7 ms·

US halts work on almost finished wind farm because national security

117 points by hvb2 1y ago

stuaxo 1y ago
Now, if Russian firms were building it, it would probably continue.
- JumpCrisscross 1y ago
  The honest truth is we’re in Sri Lanka and Argentina territory—bring in a Trump or a Kushner as a privileged LP and the project can go forward.
  - wcoenen 1y ago
    Or make a deal to pay a cut of revenue, like Nvidia and AMD did. Or a deal to give shares to the government, like Intel did. Perhaps the government can set up some type of holding company which holds such shares and receive the stream of protection money. Next, arrange for investors to only be able to acquire shares of this company if they also trade in some US debt, like France once did with the Mississippi company.
    - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
      > make a deal to pay a cut of revenue, like Nvidia and AMD did. Or a deal to give shares to the government, like Intel did Those are deals with the state. The point is if you personally enrich Trump and his cronies, you get approved. If you don’t, you don’t.
  - hliyan 1y ago
    Sri Lankan here. As of last year, the majority of Sri Lankans voted to send home the two historically establishment parties (who ran the country to the ground) and elected a third party into power with a 2/3rds majority in parliament and the presidency (an unprecedented upset). As someone who has viewed the US system favourably since childhood, it pains me to say that at present, Sri Lanka is probably marginally better than the US in terms of freedom of speech and independence of insitutions. Also painful is the fact that a such a third party upset is structurally impossible in the US. Here's wishing you all the best.
bilekas 1y ago
> The unfortunate message to investors is clear: the U.S. is no longer a reliable place for long-term energy investments. Absolutely this, there’s no longer any confidence to begin a project anymore. Would like to see the legal action go ahead against the government and set a standard that contracts can’t be treated just as “suggestions”.
- black_13 1y ago
  [dead]
- sschueller 1y ago
  The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote? If I was pharma I would think twice before investing In a factory that can be taken by the state just like that. EDIT: I was not aware that something was paid. Every time I saw trump on TV he said he got it for nothing. Yeah I know he lies a lot and I should have checked more into it. This is dangerous however as internationally you don't always get the details right away and generally one believes what a head of state says.
  - mort96 1y ago
    > The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote? I know that this is how it was reported everywhere including here, but I recently learned that it's apparently false. The US just bought shares. From https://www.reuters.com/business/us-take-10-equity-stake-intel-trumps-latest-corporate-move-2025-08-22/ https://www.reuters.com/business/us-take-10-equity-stake-int...: > Under the agreement, the U.S. will purchase a 9.9% stake in Intel for $8.9 billion, or $20.47 per share, which represents a discount of about $4 from Intel's closing share price of $24.80 on Friday. So they bought a 9.9% stake at a slight discount. (And just have to go back a couple of weeks to find Intel's stock price at under $20.47 per share, so I'm not sure you can really call it a real "discount").
    - op00to 1y ago
      How is $4 off the closing price not a discount?
CoastalCoder 1y ago
I've noticed in that past few weeks that some massive crain ships, Bokalift 1 and 2, have sometimes loitered in Narragansett Bay. I wonder if that's related to this.
- cr1895 1y ago
  Probably not. It seems to have come as a surprise. They are not loitering - either the wave conditions did not allow for installation or they are in port for resupply.
- avisser 1y ago
  Washington bridge rebuild maybe? The demolition of the piles is all that's left.
incone123 1y ago
The title on the article is "Trump administration halts work on an almost-finished wind farm" The amended title here gave me the false impression that NPR had started speaking valley girl.
- hypeatei 1y ago
  It's probably to avoid mass flagging of anything mentioning "Trump" Some don't like their dear leader being shown in a negative light here.
  - incone123 1y ago
    It was the adding of 'because...' that I thought was unhelpful. However, some sites a/b test their headlines so it is possible that NPR have used the one given.
mrtksn 1y ago
Trump appears to have particular hatred for the wind farms, not necessarily for all the renewables. He was talking about it, he brings it up when visiting European countries. What's up with that is it like a NIMBY thing? They mention things like wind farms killing birds other says it's making noise or looking ugly but even though I never lived around a wind farm, I have came close to some large wind farms and they looked futuristic to me I didn't hear any noise. I'm not convinced that is uglier or noisier than any other modern infrastructure, like roads or planes. Is this about money? is this ideological? what is this, what's going on?
- jakub_g 1y ago
