Free Republic

Undisclosed communication devices reportedly discovered in Chinese-manufactured solar panels and related equipment have sparked concerns among U.S. officials about the vulnerability of the nation’s power grid, according to a Reuters report. These “rogue” devices, found over the past nine months, could potentially destabilize energy infrastructure and trigger widespread blackouts, sources familiar with the matter told the outlet. The undocumented devices, including cellular radios, were identified in solar power inverters, batteries, electric vehicle chargers, and heat pumps produced by several Chinese suppliers. ... The U.S. has found Trojan horse communication devices in Chinese-made solar power inverters. They are used to connect...

Last Monday, the Iberian grid suffered a disturbance in the south-west at 12:33. In 3.5 seconds this worsened and the interconnection to France disconnected. All renewable generation then went off-line, followed by disconnection of all rotating generation plant. The Iberian blackout was complete within a few seconds. At the time the grid was producing 28.4 GW of power, of which 79 per cent was solar and wind. This was a problematic situation as solar and wind plants have another, not widely known, downside – one quite apart from their intermittency and expense.This is the fact that they do not supply...

Puerto Rico's grid struggles since 2017 hurricanes.. Outage caused by protection system failure and vegetation on lines.. Nearly half of the homes and businesses in Puerto Rico that receive electricity from the commonwealth's main utility were still without power on Thursday, a day after a widespread blackout struck the island, Luma Energy said in a statement. Hospitals, airports and prisons were among the structures still out. ... On New Year's Eve last year an underground power line was the most recent failure that led to island-wide ... some customers who have had service restored may experience temporary system outages throughout...

A bombshell report from a clean energy group admitted that shifting to solar and wind may mean chaos for New York’s power grid as the state’s green energy law creates hurdles for cost and reliability. The report from the New York Affordable Clean Power Alliance, which represents solar and wind energy firms, noted that the state’s timetable to phase out energy generated by fossil fuel is unrealistic — and even dangerous. “The New York City area is forecasted to experience a generation shortfall starting in 2033, driven by an increase in peak demand and the planned retirement of existing dispatchable...

Data Center Alley, a 30-square-mile stretch outside Washington D.C. and home to more than 200 data centers, consumes roughly the same electricity as Boston. So power company officials were alarmed when a big chunk of those centers – 60 of them – suddenly dropped off the grid one day last summer and switched to on-site generators. The mass reaction was triggered by a standard safety mechanism across the data center industry, intended to protect computer chips and electronic equipment from damage caused by voltage fluctuations. But it caused a huge surge in excess electricity, according to federal regulators and utility...

This weekend, Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia will take a historic step and disconnect from the Russian and even post-Soviet power system controlled by Moscow. They will join the Western European grid. Preparations for this process have been underway for 15 years. - We are prepared for all scenarios . Our societies can be calm, everything is under control - assured Lithuanian Minister Žigimantas Vaicziunas at the end of January after a meeting in which the deputy head of the Polish Ministry of Climate and Environment, Krzysztof Bolesta, also participated. Lithuania, Latvia and Estonia are facing a historic moment of disconnection...

PJM is the independent, federally regulated organization that has helped maintain reliable electrical service at competitive costs for Pennsylvanians for nearly 100 years. PJM doesn’t operate with a profit motive – our primary mission is to operate as the “air traffic controller” for the high voltage power system to keep electricity flowing to 13 states and the District of Columbia. We have been warning for over two years of the prospect that parts of our country could run short of power during high demand periods. This possibility has been growing, primarily as a result of state and federal policy decisions...

Speaking at the 16th International Aids Conference in 2006, the then UNAids executive director, Peter Piot, remarked: “Since the beginning of the epidemic, stigma, discrimination and gender inequality have been identified as major causes of personal suffering, and as major obstacles to effective responses to HIV.” Now, in the fourth decade of the HIV crisis, this statement remains largely true. Despite the leaps and bounds that have been made in the treatment and prevention of HIV, stigma and discrimination continue to harm the lives of people living with HIV, and hinder efforts to stem the epidemic globally.

The rapid growth of data centers to support AI is significantly increasing global electricity demand.This surge in demand threatens to outpace the development of renewable energy sources.International regulations are needed to ensure tech companies use clean energy and minimize their impact on climate goals.The global electricity demand is expected to grow exponentially in the coming decades, largely due to an increased demand from tech companies for new data centers to support the rollout of high-energy-consuming advanced technologies, such as artificial intelligence (AI). As governments worldwide introduce new climate policies and pump billions into alternative energy sources and clean tech, these...

A Russian strike on energy infrastructure in western Ukraine on Thursday left more than 1 million people without power, according to local officials. Electricity was knocked out for more than 500,000 households in the Lviv region due to the attack, according to regional Gov. Maksym Kozytskyi. Rivne Gov. Oleksandr Koval said the strike also cut off power for more than 280,000 households in the region, The Associated Press reported. “The Commander of the Air Force, along with the Ministers of Internal Affairs and Energy, provided reports regarding the aftermath of the latest Russian strike targeting our energy infrastructure,” Ukrainian President...

