The sun ejects charged particles that can cause geomagnetic storms, such as this one captured by the International Space Station on May 24, 2010.
The upper Midwest got a rare treat over Labor Day weekend. The aurora borealis, not typically visible south of Canada, lit up the night skies (the cloudless ones, at least). The aurora had intensified when an exceptionally strong burst of charged solar particles hit the earth’s magnetosphere.
Gorgeous as they are, such ‘solar storms’ can be dangerous. Very dangerous. When astrophysicists and electrical engineers warn that a truly massive solar storm could precipitate the collapse of civilization, they are not exaggerating.
The charged particles that comprise a solar storm are separate from the radiant energy that brightens and warms the earth. The particles cause distortions in the earth’s magnetic field, which can in turn send surges through our electrical infrastructure.
When satellites detect the approach of a moderate or severe solar storm, electrical utilities can make adjustments to prevent damage to the grid. They might, for example, temporarily shut down especially vulnerable components. But it’s unclear how effective such mitigation techniques would be against a truly massive storm, one of a magnitude not yet seen in modern times. Such a storm could fry transformers over a wide geographic area.
The last monster storm, dubbed the ‘Carrington Event,’ occurred in 1859. According to a contemporary account from Boston, the midnight aurora glowed so intensely that a newspaper could be read by its light. The resulting surges disabled the primitive American telegraph network and started fires in telegraph offices.
UW-Madison physics professor Jan Egedal tells me that, within the community of solar physicists, “it is well known that a Carrington-level disturbance today would be devastating.” If wide swaths of the highly interconnected North American electrical grid were damaged, backup generators would conk out long before the multitude of necessary grid repairs could be made. Lack of electricity itself might hamper the manufacture and transport of the required replacement equipment.
Picture what life would be like, especially in northern cities, after just one month without power. Then picture a year. Those who somehow survived winter would be consumed by a constant, likely violent, competition for scarce resources. It would be unsafe for folks from distant, unaffected areas to come in to help.
It’s just a matter of time before we are hit by another Carrington-level storm. On July 23, 2012, a burst of at least that magnitude flew right past us, through a spot where the earth had been just days before. Scientists estimate the probability of a direct hit over just the next 10 years to be between .5 percent and 12 percent.
Fortunately, governments and utility operators have started taking long-overdue steps to protect us from this apocalyptic threat. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation or NERC, an independent regulator of regional bulk power system operators, has launched a major project to harden the grid against a ‘100-year storm.’ System operators are required to complete a full assessment of their vulnerabilities by Jan. 1, 2021, and then address those vulnerabilities through corrective action plans.
Other entities have stepped up, too. The U.S. Department of Homeland Security is stockpiling replacement transformers that are specially designed for easy transport into disaster areas. Along the same lines, dozens of electric utilities have entered into an agreement to share spare transformers during emergencies. And the European Space Agency will soon launch a satellite designed to enhance our view of the sun, to improve storm warning times.
The transmission utility for most of Wisconsin, American Transmission Company, began studying the threat of massive solar storms on its own, before NERC launched its initiative. In 2015, ATC spent $500,000 to install a ‘neutral blocking device’ at a transformer station in the northeastern part of the state. The installation was a test, to see how effectively the device would perform against storm-related electrical currents.
Spokesperson Luella Dooley-Menet says that ATC is sharing the test results as part of the NERC assessment. The neutral blocking devices are performing as anticipated, so it’s possible that they will, eventually, be deployed around the country to protect the entire grid against a 100-year storm.
The 100-year-storm benchmark might, however, be too weak. NERC’s own analysis concedes that “the Carrington Event is likely less frequent than 1-in-100 years.” In other words, the NERC initiative is not really meant to protect us from a storm of that magnitude.
So while we celebrate these institutions for taking positive steps, we must insist that they keep hardening the grid until the possibility of a widespread, extended outage is virtually nil. That can be done, nationally, for as little as $10 billion. If that seems like too much, consider that the U.S. Department of Defense wastes $25 billion each year, by its own reckoning.
Or, better yet, consider how little $10 billion will seem like in retrospect, should the worst come to pass.
Michael Cummins is a Madison-based business analyst.