  There's a wind farm next to his golf course in Scotland which "ruins his view". https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo
  - forgotoldacc 1y ago
    Wild that America is signing away a good source of energy and true energy independence for the sake of one old man's golf course.
    - Gigachad 1y ago
      That's what happens when you put a clown in charge.
    - mrtksn 1y ago
      From nihilistic point of view, it makes perfect sense. Old man gave people what they wanted and now he is taking what he wants. He’s old, his offsprings are wealthy beyond comprehension and they will be fine.
    - mindslight 1y ago
      It's for the sake of his demented ego, to validate the fading-relevance entitled ramblings of all the boomers who see themselves in him. This administration is a most potent result of our festering gerontocracy. The infantile 20-somethings and "tech" billionaires bought into their hallucinations, reckoning that we don't need any "government" and a great way to destroy it was to support this incompetent moron who was sure to royally fuck things up somehow. Everything that he destroys gets interpreted as some kind of success, ignorant to the fact that the growing chorus of opposition is not merely from progressives being "owned". Note the quotes around "government" because we've got a huge preexisting corporate government that will happy step into the power vacuum. The 20-somethings are naive. The tech-surveillance billionaires are sanguine.
fuckaj 1y ago
Because national security is too good and they want to make it worse?
aaron695 1y ago
[dead]
perihelions 1y ago
Additional context missing in the NPR: Denmark is the majority owner of the offshore wind company, Ørsted, holding 50.1% of its shares (has to hold a majority by law[0]). This is could be Trump retaliating against or pressurizing the Danish government—likely his ongoing attempt to anschluss Greenland. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ørsted_(company)#Shareholders https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ørsted_(company)#Shareholders edit to add: Moreover, Denmark's foreign minister visited California this Friday, and met with Gavin Newsom[1]—obviously a provocation to Trump, given Newsom's political actions. A connection FT also made[2]. I don't know why I'm being mass-downvoted. This is a perfectly valid theory—it'd be a continuation of a retaliation threat Trump himself made, overtly [3]. [1] https://www.nbcbayarea.com/california-3/newsom-partnership-denmark/3937099/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/california-3/newsom-partnership-d... ("Newsom signs partnership with Denmark on climate and tech" (Aug. 22)) [2] https://www.ft.com/content/27bce438-9008-4c46-979a-26217e75a6a6 https://www.ft.com/content/27bce438-9008-4c46-979a-26217e75a... ( https://archive.is/r2FfQ https://archive.is/r2FfQ ) ("Ørsted hit by US stop-work order on Rhode Island wind farm") [3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-01-07/trump-threatens-denmark-with-tariffs-over-greenland-m5mzp10m https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-01-07/trump-... ("Trump Threatens Denmark With Tariffs Over Greenland" (Jan. 7))
- wosined 1y ago
  You are downvoted, because you are making too much sense, yet you don't have the correct opinion.
- ImPostingOnHN 1y ago
  > I don't know why I'm being mass-downvoted. You aren't, and your post hasn't even existed for a tenth of one day, give it at least a week or so to settle out before raising your blood pressure about a score you might've had for a fraction of a moment before it changed. That said, regardless of the (imo probable) correctness of your theory, commentary about being downvoted runs contrary to HN's posting guidelines, so you might expect downvotes in the future for that alone.
- palmfacehn 1y ago
  The theory is interesting, but the use of "anschluss" isn't warranted.
potato3732842 1y ago
This has nothing to do with national security, or trump, or anything else in the past few years other than that being the hook some slimy editor uses to get your eyeball dollars to their website. This is just another round of a fight that's been happening for over 20yr now. Wind farms in this area have been a constant political football. Regardless of the pretext the real story is that the people who have a view they want to protect, the tourism industry and the hippie/nature/biology types are on the no-wind side and the climate types, greenies, domestic energy and big business types are on the other. Sometimes one side wins, sometimes another side wins. But nothing ever gets built.
- palmfacehn 1y ago
  I doubt it is about ads as much as it is about politics. From NPR's editorial stance, Trump is an a priori bad. Therefore, all coverage needs to be framed to justify their starting premise. It isn't so different from the previous administration's regulatory uncertainty around drilling permits. The allegedly pro-biz anti-regulation Republicans like gov regulation here, while the pro-regulation Democrats don't like it. If anything, it lays bare the hypocrisy of both sides. NPR is just along for the ride to once again tell us, "Trump bad". The problem with these partisan sources is that even if there were a deeper rationalization for killing the project with regulations, such as a valid national security situation, we wouldn't expect NPR to cover it. Looking elsewhere I didn't find much. >"The bureau is seeking to protect U.S. national security and prevent "interference with reasonable uses of the exclusive economic zone, the high seas, and the territorial seas," Giacona said.
