Tag: infrastructure

Another day, another illegal billion-dollar bribe to raise your electricity prices

The Interior Department has made another illegal agreement with a gas company to drop development of cheap and clean offshore wind and instead focus on dirty, expensive gas, giving that company the better part of a billion dollars worth of taxpayer money while starving Americans of much-needed electricity.

Wind is one of the cheaper forms of energy we have available to us, and also has the benefit of not causing pollution. Pollution from fossil fuels harms human health, causing millions of deaths and childhood asthma cases and costing trillions of dollars per year globally.

It’s also an important resource at a time when American electricity demand is increasing, leading to higher energy bills as the proliferation of data centers squeezes energy availability.

However, the Department of the Interior, the government agency responsible for usage of public lands including oceans, is currently occupied by Doug Burgum, a fossil fuel advocate who has received hundreds of thousands of dollars in bribes from the fossil fuel industry.

As such, Burgum has done all he can to stop cheap and clean energy projects and to try to benefit dirty and expensive fossil fuels, to the detriment of Americans’ lungs and electricity bills.

Interior has cut off 400k homes worth of power just before Christmas, tried to pause new power generation projects and halt existing constructions, and tried to make permitting harder (while fast-tracking expensive, dirty projects with “concierge” service). His party suggested drastic new fees on wind farms, far in excess of the inspection fees on dirty oil projects.

But many of those efforts have been swiftly reversed by courts due to their illegality.

This hasn’t stopped Burgum from coming up with other illegal ideas to starve Americans of the energy they need.

The latest trend has involved a pattern of bribes given to oil companies from public coffers to convince them to stop development of offshore wind and instead refocus on gas projects.

It started with a nearly-$1B bribe from taxpayer coffers to French oil giant TotalEnergies in March, basically buying out its offshore wind lease in exchange for a commitment to put that money into fossil fuel projects.

Interior made up a fake national security reason for this agreement, even though it is clear that domestic sources of power are far more secure than the kind that start intractable global conflicts. Courts have previously ruled that there are no national security concerns around wind power and Dept. of Defense had signed off on these projects.

But it didn’t stop there. Interior has continued with similar near-billion-dollar bribes, with an $885 million deal in April, and another near-billion-dollar deal today.

Keep reading

Ukraine Hits Moscow Oil Refinery Causing Black Skies, But Kremlin Continues Advancing In Donbass-Kostiantynivka Falls, Ukrainian Drones Specifically Targeting Civilians In Russia Areas

Ukraine scored a public relations and tactical win this morning with strikes on the Moscow oil refinery, hitting a storage tank and causing black smoke to drift over the entire city.

Oil-like residue is falling over Moscow and the surrounding region, leaving marks on cars, windowsills, benches, and other surfaces.

The development caused Ukrainian President Zelenskiy to declare, “If Ukraine burns, your Moscow will burn too.If Putin does not want to end this war and wants to continue it, we will not sit quietly. We will respond.”

What Zelenskiy is not telling the world is that the city of Kostiantynivka in Donbass has recently fallen under the Russian advance. Russian forces are now focusing on Sloviansk, which once taken, will open the door to Kramatorsk in one or two months.

A situation is developing where a massive cauldron is forming, encircling thousands of Ukrainian troops and the Zelenskiy government will not order the withdrawal to save the soldiers.

“It is a deliberate slaughter of Ukrainian soldiers,” said a source in Kyiv. “It is intentionally losing a division.”

Russia has launched massive strikes on Kyiv as of late in response to Ukrainian attacks on civilian targets. Recently many attacks have been filmed of drones hitting civilian vehicles, such as buses and trucks carrying civilian personnel and cargo, raising Russian ire. One such video of a drone intentionally targeting a truck in the Belgorod region of Russia is below.

Keep reading

Power Transformer Lead Times Hit Record Highs As US Grid Equipment Shortage Deepens

Power transformer lead times have reached levels that are now dictating the pace of industrial expansion across the United States. According to Wood Mackenzie’s second quarter 2025 survey, standard power transformers average 128 weeks for delivery. Generator step-up transformers, which connect large power generation assets to the grid, average 144 weeks. Some orders extend to four years.

