Dr Ali Ahmad, who launched the Energy Policy and Security Program at AUB's Issam Fares Institute, explains why urgent economic, climate, water, nuclear power, and other challenges in the region demand credible policy responses.

Dr Ali Ahmad's research career at Cambridge, Princeton, AUB and Harvard Universities now sees him focus on the complex links among energy, nuclear power, security across the Middle East. As an AUB- Issam Fares Institute senior fellow and a research scholar at the Harvard Kennedy School, he explains the positive developments in these sectors as well as the hard decisions that must be made soon on energy subsidies, sustainability, environmental protection, and other critical issues. Water stress and the expected impacts of climate change add urgency to new inter-disciplinary efforts in nuclear power and energy resilience.