  - space-savvy 1y ago
    Will you extend your “biased messenger analysis” to reuters as well? https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-halt-offshore-wind-project-deepening-industry-woes-2025-08-22/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-ha.... The only difference is they didn’t have an attempt to contact the relevant government org for comment. There are multiple sources indicating this administrations stance on wind power. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/28/are-trump-claims-about-wind-power-correct https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/28/are-trum... for instance. It would seem the foreign production source (China) is probably the only related to US security. The other statements about price or environmental impact have no particular basis in data or direct US security impact. This analysis of using foreign sourcing as a reason to kill energy projects roughly lines up with portions of the official press release: https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/department-interior-curbs-preferential-treatment-wind-energy#:~:text=Stopping%20Preferential%20Treatment%20for%20Wind%20Projects&text=In%20line%20with%20the%20January,5%20of%20Executive%20Order%2014315. https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/department-interior-curbs-... Although they amend that with statements about land use and environmental impact. From a strictly personal analysis, it’s hard though to frame the current administrations aggregate actions as anything but an attempt to cripple wind and solar based industries, which have far less environmental impact and carbon footprint than any other industry except maybe nuclear. But nuclear struggles due to buy in costs and public perception.
anonymousiam 1y ago
Politics aside, why not let the market drive the adoption of renewables? The former administration went to great lengths to penalize petroleum and subsidize solar and wind, without much regard for the damage this would do to the economy. I'm all for funding the development of alternative energy sources, but forcing their deployment before they're viable is a mistake.
- api 1y ago
  Forcing their deployment is how you make them cheap enough to compete in the market without subsidies. It’s how industrial economies of scale work. The more of something you do the cheaper it is. Bootstrapping an industry is analogous to overcoming the activation energy for a chemical reaction. The rate of scaling is different for different tech, and it’s actually quite good for renewables. That’s because solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries are incrementally deployable and subject to rapid iteration. It looks more like the electronics industry or, in the case of windmills, the car and truck industry, than the conventional power plant industry. Look up the rate at which these technologies have gotten cheaper. For solar annd batteries in particular it’s almost like Moore’s law. It would never have gotten started without subsidies. Most things are deeply unprofitable at first. Fossil fuels also require massive subsidies to bootstrap until they could scale. Look into the history of Standard Oil, the railroads, and electrification. The two world wars also helped. One of the things that deeply challenged the minarchist libertarianism I held when younger was seeing that virtually nothing happens in tech or industry without state bootstrapping. Someone must be prepared to set huge piles of money on fire to start anything. Once things get going they can be profitable in a free market. Solar is there in markets with high sun exposure. Battery storage is there in markets with a high power cost arbitrage spread. Both are still getting cheaper. Solar may be the cheapest source of power in a decade in most of the world. Computing and the Internet is the same. The latter was originally called DARPAnet. BTW the biggest disadvantage of nuclear vs renewables is that it is much more of a slog to scale. It doesn’t get cheaper as quickly due to slow iteration time and capital intensive large projects.
- hellisothers 1y ago
  Define punish given the extreme amount of subsidies and preference given to fossil fuels? Did they subsidize renewables as much? Less? More?
ChrisArchitect 1y ago
Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44991696 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44991696 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44966233 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44966233
instagib 1y ago
It could disrupt radar scanning of the sea. Above ground power lines and wind farm plans have been stopped before due to it.
Eddy_Viscosity2 1y ago
The title says because of national security, but no where in the article does it explain how a new wind energy farm poses any such security threat. Is there actually a threat, or is it just that Trump needs to cite national security in order to cancel the work. In other words, its yet another blatant abuse of executive power.

