test sites without losing secrets, radionuclide monitoring improvement by a factor of 10, and other results. This presentation showed that the CTBT was effectively verifiable, in accordance with the Nitze-Baker definition.

CTBT has not been discharged from the Senate's Executive Calendar, thus the United States cannot legally resume nuclear testing without a Senate vote to discharge it. The NPT regime is in trouble; Article IV will mostly allow sensitive fuel cycle operations. The overlap between NPT and CTBT will be discussed. The statement of concern on CTBT by Senator Kyl (Cong. Record, 10-24-07) will be examined. Lastly, a path to Entrance-Into-Force for the CTBT will be described.

David Hafemeister was a 2005-2006 science fellow at CISAC. He is a professor (emeritus) of physics at California Polytechnic State University. He spent a dozen years in Washington as professional staff member for Senate Committees on Foreign Relations and Governmental Affairs (1990-93 on arms control treaties at the end of the Cold War), science advisor to Senator John Glenn (1975-77), special assistant to Under Secretary of State Benson and Deputy-Under Secretary Nye (1977-78), visiting scientist in the State Department's Office of Nuclear Proliferation Policy (1979), the Office of Strategic Nuclear Policy (1987) and study director at the National Academy of Sciences (2000-02). He also held appointments at Carnegie Mellon, MIT, Stanford, Princeton, and the Lawrence-Berkeley, Argonne and Los Alamos national laboratories. He was chair of the APS Forum on Physics and Society (1985-6) and the APS Panel on Public Affairs (1996-7). He has written or edited ten books and 140 articles and was awarded the APS Szilard award in 1996.

(1) http://www.ctbto.org/reference/article_xiv/2007/article_xiv07_main.htm

(2) http://www.vertic.org/news.asp#ctbtreport

(3) D. Hafemeister, "Progress in CTBT Monitoring Since its 1999 Senate Defeat," Science and Global Security 15(3), 151-183 (2007).

Scott Sagan (speaker) is a professor of political science and co-director of Stanford's Center for International Security and Cooperation. Before joining the Stanford faculty, Sagan was a lecturer in the Department of Government at Harvard University and served as a special assistant to the director of the Organization of the Joint Chiefs of Staff in the Pentagon. He has also served as a consultant to the office of the Secretary of Defense and at the Sandia National Laboratory and the Los Alamos National Laboratory. Sagan is the author of Moving Targets: Nuclear Strategy and National Security (Princeton University Press, 1989), The Limits of Safety: Organizations, Accidents, and Nuclear Weapons (Princeton University Press, 1993), and with co-author Kenneth N. Waltz, The Spread of Nuclear Weapons: A Debate Renewed (W.W. Norton, 2002). He is the co-editor of Peter R. Lavoy, Scott D. Sagan, and James L. Wirtz, Planning the Unthinkable (Cornell University Press, 2000). Sagan was the recipient of Stanford University's 1996 Hoagland Prize for Undergraduate Teaching and the 1998 Dean's Award for Distinguished Teaching. As part of CISAC's mission of training the next generation of security specialists he and Stephen Stedman founded Stanford's Interschool Honors Program in International Security Studies in 2000. His recent articles include "How to Keep the Bomb From Iran," in Foreign Affairs (September-October 2006); "The Madman Nuclear Alert: Secrecy, Signaling, and Safety in October 1969" co-written by Jeremi Suri and published in International Security in spring 2003; and "The Problem of Redundancy Problem: Will More Nuclear Security Forces Produce More Nuclear Security?" published in Risk Analysis in 2004. In addition to these works, Sagan is also finishing a collection of essays for a book tentatively entitled Inside Nuclear South Asia.

Paul Kapur (discussant) is a visiting professor at CISAC, on leave from the U.S. Naval War College, where he is an associate professor in the Department of Strategic Research. Before joining the War College in 2006, Kapur was visiting professor at CISAC and assistant professor of Government at Claremont McKenna College. He also served as a postdoctoral fellow at the University of Chicago, where he received his PhD in political science. His research interests include the strategic effects of nuclear weapons proliferation, deterrence theory, and the international security environment in South Asia. Kapur is author of Dangerous Deterrent: Nuclear Weapons Proliferation and Conflict in South Asia (Stanford University Press, 2007). His work has also appeared in journals such as International Security, Security Studies, Asian Survey, and Asian Security.

