***

'After 72 hours without power in Israel – it will be uninhabitable,' says CEO of company overseeing electrical systems.

Israel is utterly unprepared for a war with Hezbollah and for the toll such a conflict could take on the country's power infrastructure, the CEO of a company that manages and oversees Israel's electrical systems on behalf of the government said on Thursday.

"We are not ready for a real war. We live in a fantasy world, in my eyes," said Shaul Goldstein, head of Noga – the Israel Independent System Operator. Later, in an interview with Kan Public Broadcaster, he seemed to walk his comments back somewhat: "I said irresponsible things. I shouldn't have."

"If Nasrallah decides to paralyze Israel's power grid, he only needs to pick up the phone and call the head of Beirut's power grid, which is [technically] identical to Israel's." Goldstein said, before noting that "the upside is that we have invested a lot in protection, working together with Israel Electric Company."

      • Xavienth@lemmygrad.ml
        ·
        8 days ago

        I mean, crown corporations are technically public because they are owned by and accountable to the government.

        But the fact that they must turn a profit kinda ruins them...

    • HexBroke [any, comrade/them]
      ·
      8 days ago

      Most of Australia by area, probably half of Australia by population

      One state which sold off all their electricity infrastructure in the 90s just amended the constitution to require a parliamentary supermajority to privatise electricity assets in future, and established a state owned enterprise to take over energy sector projects*

      *probably bailing out all the stranded coal and gas assets, but also some renewables in there

      The national energy grid (which is huge) is a federal government run mix of private and public infrastructure (interestingly one state's electricity SOEs were caught manipulating prices and ripping off the federal government)