117 points by hvb2 1y ago

stuaxo 1y ago

Now, if Russian firms were building it, it would probably continue.

JumpCrisscross 1y ago
The honest truth is we’re in Sri Lanka and Argentina territory—bring in a Trump or a Kushner as a privileged LP and the project can go forward.
- wcoenen 1y ago
  Or make a deal to pay a cut of revenue, like Nvidia and AMD did. Or a deal to give shares to the government, like Intel did. Perhaps the government can set up some type of holding company which holds such shares and receive the stream of protection money. Next, arrange for investors to only be able to acquire shares of this company if they also trade in some US debt, like France once did with the Mississippi company.
  - JumpCrisscross 1y ago
    > make a deal to pay a cut of revenue, like Nvidia and AMD did. Or a deal to give shares to the government, like Intel did Those are deals with the state. The point is if you personally enrich Trump and his cronies, you get approved. If you don’t, you don’t.
- hliyan 1y ago
  Sri Lankan here. As of last year, the majority of Sri Lankans voted to send home the two historically establishment parties (who ran the country to the ground) and elected a third party into power with a 2/3rds majority in parliament and the presidency (an unprecedented upset). As someone who has viewed the US system favourably since childhood, it pains me to say that at present, Sri Lanka is probably marginally better than the US in terms of freedom of speech and independence of insitutions. Also painful is the fact that a such a third party upset is structurally impossible in the US. Here's wishing you all the best.

bilekas 1y ago

> The unfortunate message to investors is clear: the U.S. is no longer a reliable place for long-term energy investments. Absolutely this, there’s no longer any confidence to begin a project anymore. Would like to see the legal action go ahead against the government and set a standard that contracts can’t be treated just as “suggestions”.

black_13 1y ago
[dead]
sschueller 1y ago
The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote? If I was pharma I would think twice before investing In a factory that can be taken by the state just like that. EDIT: I was not aware that something was paid. Every time I saw trump on TV he said he got it for nothing. Yeah I know he lies a lot and I should have checked more into it. This is dangerous however as internationally you don't always get the details right away and generally one believes what a head of state says.
- mort96 1y ago
  > The US getting 10% of Intel without any payment is very bad. Was there no shareholder vote? I know that this is how it was reported everywhere including here, but I recently learned that it's apparently false. The US just bought shares. From https://www.reuters.com/business/us-take-10-equity-stake-intel-trumps-latest-corporate-move-2025-08-22/ https://www.reuters.com/business/us-take-10-equity-stake-int...: > Under the agreement, the U.S. will purchase a 9.9% stake in Intel for $8.9 billion, or $20.47 per share, which represents a discount of about $4 from Intel's closing share price of $24.80 on Friday. So they bought a 9.9% stake at a slight discount. (And just have to go back a couple of weeks to find Intel's stock price at under $20.47 per share, so I'm not sure you can really call it a real "discount").
  - op00to 1y ago
    How is $4 off the closing price not a discount?

CoastalCoder 1y ago

I've noticed in that past few weeks that some massive crain ships, Bokalift 1 and 2, have sometimes loitered in Narragansett Bay. I wonder if that's related to this.

cr1895 1y ago
Probably not. It seems to have come as a surprise. They are not loitering - either the wave conditions did not allow for installation or they are in port for resupply.
avisser 1y ago
Washington bridge rebuild maybe? The demolition of the piles is all that's left.

incone123 1y ago

The title on the article is "Trump administration halts work on an almost-finished wind farm" The amended title here gave me the false impression that NPR had started speaking valley girl.

hypeatei 1y ago
It's probably to avoid mass flagging of anything mentioning "Trump" Some don't like their dear leader being shown in a negative light here.
- incone123 1y ago
  It was the adding of 'because...' that I thought was unhelpful. However, some sites a/b test their headlines so it is possible that NPR have used the one given.

mrtksn 1y ago

Trump appears to have particular hatred for the wind farms, not necessarily for all the renewables. He was talking about it, he brings it up when visiting European countries. What's up with that is it like a NIMBY thing? They mention things like wind farms killing birds other says it's making noise or looking ugly but even though I never lived around a wind farm, I have came close to some large wind farms and they looked futuristic to me I didn't hear any noise. I'm not convinced that is uglier or noisier than any other modern infrastructure, like roads or planes. Is this about money? is this ideological? what is this, what's going on?

