Europe

Infineon Technologies has opened its Smart Power Fab in Dresden, Germany, months ahead of schedule, bringing the world’s largest manufacturing facility for intelligent power semiconductors and analog/mixed-signal technologies into operation.

The facility represents a €5 billion (about $5.7 billion) investment, the largest in the company’s history. It creates 1,000 direct jobs and doubles Infineon’s manufacturing capacity in Dresden.

The factory will produce chips that improve how electricity is converted and managed. Those devices will support AI data centers. They will also help power electricity grids and software-defined vehicles.

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Archived

• Estonia, Luxembourg and UK are the top three in biennial Yale University index in tackling pollution and other issues
• US, China are falling further behind, the researchers say

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The biennial Yale University index again ranks Estonia as the best-performing of 177 assessed countries, after strong recent efforts to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and protect its ecosystems. Luxembourg is second, and the UK is third, having moved up from fifth place in the 2024 index.

European countries dominate the top 20, with only Japan, in 16th, not situated in the continent. Australia is in 25th place, two places ahead of the US. Laos is the last-ranked nation, with the bottom three rounded out by India and Bangladesh.

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Despite this worsening situation, several countries, most notably the US under Donald Trump, have recently scaled back efforts to combat the climate crisis. The Yale index uses data up to 2024, capturing the last part of Joe Biden’s presidency rather than Trump’s, but still finds that even then the US’s emissions were falling far too slowly to reach net zero by 2050, as the science demands must be done to avoid disastrous climate breakdown.

China, now the world’s largest carbon emitter ahead of the US, has made huge progress in developing its clean energy sector, the Yale report finds, but still derives 56% of its electricity from coal, the dirtiest of fossil fuels, and performs relatively poorly on its marine conservation and biodiversity stewardship, the scorecard found.

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“Europe has really stepped out in front and is continuing to pursue climate change with not the full vigor it might have a few years back when the political circumstances were different, but they’re getting the payback for decades now of work on this issue at the cutting edge,” said Esty.

“The laggards in the US and China both are still lagging, seem to be falling further behind and are holding back the global community’s efforts to achieve the targets that have been agreed upon.”

China has climbed the table somewhat to 129th position, however, after previously being ranked near last due to the dangerous air pollution suffered by many of its major cities. It has since removed many of the coal-fired power plants near cities that caused such problems. The Yale index also marks India down for its tree cover loss, pesticide pollution risks and ocean conservation from the last index. “India’s performance is shockingly bad for a country that aspires to be a leader in global terms on the economy,” Esty said.

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Archived

European Parliament supports the setting up of an EU centre for democratic resilience. This centre should include existing cooperation systems and crisis management capacity, and be adaptable to evolving threats.

The MEPs name Russia the "primary threat for Europe’s democratic integrity," adding that frequent hybrid attacks on critical infrastructure, such as cyberattacks, physical sabotage, arson, espionage and signal jamming, are also originating also from Belarus, China, Iran and North Korea.

The lawmakers call for expanded sanctions targeting enablers of Russian disinformation and non-EU entities, particularly Chinese ones, that help circumvent sanctions and facilitate Russian operations.

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There are also measures and funding for civil society organization, particularly via AgoraEU (opens pdf).

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Security researchers from the Chaos Computer Club (CCC) have exposed critical vulnerabilities in Hoymiles solar inverters that allow attackers to remotely control, manipulate, or destroy hundreds of thousands of solar installations across Europe. The Chinese manufacturer holds roughly 20 percent of the European microinverter market, making the security flaw a widespread threat to balcony power plants and small rooftop solar systems.

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During experimental tests, a modified handheld scanner located two dozen foreign inverters and their identification numbers within 20 minutes. In Augsburg, Hunz identified 42 hackable systems within just one hour. The radio signals can travel several hundred meters, making it feasible to mount attack equipment on drones for systematic scanning of residential areas.

Once attackers have the serial numbers, they can switch inverters on or off, alter power limits, and inject malware through an unprotected firmware update command. Tampering with sensitive network parameters or erasing bootloader memory could lead to fires, electrical accidents, or device destruction requiring physical repair.

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The CCC informed Hoymiles [which is headquartered in China] about the vulnerability in February but received no initial response. Only after the German Federal Office for Information Security contacted the Chinese authority CNCERT did Hoymiles react at the end of June. The company announced a security update for mid-October.

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Archived

cross-posted from: https://scribe.disroot.org/post/10060855

• Rules would favour EU companies in strategic sectors
• Could reject bids with less than 50% EU content
• Proposal is expected to be published in September

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Public procurement accounts for around 15% of the EU's GDP, according to the draft proposal, ​equating to about €2.5 trillion ($2.86 trillion) based on the EU's 2025 GDP.

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The proposal increases the security role of public procurement in that it allows authorities to examine whether a bidder's ownership, control or financing structure creates a risk of foreign interference.

Buyers could also take into ​account whether companies are subject ​to third-country laws that ⁠may force disclosure of sensitive information or otherwise interfere with the contract's performance.

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Authorities would be encouraged, and in some cases required, to take account of risks linked to critical infrastructure, cybersecurity, supply-chain disruptions, strategic ⁠dependencies and ​foreign influence when awarding contracts.

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The European Commission ... has approved definitive anti-dumping duties on imports of certain tires from China used on passenger cars and light trucks and buses.

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The duties range from 4.3% to 45.3%, depending on the manufacturer. The Commission said the measures are intended to offset the effects of dumping and help ensure fair competition for tire makers operating within the EU.

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The measures were adopted under the European Union’s trade defense framework, which permits anti-dumping duties when imported goods are found to be priced below their normal value and to have caused harm to producers in the bloc.

The decision comes amid broader trade frictions between Brussels and Beijing, with both sides pursuing trade-related investigations and other measures affecting a range of industrial products.

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Archived

Director of the Security and Intelligence Service of Moldova, Alexandru Musteata, said that Russia has begun to use the video platform TikTok more actively to spread propaganda.

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He stated that Russia is already preparing to interfere in the upcoming elections in Moldova and has intensified its disinformation campaigns, as well as its attempts to influence public opinion.

He added that while the messaging app Telegram was previously the main channel for spreading Russian propaganda, the video platform TikTok has now become the primary tool.

In addition, campaigns to manipulate public opinion on Facebook have resumed, and temporary websites created specifically to spread false information have appeared.

According to Musteata, the goal of these campaigns is to undermine citizens’ trust in democratic institutions.

“Campaigns are being carried out to discredit the army, the security sector, law enforcement agencies, and the justice system. The goal is to lower the level of trust so that by the next election cycle, citizens will begin to doubt whether state institutions are functioning effectively,” explained the director of the SIS.

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Heat now kills three times more Europeans than roads. A heat pump is a two-way air conditioner: cooling in July, heating in January, no imported gas.

cross-posted from: https://feddit.online/c/euro@feddit.online/p/1817064/germany-tightens-sick-leave-rules-medical-doctor-note-required-from-day-one-telephone-s

Germany's Chancellor Merz:

We can no longer accept the extraordinarily high levels of sick leave in our companies.

We are abolishing sick leave by telephone and introducing the requirement to submit a medical certificate from the very first day of illness.

We know this is a tough decision. But we can no longer afford this competitive disadvantage caused by prolonged absences from work.

Bans on Russian combatants entering Europe and LNG flows have been significantly scaled back in ambition