For plant operators, energy developers, and infrastructure planners, that math has a direct consequence: a facility that breaks ground today cannot energize its electrical systems on a standard timeline. Equipment availability has become the gating factor for industrial growth, replacing capital availability and permitting as the primary project constraint.

Power Transformer Lead Times: What the Numbers Actually Mean

128 weeks is nearly two and a half years of wait time before a transformer ships. That figure comes from actual utility and developer order data, not theoretical capacity projections. Generator step-up transformers, which are larger and more specialized, run even longer at 144 weeks. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation reported lead times crossing 120 weeks in 2024, and the trend has continued upward into 2025.

The cost pressure is equally significant. Power transformer prices have risen 77% since 2019, according to industry sourcing data. Distribution transformer prices have climbed 78% to 95% over the same period. The underlying material drivers are straightforward: grain-oriented electrical steel prices have roughly doubled since 2020, and copper prices have risen more than 50%. Both materials are core inputs in every transformer manufactured.

The demand surge is not temporary. Generator step-up transformer demand has grown 274% since 2019. Power transformer demand has grown 119% over the same period. AI data center construction, large-scale electrification of industrial processes, and grid modernization programs are all pulling from the same constrained supplier base simultaneously.

The Cleveland-Cliffs Bottleneck: One Domestic Supplier for Critical Steel

The transformer shortage is not simply a volume problem. It has a structural bottleneck at the material level. Transformer cores require grain-oriented electrical steel, a highly engineered material that gives the steel specific magnetic properties needed for efficient power transformation. In the United States, Cleveland-Cliffs is the only domestic producer of this material, operating plants in Pennsylvania and Ohio.

That concentration means that every U.S. transformer manufacturer drawing on domestic steel supply draws from a single source. When that source faces capacity constraints, pricing pressure, or supply disruptions, the effect ripples through the entire domestic transformer manufacturing base immediately. Roughly 80% of large power transformers used in the U.S. are imported, primarily from Mexico, South Korea, and other international manufacturers, creating additional exposure to global trade conditions.

The Biden administration awarded Cleveland-Cliffs $500 million to upgrade its electrical steel plants under the CHIPS and Infrastructure framework. Key elements of that grant have since been reviewed under the current administration, adding uncertainty to the domestic steel expansion timeline.

Keep reading

Satellite station takes shape on city rooftop for secret US broadband provider

The first of dozens of dome-shaped antennas for a controversial satellite earth station in Auckland have been installed on an inner-city rooftop. 

2degrees has been contracted by an undisclosed US satellite broadband company to build the ground station on the roof of a building at 43 College Hill, Freemans Bay, the telecommunications provider told the Herald. 

The facility will eventually house 30 of the mushroom-like structures, each about 2m tall, and be used to relay swathes of data to and from satellites. 

A 2degrees spokesperson said the telco’s unnamed US client would “operate and maintain the ground station” once construction was complete. 

2degrees announced a partnership with AST SpaceMobile, a US company building the first space-based cellular broadband network, in March 2025, with plans to launch a satellite-to-mobile service that they hoped to begin testing from the middle of this year. 

The Kiwi firm was granted non‑notified consent from Auckland Council to build the rooftop station on June 24 last year, but the project courted criticism from nearby residents and community groups after construction began in January. 

Opponents told the Herald in February they were concerned about the scale and appearance of the installation, potential side effects from the radiofrequency technology and, more broadly, the council’s decision to approve the project without public notification. 

The council’s head of resource consents James Hassall said its staff had since met with two of the concerned residents but were unable to address their concerns, given the project was approved in line with regulatory standards. 

“Once a consent is granted, the only avenue for challenge is through an application for judicial review in the High Court,” Hassall said. 

“The council will monitor the site to ensure that the consent holder meets the conditions of the consent.” 

