The News
President Donald Trump found that imported wind turbines and their parts threaten to impair US national security but imposed no new tariffs, directing the Commerce Department and the US Trade Representative to negotiate with supplier countries and report back within 180 days, according to a proclamation.
The proclamation says “imports of wind turbine components and subcomponents have increased over the last decade,” while domestic capacity “for certain products, such as blades, has not meaningfully increased.”
If no agreement is reached within 180 days, the president “may also take other actions he deems necessary to adjust imports.”
The details
The order singles out inverters, the power electronics that connect a wind farm to the grid. It treats them as a cybersecurity risk as well as a supply risk.
It calls modern networked inverters “an exploitable vulnerability that can allow remote access and interference with United States power systems.”
“The vast majority of these inverters are produced outside the United States and imported into the United States,” it says.
Turbine parts already pay tariffs on their metal content. The new proclamation leaves the steel, aluminum and copper proclamations in place.
Wind turbines and their parts were added to the Section 232 steel and aluminum derivatives list in 2025 at 50%, Review Energy reported.
The proclamation notes that “certain wind turbine components and subcomponents are made of significant amounts of aluminum, steel, or copper.”
The industry relies on imports for its largest components. Blades, drivetrains and electrical equipment are the most import-dependent, according to Wood Mackenzie.
US wind imports totaled $1.7 billion in 2023, with 41% from Mexico, Canada and China, Wood Mackenzie found, per Utility Dive.
In early 2025, the firm estimated that tariffs then proposed could raise onshore turbine costs 7% and total project costs 5%.
What’s next
Commerce and the Trade Representative owe the president an update on the talks within 180 days. The proclamation says Commerce will keep monitoring turbine imports and can flag the need for further action before then.
(Photo credit: Dale Frost/Port of San Diego via Wikimedia Commons)