“I feel more concerned today than I did two years ago about resource adequacy,” he said Monday. “Load is growing much faster than we had projected then, which even back then was an eye-popping set of numbers.” PJM’s recent capacity auction, in which PJM secures commitments from generators to provide electricity in the future, produced higher than usual prices. Those prices have thus far served their purpose of incentivizing some generators to delay retirement and others to consider investments in new generation. “I haven’t seen any forecast of load that allows me to rest and say we’re good,” he said...

Cuba's electrical grid collapsed again on Sunday, the fourth such failure in 48 hours as a looming hurricane threatened to wreak further havoc on the island's decrepit infrastructure. Cuba earlier on Sunday had said it was making headway restoring service after multiple false starts, though millions of people remained without electricity more than two days after the grid's initial collapse. "Restoration work began immediately," the country's energy and mines ministry said on X. The clock was ticking as Hurricane Oscar bore down on the Caribbean island on Sunday, bringing strong winds and rain to northeastern Cuba and threatening to further...

The price of solar electricity is further reduced by about another 50 percent by a fleet of federal subsidies. That reduces the cost to $50 per megawatt-hour. The remaining gap between $50 and the $20 worth of gas saved is filled by increased electric rates ­­­— a subsidy paid for by electricity customers. A spreadsheet showing these computations can be downloaded here.

September 13, 2024: Is HIV stigma finally decreasing in the United States? More Americans believe so, found the 2024 State of HIV Stigma report. “For the first time in five years, [the report] found a statistically significant decline of HIV stigma in the U.S., with 85% of Americans saying they believe HIV stigma exists, down from 89% in 2020,” according to a press release from LGBTQ media advocacy group GLAAD, which spearheaded the annual report in partnership with pharma giant Gilead Sciences’ Gilead COMPASS Initiative. Troublingly, though, is the finding that fewer people believe everyone should get tested for HIV...

Ah, THE FUTURE!It is weirdly starting to look like the past, no?While the Green grifters are busy making sure people's lives get less comfortable and more expensive every day, as the things that once made a "standard of living" worth attaining are stripped away piece by piece......some of the wealthiest in the EAT THE BUGS crowd have the wherewithal to take a different approach by virtue of their place in the economic food chain - at the pinnacle.Not relegated to gluing themselves to the floors of Porsche showrooms or flinging tomato soup at old masterpieces, these are the big thinkers,...

Gay men get HIV at higher rates than any other group in the United States, and there are many reasons for this. Biological factors dramatically increase a gay man's vulnerability to infection. Social, cultural, and economic factors—such as stigma, racism, homophobia, and high rates of poverty—further compound the risk. Regardless of the causes, securing access to testing, prevention, and PrEP to lower HIV transmission in this high-risk group remains a pressing issue. There are numerous free or low-cost confidential testing and treatment sites offered by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services via their online testing locator.

Federal prosecutors said they are willing to disclose whether they used a controversial surveillance program to foil a Florida neo-Nazi leader’s alleged plot to attack Baltimore’s power grid last year, but will only do so in secret, during a classified meeting with the judge handling the case. Government lawyers refused Thursday to disclose publicly whether they used Section 702 of the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act to build the case against the accused plotter, Brandon C. Russell, but agreed to a private meeting with Senior U.S. District Judge James K. Bredar where they will provide more information. Russell’s defense team remains...

Last week a cyberattack hit a huge number of car dealers in the United States. The software designed by the company CDK was completely disabled, affecting the whole of an integrated process of purchasing and processing. Sellers could not process sales, loans, insurance, registrations, and much more. It happened suddenly, lasted two and a half days, came back, then went down again.How did car dealers function? They wrote it all out on paper and pledged to complete the process after the systems came back. They are back and all seems well but the experience is a warning sign. These systems...

A community of society-shunning Americans launched a survivalist haven in the Utah desert after finding themselves alienated from the modern world. Hundreds of people have set themselves up to live off the land under 'Operation Self-Reliance,' feeling that getting off-the-grid is the solution to a crumbling culture. The commune was established by Philip Gleason, 74, a former general contractor who felt a calling to allow people to grow their own food, pump their own water and rely on nothing but themselves. He admitted to Deseret News that while some choose to live there for environmental or health reasons, its intended...

Coal and natural gas plants provide 60% of the U.S.’ affordable, reliable, and baseload power. In a time of increased electricity demand, America needs to double down on harnessing these sources—not abandon them.The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)’s recently finalized Clean Power Plan 2.0 (CPP) rule, however, takes the country in the wrong direction. Under this regulation, one that is arguably illegal, existing coal and new natural gas power plants will be mandated to install emissions control technologies that aren’t yet commercially viable. Plants that don’t comply risk permanent closure. This unrealistic mandate is advanced under the guise of reducing greenhouse...