Glenn Kessler is a diplomatic correspondent for The Washington Post, a position he has held since May 2002. He reports on the formulation and implementation of U.S. foreign policy at the State Department, the White House, and other agencies.

He is also the author of the book, The Confidante: Condoleezza Rice and the Creation of the Bush Legacy, published in September, 2007, by St. Martin's Press.

Kessler, who is 48, joined the Post in January 1998 as national business editor. In that position, Kessler oversaw the reporting of a dozen reporters based in Washington and New York. Kessler switched from editing to reporting in February 2000, covering domestic economic policy and the Bush administration's push to pass a large tax cut, before moving to the national desk to become diplomatic correspondent.

Before joining the Post, Kessler spent nearly 11 years as a Washington correspondent and New York City-based reporter for Newsday. In Washington, Kessler served as White House correspondent, national political correspondent, and congressional correspondent. He led the newspaper's coverage of the 1996 election and the 1995 budget stalemate between Congress and the White House that resulted in two government shutdowns.

In New York, Kessler covered a variety of subjects for Newsday, including Wall Street (the insider trading scandals and 1987 stock market crash) and airline safety. Kessler's investigative articles on airline safety led to the indictments of airline executives and federal officials for fraud, prompted congressional hearings into safety issues, and led the federal government to impose new safety rules for DC-9 jets and begin regular inspections of foreign airlines.

Among other awards, Kessler has won the Page One Award of the Newspaper Guild (1989), the Atrium Award (1990), the investigative reporting award of the Society of the Silurians (1991) and the Premier Award of the Aviation/Space Writers Association (1992). He also was part of reporting teams that won a 1992 Pulitzer Prize for coverage of a deadly subway crash and a 1996 Pulitzer Prize for coverage of the TWA Flight 800 crash.

Before joining Newsdayin February 1987, Kessler was editor of Investment Dealers Digest and, before that, managing editor of Corporate Financing Week and Wall Street Letter.

Kessler is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations. He received a Master's degree in international affairs from Columbia University in 1983 and a Bachelor's degree in European history from Brown University in 1981. He lives with his wife and three children in McLean, Va.

About The Confidante: Condoleezza Rice and the Creation of the Bush Legacy:

In his riveting glimpse into the life of one of the most powerful Secretaries of State in recent years, Washington Post diplomatic correspondent Glenn Kessler provides not only a revealing look at Condoleezza Rice but a rich portrait of the Bush administration's controversial foreign policy regime. From her grievous errors in judgment as national security advisor to her notable influence over the president as Secretary of State, Rice has not gone unnoticed during her rise to power. But, as an intensely private person, she has despite endless media attention remained a mystery. As the first critical examination of Rice's skills as policy-maker, politician and manager, this definitive biography explains not only her rise to power, but the pivotal role she has played in our nation's history.

Full of candor as well as honesty, The Confidante shows unseen moments in Rice's life and of her frequently divisive performance during one of the most tumultuous foreign-policy periods in U.S. history. Drawing on personal interviews with Rice, an intimacy afforded to Kessler as one of the few reporters granted the opportunity to travel with her, Kessler takes readers inside the secret meetings Rice has held with foreign leaders and even her private conversations with President Bush. With access to all of Rice's top aides and sources in many overseas governments, Kessler also provides dramatic new information about one of the most secretive administrations in U.S. history. He shows how Rice molded herself into the image of a globe-trotting diplomatic super star, negating memories of her past failures. He exposes new details about her secret role in Israel's withdrawal from Gaza, her maneuvers around government bureaucracy to strike a pivotal nuclear-energy deal with India, her persuasion of Bush to support a dramatic gesture to Iran, her failure to prevent the North Korean nuclear test, and her struggle to contain the devastating war between Israel and Lebanon. This brilliantly written book reveals not only her public and private humiliation of foreign officials but also how her charm and grace have been successful assets in repairing fractured relations overseas. Condoleezza Rice remains today and in the future one of the most alluring, controversial, and ultimately influential decision makers in the United States. With this captivating work, Kessler shows what traits could solidify her shot at greatness or what cracks in her hard veneer could send her career hurtling to ruin.

This event is co-sponsored by the John S. Knight Fellowships Program.