Keep reading

Trump Snaps On Iran, Vows To Decimate Power Plants, Key Infrastructure

President Donald Trump said he is preparing new strikes against Iran’s infrastructure after accusing the Islamic Republic of dragging its feet on peace talks and warning the regime that it will “have to pay the price.”

Trump told Fox News Chief Foreign Correspondent Trey Yingst in a phone call Wednesday that he is “getting close to ordering new strikes against Iranian power plants and bridges.”

The president also accused Tehran of “tapping the United States alone when it comes to the negotiating process,” according to Yingst.

The comments came hours after Trump issued a fiery Truth Social post following the downing of a US Apache helicopter near the Strait of Hormuz on Monday.

“They’ve taken too long to negotiate a deal that would have been great for them, now they will have to pay the price!!!” Trump wrote Wednesday morning.

He also declared that Iran’s military had been devastated.

“Iran’s Military is a complete and total mess. Much of it, like their Navy and Air Force, doesn’t even exist anymore – They have been completely defeated. Iran is all talk and no action. The Bully of the Middle East is DEAD!!! ” he added.

During his conversation with Yingst, Trump reportedly described the dramatic survival of the two Apache pilots involved in Monday’s incident, calling it a “miracle.”

Keep reading

AfD’s Weidel Demands Ukraine Pay Reparations Over Nord Stream “State Terrorist” Attack; Calls for End of Military and Financial Support

Co-leader of Alternative for Germany (AfD)—the most popular party in Germany—Alice Weidel has demanded that Ukraine pay reparations to Germany over the destruction of the Nord Stream pipelines, escalating a political fight over German sovereignty, cheap energy, deindustrialization, and Berlin’s open-ended support for Kyiv.

Speaking at an AfD event on Tuesday, Weidel rejected Chancellor Friedrich Merz’s proposal to move Ukraine closer to the European Union through associate membership. She described Kyiv as a “bottomless pit” that has already drained enormous sums from German taxpayers.

“Germany has already transferred more than €100 billion to Ukraine over the past four years alone,” Weidel said.

Her remarks come as German investigators continue pursuing suspects in the September 2022 sabotage of Nord Stream 1 and Nord Stream 2—the Baltic Sea pipelines built to carry Russian natural gas directly to Germany.

The blasts destroyed three of the four pipeline strands at a depth of roughly 80 meters. Nord Stream 1 had long delivered large volumes of cheap Russian gas to Germany, while Nord Stream 2 had been completed but never activated because of political tensions over Ukraine.

The sabotage, as many Germans see it, was not merely an attack on infrastructure, but an attack on Germany’s industrial future, energy independence, working class, and ability to remain economically sovereign.

Weidel said Ukraine must explain its role before Berlin considers further concessions, aid, or EU privileges, framing the pipeline destruction as a direct assault on Germany’s most important energy lifeline.

“We need to know how this state-terrorist act against the most important infrastructure we had, namely the Nord Stream pipelines, came about and what role Ukraine played in it,” she said.

German investigators have reportedly attributed the explosions to a small group of Ukrainian operatives. The alleged ringleader was extradited to Germany from Italy last autumn.

Keep reading

The Public Goods Circular Argument

In our modern, Western world, many justify the state and its policies because of the presupposition that the state—and the state uniquely—is an indispensable service-provider of essential services that could not or would not be provided by the free market or which would be underprovided were it not for the state’s collective provision. This is the public goods argument.

It has become a cliche for defenders of the state to ask critics, especially libertarians, “But without the government, who would build the roads?” It is astounding that it has been easier to convince people to send their children to kill and die in wars, pay exorbitant taxes, see their purchasing power evaporate through inflation, and passively observe general criminal behavior from political elites than to convince people that roads could be built without the state.

While roads and other public infrastructure are considered “public goods,” there are also certain services that have become inextricably linked to the state, such that to not have the state is to not have those services—national defense, collective security, police, courts, etc.

