Top US politician urges UK to block Mingyang wind turbine factory
Mingyang proposal for offshore wind turbine factory comes at difficult moment for UK government on China, amid collapse of high-profile trial against two people accused of spying for Asian country
A top US politician has urged UK Prime Minister Keir Starmer to block a proposal from China’s Mingyang to open a wind turbine factory in Scotland on security grounds, arguing that failing to do so would “defy common sense”.
The factory plan remains subject to approval by the Labour government led by Prime Minister Keir Starmer.
“It would defy common sense for UK officials to allow a Chinese company to build this project and gain even more leverage over their country,” he said.
“China is a foreign adversary that has spied on Parliament, interfered in elections in Britain and the Commonwealth and fuelled Russia’s war on Ukraine.”
Moolenaar argued that Chinese companies benefit from “massive state subsidies to act as agents of China’s economic ambitions,” and approving this project would therefore “create greater dependency and vulnerability in the UK’s energy supply chain.”
The proposal from Mingyang, which was approached for comment, comes at a difficult moment for Starmer on China. The government is under pressure over the collapse of a trial against two men accused of spying for China.
The case – brought under the Official Secrets Act – is said to have collapsed because prosecutors could not obtain government evidence referring to China as a national security threat, as Starmer tries to warm relations between the countries and encourage investment to help boost UK growth.
Conservative Party shadow energy minister Greg Smith pressed the government on the Mingyang factory plan this week, saying that the country’s own security services have “warned about the risk of Chinese state-sponsored hackers trying to infiltrate and destroy energy systems in the West.”
He also said that “hidden kill switches have been found in Chinese solar installation technology in the United States.”
While stopping short of calling for the factory plan to be rejected, he sought reassurance from the government that “neither Mingyang nor the Chinese state will be able to remotely control our energy infrastructure.”
Labour energy minister Michael Shanks said in response: “Many companies want to come and invest in the UK. We absolutely welcome investment into this country. But every single decision made about that, every single investment, obviously has to pass stringent national security tests.”
“Any decisions that we make will never compromise on our national security,” he added.
Mingyang last month struck a deal with Octopus that would see the British power group “provide Octopus software to control Mingyang’s world-class hardware,” in a move seemingly aimed at assuaging such concerns.