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Open Mike 12/02/2026

Written By: - Date published: 6:00 am, February 12th, 2026 - 15 comments
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15 comments on “Open Mike 12/02/2026 ”

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  1. SPC 1
    12 February 2026 at 8:08 am

    Industry government.

    Much of the detail in the Cabinet paper mirrored the findings of an independent report commissioned from Boston Consulting Group (BCG) last year by the four gentailers – Contact, Genesis, Mercury and Meridian.

    That report recommended LNG only as a fuel of last resort and recommended a $2 per megawatt hour (MWh) levy across all gas and electricity users to make it economically feasible.

    Broader perspective

    Large-scale battery technology had not progessed enough to cover "long-duration cover needs", while rooftop solar would not provide enough additional energy during winter, when supply was most likely to be a problem, the annex said.

    This ignores the fact that there is still gas from local fields after 2029 if Methanex was phased down, the use of coal, a wind farm off Taranaki (winter) and thermal development.

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/political/586599/government-wants-to-bypass-fast-track-process-for-proposed-liquefied-natural-gas-terminal

    Imported gas is not the most economic, nor the most GW compliant.

    https://www.rnz.co.nz/news/national/586475/better-to-burn-huntly-s-giant-mountain-of-coal-than-import-renewable-energy-advocate-says

    • SPC 1.1
      12 February 2026 at 9:01 am

      Stupid government

      In 2023 it shelved the Gas Transition Plan, designed to manage reserves and declining supply, then went on to cancel the GIDI Fund, which provided co-funding for businesses to switch from fossil fuels to cleaner energy sources.

      Clearly, this is a Government that largely pays lip service to alternative energy, and while it issues draft statements on geothermal energy and prattles on about biomass and biogas, it still doesn’t have an energy strategy despite promising one.

      Sure, New Zealand needs fossil fuel as back up, but doesn’t it already have it in the Huntly stockpile, which the Commerce Commission recently gave its approval as an emergency reserve?

      https://www.thepost.co.nz/nz-news/360947038/slick-sales-job-country-doesnt-need

  3. joe90 3
    12 February 2026 at 10:58 am

    Tech bros are going to rule the world.

    /

    @milesdeutscher

    This is getting out of control now…

    Read this slowly.

    In the past week alone:

    • Head of Anthropic's safety research quit, said "the world is in peril," moved to the UK to "become invisible" and write poetry.

    • Half of xAI's co-founders have now left. The latest said "recursive self-improvement loops go live in the next 12 months."

    • Anthropic's own safety report confirms Claude can tell when it's being tested – and adjusts its behavior accordingly.

    • ByteDance dropped Seedance 2.0. A filmmaker with 7 years of experience said 90% of his skills can already be replaced by it.

    • Yoshua Bengio (literal godfather of AI) in the International AI Safety Report: "We're seeing AIs whose behavior when they are tested is different from when they are being used" – and confirmed it's "not a coincidence."

    And to top it all off, the U.S. government declined to back the 2026 International AI Safety Report for the first time.

    The alarms aren't just getting louder. The people ringing them are now leaving the building.

    8:33 PM · Feb 11, 2026

    https://xcancel.com/milesdeutscher/status/2021487637299855540

    https://www.businessinsider.com/read-exit-letter-by-an-anthropic-ai-safety-leader-2026-2

    https://sdg.iisd.org/news/expert-report-identifies-ai-risks-recommends-solutions/

  4. Bearded Git 4
    12 February 2026 at 11:17 am

    Australia's power prices are falling because of the renewables boom over there.

    WTF is NZ doing investing in expensive and planet destroying imported LNG, including spending $2.7 billion on an import terminal according to Bernard Hickey today.

    https://www.reuters.com/markets/commodities/australias-renewables-boom-delivers-coveted-power-price-payoff-2026-02-10/

  5. gsays 5
    12 February 2026 at 3:36 pm

    Sometimes an election campaign writes itself.

    Promising to repeal: Pay Equity Undoing and the recent Uber Law.

    Scrapping this LNG craziness, Luxon's Folly. Implement Gas Transition Plan and start the Lake Onslow pumped hydro scheme. Ideally as an anchor project for a 21st century MOW. Apprenticeships and upskilling to reverse the migration trend.

    Reinstating the Live Animal Export Ban.

    • aj 5.1
      12 February 2026 at 6:42 pm

      Good start yes

    • alwyn 5.2
      12 February 2026 at 7:22 pm

      I would be willing to wager that no party that anticipates being able to form a Government will promise to scrap the LNG terminal in their manifesto for the next election.

      They would be stuck with having to explain how they can guarantee supply without either, burning enormous amounts of coal, or having the LNG available, to a large percentage of the population.

      The only two parties who will be in that situation are, of course, National and Labour. The Green Party, ACT party, NZ First or TPM could make the promise of course because they only regard it as necessary to get somewhere between 5% and 10% of the vote. They don't need to get the 30+% to actually form the Government.

  6. joe90 6
    12 February 2026 at 5:37 pm

    Gallup folds. James Carville responds.

    https://youtu.be/CeTCpvJ3GB0?si=B-vrFgmjF2KLW9tZ

    Gallup will no longer track presidential approval ratings after more than eight decades doing so, the public opinion polling agency confirmed to The Hill on Wednesday.

    The company said starting this year it would stop publishing approval and favorability ratings of individual political figures, saying in a statement it “reflects an evolution in how Gallup focuses its public research and thought leadership.”

    https://thehill.com/homenews/media/5733236-gallup-stops-presidential-approval-ratings-polls/

  7. joe90 7
    12 February 2026 at 7:48 pm

    Tl,dr; the US military who spent years developing some sort of direct energy weapon lent one to tRump's DHS who then downed a balloon in the vicinity of commercial air traffic.

    /

    https://www.foxnews.com/politics/us-military-shot-down-party-balloon-near-el-paso-after-suspecting-drone-official-says

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Malaysia_Airlines_Flight_17

  8. joe90 8
    13 February 2026 at 2:54 am

    What could go wrong.

    /

    A Pentagon plan to use a high-energy, counter-drone laser without having coordinated with the Federal Aviation Administration about potential risks to civilian flights prompted Wednesday’s unprecedented airspace shutdown over El Paso, Texas, multiple sources told CNN.

    Two people familiar with the matter said later Wednesday that Customs and Border Protection, not the US military, was in control of the laser technology when it was used this week around El Paso to shoot down balloons.

    Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth signed off on loaning CBP the technology in recent weeks, one of the sources said.

    The sources said the Defense Department led the development of the technology, but CBP was physically operating it this week. Another source familiar with the matter said Defense personnel were present when the device was used used.

    https://edition.cnn.com/2026/02/11/us/faa-el-paso-texas-flight-restrictions-hnk

  9. Bearded Git 9
    13 February 2026 at 4:02 pm

    To Obtrectator above….I can only do Spanish, pero parece que acordamos.