jakub_g 1y ago
There's a wind farm next to his golf course in Scotland which "ruins his view". https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo https://www.bbc.com/news/articles/c15l3knp4xyo
- forgotoldacc 1y ago
  Wild that America is signing away a good source of energy and true energy independence for the sake of one old man's golf course.
  - Gigachad 1y ago
    That's what happens when you put a clown in charge.
  - mrtksn 1y ago
    From nihilistic point of view, it makes perfect sense. Old man gave people what they wanted and now he is taking what he wants. He’s old, his offsprings are wealthy beyond comprehension and they will be fine.
  - mindslight 1y ago
    It's for the sake of his demented ego, to validate the fading-relevance entitled ramblings of all the boomers who see themselves in him. This administration is a most potent result of our festering gerontocracy. The infantile 20-somethings and "tech" billionaires bought into their hallucinations, reckoning that we don't need any "government" and a great way to destroy it was to support this incompetent moron who was sure to royally fuck things up somehow. Everything that he destroys gets interpreted as some kind of success, ignorant to the fact that the growing chorus of opposition is not merely from progressives being "owned". Note the quotes around "government" because we've got a huge preexisting corporate government that will happy step into the power vacuum. The 20-somethings are naive. The tech-surveillance billionaires are sanguine.

fuckaj 1y ago

Because national security is too good and they want to make it worse?

aaron695 1y ago

[dead]

perihelions 1y ago

Additional context missing in the NPR: Denmark is the majority owner of the offshore wind company, Ørsted, holding 50.1% of its shares (has to hold a majority by law[0]). This is could be Trump retaliating against or pressurizing the Danish government—likely his ongoing attempt to anschluss Greenland. [0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ørsted_(company)#Shareholders https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ørsted_(company)#Shareholders edit to add: Moreover, Denmark's foreign minister visited California this Friday, and met with Gavin Newsom[1]—obviously a provocation to Trump, given Newsom's political actions. A connection FT also made[2]. I don't know why I'm being mass-downvoted. This is a perfectly valid theory—it'd be a continuation of a retaliation threat Trump himself made, overtly [3]. [1] https://www.nbcbayarea.com/california-3/newsom-partnership-denmark/3937099/ https://www.nbcbayarea.com/california-3/newsom-partnership-d... ("Newsom signs partnership with Denmark on climate and tech" (Aug. 22)) [2] https://www.ft.com/content/27bce438-9008-4c46-979a-26217e75a6a6 https://www.ft.com/content/27bce438-9008-4c46-979a-26217e75a... ( https://archive.is/r2FfQ https://archive.is/r2FfQ ) ("Ørsted hit by US stop-work order on Rhode Island wind farm") [3] https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-01-07/trump-threatens-denmark-with-tariffs-over-greenland-m5mzp10m https://www.bloomberg.com/news/newsletters/2025-01-07/trump-... ("Trump Threatens Denmark With Tariffs Over Greenland" (Jan. 7))

wosined 1y ago
You are downvoted, because you are making too much sense, yet you don't have the correct opinion.
ImPostingOnHN 1y ago
> I don't know why I'm being mass-downvoted. You aren't, and your post hasn't even existed for a tenth of one day, give it at least a week or so to settle out before raising your blood pressure about a score you might've had for a fraction of a moment before it changed. That said, regardless of the (imo probable) correctness of your theory, commentary about being downvoted runs contrary to HN's posting guidelines, so you might expect downvotes in the future for that alone.
palmfacehn 1y ago
The theory is interesting, but the use of "anschluss" isn't warranted.

potato3732842 1y ago

This has nothing to do with national security, or trump, or anything else in the past few years other than that being the hook some slimy editor uses to get your eyeball dollars to their website. This is just another round of a fight that's been happening for over 20yr now. Wind farms in this area have been a constant political football. Regardless of the pretext the real story is that the people who have a view they want to protect, the tourism industry and the hippie/nature/biology types are on the no-wind side and the climate types, greenies, domestic energy and big business types are on the other. Sometimes one side wins, sometimes another side wins. But nothing ever gets built.

