By Jo Nova

There’s nothing like a few belligerent trade spats, and miscreant dragged anchors to ruin a brand’s reputation

After six separate incidents of underwater cables being sabotaged in the Baltic Sea, the German Defense Ministry is wondering if it is wise to buy Chinese wind turbines with all their electronic parts. A new report commissioned for the department not only suggests the government should restrict new turbines, it advises them to call a halt to an existing project.

Hypothetically, China might remotely shut down wind turbines at a key moment, creating crazy price spikes, and industrial havoc (although wind turbines seem quite good at that on their own). But seriously, if wind turbines got a bit more random, or a bit less efficient, would anyone know for sure? And if a market player had that information in advance, they could make out like a bandit — bidding at the right moment, and collecting on all the price spikes. It would be just another way to bleed a country, raise electricity prices, and reduce it’s competitiveness. (But good for business back home, eh? )

Oddly, the Defense analysts seem to worry more that China might delay projects on purpose, which sounds like an act of kindness to me. But if the electricity managers had already blown up the coal plants, then it might leave a vulnerable gigawatt gap.

Some thing has to charge the big batteries and pumped hydro, after all or they won’t be there for the dinner time peak. Likewise with the EVs.

But they were also concerned China could harvest data from hundreds of radars, and be able to spy on military training sites.

Part of the danger also comes from the access that manufacturers get to turbines, according to the study. Beijing’s suppliers would have access to computer programs that control active turbines and collect data from hundreds of radars built into farms, it states — a significant issue given that wind produced a third of Germany’s electricity last year and a fifth of the EU’s power.

In sum, the report argues, that would hand China “considerable blackmail potential in the future.”

The report warns that the “first time use of Chinese wind turbines must be prevented” on “public safety” grounds, since it risks creating a reliance on Beijing’s expertise and giving it access to “essential elements of German critical infrastructure” near militarily relevant training areas.

The Defence team also suspect the Chinese projects are being subsidized by China to beat out European competitors. It’s almost a case of China-would-be-crazy if they weren’t. The more renewables they supply, the more incapacitated and deindustrialized Europe gets, and the easier it is for the rest of China’s factories to drive competitors out of business.

Think of renewables as loss-leaders for a whole civilization.

From MasterResource

By Robert Bradley Jr.

Want to know why the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration needs a massive downsizing? Because it is a political organization masquerading as a weather forecast center. And the climate lobby is upset at the clean-up.

Monday between 10:00 am and noon eastern, the Chesapeake Climate Action Network / Action Fund is hosting a “Hands off NOAA!” rally at NOAA’s headquarters in Silver Springs, MD. Here is CCAN’s announcement:

The Trump Administration and Elon Musk continue to recklessly demonize dedicated federal workers who provide critical services everyday. The National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) who provide critical services from the National Weather Service to seafood safety is not immune from DOGE’s intimidation tactics to fulfill the promise of Project 2025 to eliminate NOAA.

But we are NOT going to sit back and watch.

On Monday, March 3rd at 10am Congressional leaders and advocates will gather at NOAA HQ in Silver Spring, MD (right at the Silver Spring Metro stop) to tell Trump and Musk to keep their hands off of NOAA.

The call-to-action continued:

Firing hundreds of NOAA workers would have severe impacts on day-to-day life for Americans. We depend on NOAA workers everyday to warn us of weather events, protect our commercial fisheries, support first-responders when disasters happen, and much more. We have already seen the damage Trump and Musk have done to other critical agencies. We have seen how families and communities have paid a heavy price for so-called “efficiency.” NOAA must be defended!

On the contrary, NOAA workers with their nice severance package can find employment in the private sector, even if it means a career change. Foundations can take over functions considered vital to human wellbeing to reemploy the displaced. But climate lobbying is over on the taxpayer’s dime.

————

Sarah Guy, executive director of Ocean Defense Initiative, stated on social media.

💙💙💙 is with NOAA employees who lost their jobs today as DOGE sows chaos across federal agencies. But as Chesapeake Climate Action Network says here, “we are NOT going to sit back and watch.”

I commented:

The private sector can pick up the NOAA ex’s who add value to weather forecasting services, and foundations can underwrite research. Others should alter career paths into teaching or who-knows-what.

Political jobs are risky, and the US is broke! www.usdebtclock.org

and:

That a climate group is leading the protest is exactly why NOAA is being downsized!

In another post regarding NOAA, I noted that this agency’s weather forecast for Texas in the winter of 2020/21 was so wrong that it contributed to the Great Texas Blackout from Storm Uri.

Other voices of despair were heard with the announcement. Jane Lubchenco, Deputy Director for Climate and Environment in Biden’s White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, stated:

The mass firings today at NOAA: National Oceanic & Atmospheric Administration are a national disaster and a colossal waste of money.  Destroying NOAA’s ability to provide life-saving information, keep our ocean healthy, and strengthen the economy makes no sense—no sense at all. NOAA is a lean agency, with highly skilled, impressively dedicated people –I know because I have worked with them for years. We need them; all of them.

A lean agency? Need every last employee? That’s one bureaucrat protecting another, part of the Climate Deep State in this instance.

Check out this function of NOAA that screams for budget cut for ecological improvement.