Public goods theory is presented as scientific, value-free economic theory, however, it implicitly smuggles in normative presuppositions that lead to the conclusion that the modern nation-state, and the state alone, must provide certain essential goods and services, which legitimates the state and its actions as necessary and legitimate. Historically, many applications of public goods theory emerged less as neutral demonstrations of state necessity than as retrospective justifications for functions governments had already monopolized.

Hobbesian Theory + Social Contract Theory/Tacit Consent Assumptions + Neoclassical Presuppositions = A Legitimating Myth for the State

Public goods theory—and various arguments made for the state because of assuming it—is a dangerous combination of several fallacious ideas. These errors include 1) Hobbes’s theory of the modern nation-state which argued the necessity and legitimacy of the state because of insecurity; 2) various social contract theories and tacit consent assumptions that argued that people not only need the state but agree with it; and, 3) neoclassical economic assumptions regarding equilibrium as a realistic and normative goal, market failure, and perfect competition. When these fallacious theories are combined, public goods theory becomes apologetic for the state.

Due to the prior assumptions it is even argued that, because someone used public goods—for which he was required to pay through taxation—whatever he successfully produces in such a system comes under some form of collective ownership and the control of the state. Therefore, since the state claims credit for success, the results of success may be legitimately expropriated by the state.

For example, according to Barack Obama and Elizabeth Warren, respectively,

If you’ve been successful, you didn’t get there on your own. You didn’t get there on your own. I’m always struck by people who think, “Well, it must be because I was so smart,” there are a lot of smart people out there. “It must be because I worked harder than everybody else,” let me tell you something, there are a whole bunch of hard-working people out there. If you were successful, somebody along the line gave you some help. There was a great teacher somewhere in your life. Somebody helped to create this unbelievable American system that we have that allowed you to thrive. Somebody invested in roads and bridges. If you’ve got a business, you didn’t build that. Somebody else made that happen. The internet didn’t get invented on its own. (emphasis added)

There is nobody in this country who got rich on his own. Nobody. You built a factory out there, good for you. But I want to be clear, you moved your goods to market on the roads the rest of us paid for, you hired workers the rest of us paid to educate, you were safe in your factory because of police forces and fire forces that the rest of us paid for, you didn’t have to worry that marauding bands would come and seize everything that your factory and hire someone to protect against this because of the work the rest of us did. Now, you built a factory and it turned into something terrific or a great idea, God bless! Keep a big hunk of it. But part of the underlying social contract is you take a hunk of that and pay forward for the next kid who comes along [via the state]. (emphasis added)

Doubtless, many critiques could be made regarding the statements above, however, this article focuses on the argument that the collective provision of public goods is the independent variable in any success. If public goods theory is accepted, then the state is no longer viewed merely as one institution among many within society, but as the indispensable precondition for society itself, the necessary provider of essential collective goods, and the institutional framework upon which production, exchange, order, and security ultimately depend. Combined with social contract and tacit-consent theories, the continued use of state-provided services is then treated as evidence of public consent, political obligation, and the legitimacy of the state’s ongoing interventions.

Keep reading

Protesters Target NV Energy At Utility Conference As Anger Over Soaring Electricity Prices Boils Over

Protesters shouting affordability complaints and chanting slogans interrupted a speech by NV Energy President and CEO Brandon Barkhuff on Wednesday. Barkhuff was speaking to some 1,000 utility executives and electricity industry stakeholders during the Edison Electric Institute 2026 conference at the Fontainebleau Las Vegas.

After being escorted out by security, the protesters spoke to the media outside the hotel to demand the cancellation of a daily demand charge for NV Energy customers slated to take effect Jan. 1, 2027, as well as to demand action on clean energy and high electricity bills.

The confrontation shows the extent to which energy costs have stoked public anger, raising pressure on utilities and their regulators.  

Utilities have made affordability a cornerstone of their public messaging as they prepare to spend over $1 trillion over the next five years to meet a surge in demand, much of it driven by large-load data centers. 

In Nevada, The Public Utility Commission in September unanimously approved a demand charge and new rate design for NV Energy customers in the southern portion of the state. It also approved changing the utility’s net metering design in ways that solar advocates said would weaken customer protections and set back Nevada’s clean energy goals. 

