The Committee on Foreign Investment in the U.S. cleared a deal for Denmark-based energy company Orsted A/S to purchase land in Massachusetts from Eversource Energy, a U.S.-based electric services company, Squire Patton said in a September client alert. The CFIUS clearance was announced by the parties earlier this month, making the $625 million deal official. The land will be used for “wind development.”
China again extended its Section 301 retaliatory tariff exclusion period for sorbitol and other non-U.S. agricultural goods, the USDA Foreign Agricultural Service said in a September report. The exclusion period was scheduled to expire Sept. 15 but now will remain in effect until April 20, 2024. USDA said this is the sixth time China has extended the exclusion period for sorbitol, adding that the U.S. was the second-largest supplier of sorbitol to China in 2022, with Chinese imports reaching $1.4 million.
The State Department approved a potential $313.4 million military sale to Canada for munitions and “other systems to be integrated into MQ-9Bs,” the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said Sept. 15. The principal contractor will be General Atomics Aeronautical Systems.
The Bureau of Industry and Security is seeking public comments on an information collection involving import and end-use certificates, its delivery verification procedures and its firearms entry clearance requirements. The import and end-use certificates are obtained by the foreign importer and transmitted to the U.S. exporter, BIS said, and the delivery verification certificate, required by BIS as part of its export control program, must be completed by the ultimate consignee when the goods are delivered. BIS said the firearms entry clearance requirements are “necessary” due to the 2020 shift in export control jurisdiction of certain defense items from the State Department to the Commerce Department (see 2001170030), adding that Commerce “must now take over this collection of information.” Comments are due Nov. 20.
Taiwan-based carrier Yang Ming Marine Transport Corp. violated the Shipping Act by not providing agreed upon space, charging "extracontractual prices and surcharges” and charging unfair detention and demurrage fees, Bed Bath & Beyond said in a recent complaint to the Federal Maritime Commission. Bed Bath & Beyond is seeking reparations for the "injuries" caused by Yang Ming, telling the FMC that it may have been subject to more than $700,000 in unfair charges.
A think tank with roots in libertarianism that now supports a carbon tax warned that members of Congress who want to pass a carbon border adjustment tax without a domestic carbon tax face more than just litigation at the World Trade Organization.
The State Department approved potential military sales to South Korea and Poland worth more than $5.3 billion combined, the Defense Security Cooperation Agency said. The $5.06 billion sale to South Korea includes F-35 aircraft and related equipment, and the principal contractors will be Lockheed Martin Aeronautics Company and Pratt & Whitney Military Engines. The $389 million sale to Poland includes F-16 “sustainment” and related equipment, and the principal contractor will be Lockheed Martin.
Commerce Deputy Secretary Don Graves will travel with 15 American companies on a cybersecurity “trade mission” to Japan and South Korea Sept. 20-26, the agency announced this week. The mission will help deepen commercial ties between the countries in cybersecurity and “other critical emerging technologies by strengthening joint efforts to safeguard our critical infrastructure and tech ecosystems from those who seek to undermine our national and economic security,” Commerce said. Leaders from the three countries met in August and agreed to boost export control cooperation and work closely in other “protection measures” to safeguard cutting-edge technologies (see 2308180046).
The U.S. doesn't have to sacrifice innovation when imposing new regulations on artificial intelligence, including through potential export controls, said Jack Corrigan, a senior research analyst at Georgetown University’s Center for Security and Emerging Technology (CSET). Corrigan said there is always “tension” between the government’s desire to issue restrictions and industry’s drive to develop new technologies, but “as it relates to AI, regulation doesn't necessarily need to get in the way of innovation.”
The U.S. should push World Trade Organization members to "revisit what constitutes good and bad subsidies," which may help encourage transparency and improve "enforcement through incentives for compliance and penalties for noncompliance," the Council on Foreign Relations said in a new report.