palmfacehn 1y ago
I doubt it is about ads as much as it is about politics. From NPR's editorial stance, Trump is an a priori bad. Therefore, all coverage needs to be framed to justify their starting premise. It isn't so different from the previous administration's regulatory uncertainty around drilling permits. The allegedly pro-biz anti-regulation Republicans like gov regulation here, while the pro-regulation Democrats don't like it. If anything, it lays bare the hypocrisy of both sides. NPR is just along for the ride to once again tell us, "Trump bad". The problem with these partisan sources is that even if there were a deeper rationalization for killing the project with regulations, such as a valid national security situation, we wouldn't expect NPR to cover it. Looking elsewhere I didn't find much. >"The bureau is seeking to protect U.S. national security and prevent "interference with reasonable uses of the exclusive economic zone, the high seas, and the territorial seas," Giacona said.
- space-savvy 1y ago
  Will you extend your “biased messenger analysis” to reuters as well? https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-halt-offshore-wind-project-deepening-industry-woes-2025-08-22/ https://www.reuters.com/legal/litigation/us-orders-orsted-ha.... The only difference is they didn’t have an attempt to contact the relevant government org for comment. There are multiple sources indicating this administrations stance on wind power. https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/28/are-trump-claims-about-wind-power-correct https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2025/jul/28/are-trum... for instance. It would seem the foreign production source (China) is probably the only related to US security. The other statements about price or environmental impact have no particular basis in data or direct US security impact. This analysis of using foreign sourcing as a reason to kill energy projects roughly lines up with portions of the official press release: https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/department-interior-curbs-preferential-treatment-wind-energy#:~:text=Stopping%20Preferential%20Treatment%20for%20Wind%20Projects&text=In%20line%20with%20the%20January,5%20of%20Executive%20Order%2014315. https://www.doi.gov/pressreleases/department-interior-curbs-... Although they amend that with statements about land use and environmental impact. From a strictly personal analysis, it’s hard though to frame the current administrations aggregate actions as anything but an attempt to cripple wind and solar based industries, which have far less environmental impact and carbon footprint than any other industry except maybe nuclear. But nuclear struggles due to buy in costs and public perception.

anonymousiam 1y ago

Politics aside, why not let the market drive the adoption of renewables? The former administration went to great lengths to penalize petroleum and subsidize solar and wind, without much regard for the damage this would do to the economy. I'm all for funding the development of alternative energy sources, but forcing their deployment before they're viable is a mistake.

api 1y ago
Forcing their deployment is how you make them cheap enough to compete in the market without subsidies. It’s how industrial economies of scale work. The more of something you do the cheaper it is. Bootstrapping an industry is analogous to overcoming the activation energy for a chemical reaction. The rate of scaling is different for different tech, and it’s actually quite good for renewables. That’s because solar panels, wind turbines, and batteries are incrementally deployable and subject to rapid iteration. It looks more like the electronics industry or, in the case of windmills, the car and truck industry, than the conventional power plant industry. Look up the rate at which these technologies have gotten cheaper. For solar annd batteries in particular it’s almost like Moore’s law. It would never have gotten started without subsidies. Most things are deeply unprofitable at first. Fossil fuels also require massive subsidies to bootstrap until they could scale. Look into the history of Standard Oil, the railroads, and electrification. The two world wars also helped. One of the things that deeply challenged the minarchist libertarianism I held when younger was seeing that virtually nothing happens in tech or industry without state bootstrapping. Someone must be prepared to set huge piles of money on fire to start anything. Once things get going they can be profitable in a free market. Solar is there in markets with high sun exposure. Battery storage is there in markets with a high power cost arbitrage spread. Both are still getting cheaper. Solar may be the cheapest source of power in a decade in most of the world. Computing and the Internet is the same. The latter was originally called DARPAnet. BTW the biggest disadvantage of nuclear vs renewables is that it is much more of a slog to scale. It doesn’t get cheaper as quickly due to slow iteration time and capital intensive large projects.
hellisothers 1y ago
Define punish given the extreme amount of subsidies and preference given to fossil fuels? Did they subsidize renewables as much? Less? More?

ChrisArchitect 1y ago

Previously: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44991696 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44991696 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44966233 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44966233

instagib 1y ago

It could disrupt radar scanning of the sea. Above ground power lines and wind farm plans have been stopped before due to it.

Eddy_Viscosity2 1y ago

The title says because of national security, but no where in the article does it explain how a new wind energy farm poses any such security threat. Is there actually a threat, or is it just that Trump needs to cite national security in order to cancel the work. In other words, its yet another blatant abuse of executive power.