“In Las Vegas, one of the fastest-warming cities in the country, you cannot live without electricity,” said protest organizer Leslie Vega. Vega, a climate equity policy fellow at the Progressive Leadership Alliance of Nevada, said she’s lost loved ones to heatstroke and sees the demand charge as air conditioning rationing.

“We’re not just asking for lower rates. We’re asking for survival,” she said.

NV Energy issued a statement following the protest citing “misinformation and confusion” about the daily demand charge. 

“Daily demand [charges] will lower bills for the majority of our southern Nevada customers,” it said. “We understand that energy costs are an important issue for our customers, and that’s exactly why daily demand [charges are] critical in stopping subsidies that shift costs to other customers.”

Demand charges are tied to a customer’s peak electricity use, and NV Energy’s daily demand charge is based on the energy a customer consumes during a 15-minute period of peak usage each day. The utility expects the demand charge to add about 49 cents/day to a typical customer’s bill, but says most southern Nevada customers will see monthly bills that are similar to or slightly lower under the new structure.

Regulators and the utility have said that consumers who are concerned about potential spikes on their bill from the charge can shift their electricity use, but advocates say that’s not realistic, especially for cooling. Las Vegas temperatures on Wednesday reached 103 degrees as the city experiences its longest 100-degree streak of the year, according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal.

Keep reading

Ukraine Strikes St Petersburg As International Economic Forum Commences

Ukrainian forces have struck an oil facility in St. Petersburg, only hours before the start of the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum, an event highlighted by Russian leadership as a flagship conference on Russian world leadership.

The Kremlin declared, “The “Special Military Operation” is continuing precisely to prevent attacks like the attack on Saint Petersburg from occurring. Putin will speak at the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum.”

Keep reading

Russia Bans Jet Fuel Exports As Ukrainian Attacks Cripple Refining

Russia is banning exports of jet fuel through November 30, 2026, as it seeks to ensure domestic supply amid intensifying Ukrainian drone attacks on the Russian refining infrastructure, OilPrice.com reported.

Russia on Monday announced it is temporarily banning jet fuel exports until the end of November to keep sufficient domestic aviation fuel supplies. Supplies under intergovernmental agreements are exempted from the ban, the Russian government said today.

The decision comes after drone strikes on refineries pushed Russia’s crude-processing rate to the lowest in more than 16 years. In an effort to curb the flow of petrodollars into the Kremlin’s coffers, Ukraine has targeted a wide range of energy assets including sea ports and pipelines. 

The ban is not expected to be felt on the tight international jet fuel market as Russia is a small exporter of aviation fuels.  Last year, it exported an average of 30,000 barrels a day, or less than 2% of the global supplies, according to data compiled by Bloomberg from analytics firm Vortexa Ltd. Daily average exports slipped to 28,000 barrels in the first four months of 2026, with Turkey being the main buyer, the data show. 

But the ban on kerosene exports follows a ban on gasoline exports, in force since April 1, as Russia has seen its refining capacity and capability crippled in recent weeks by intensifying drone attacks from Ukraine.

Kyiv has targeted several major refiners and oil export terminals since the war in Iran began, aiming to cripple Russia’s ability to take advantage of the soaring international oil and fuel prices.

Last month, Ukraine targeted the 300,000-barrels per day Yaroslavl oil refinery in Russia, escalating the drone attacks on Russian refining and oil exporting assets, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy said.

“We are bringing the war back home – to Russia – and that’s only fair,” Zelenskyy said in May.

The attack on the Yaroslavl oil refinery, co-owned by Gazprom Neft, was the fourth on the facility in one month, as Ukraine looks to diminish Russia’s refining and export capabilities amid soaring international oil and fuel prices.

Since international crude oil prices surged following the war in the Middle East, Russia has boosted its oil revenues as not only prices have jumped, but Russian oil was made desirable in India again, thanks to U.S. waivers for sales of Russia’s crude already loaded on tankers.

Keep reading