If a solar flare on the scale of the September 1, 1859 Carrington Event (named after solar astronomer Richard Carrington who observed it from England) were to happen today we would very quickly revert to a much more primitive level of living that would last for months or years. No electricity means no water. No water means death.
According to the NAS report, a severe space weather event in the US could induce ground currents that would knock out 300 key transformers within about 90 seconds, cutting off the power for more than 130 million people (see map). From that moment, the clock is ticking for America.
First to go - immediately for some people - is drinkable water. Anyone living in a high-rise apartment, where water has to be pumped to reach them, would be cut off straight away. For the rest, drinking water will still come through the taps for maybe half a day. With no electricity to pump water from reservoirs, there is no more after that.
There is simply no electrically powered transport: no trains, underground or overground. Our just-in-time culture for delivery networks may represent the pinnacle of efficiency, but it means that supermarket shelves would empty very quickly - delivery trucks could only keep running until their tanks ran out of fuel, and there is no electricity to pump any more from the underground tanks at filling stations.
These transformers normally take a year to build each. More than just these key transformers would be damaged.
The truly shocking finding is that this whole situation would not improve for months, maybe years: melted transformer hubs cannot be repaired, only replaced.
What I would like to know: How much do these transformers cost? How much would it cost to build duplicates of these transformers and some other key equipment so that we could restore electric power at least for water and a few other key functions in a matter of days or weeks?
BTW, ever notice how much more severe the 19th century was in terms of solar and geological events as compared to the 20th century and early 21st century? The 19th century witnessed the Carrington Event along with the Tambora eruption in 1815 and Krakatoa in 1883. Plus, the 19th century began at the tail end of the Little Ice Age and the Dalton Minimum of sunspot activity lasted till 1820. In the 21st century we could easily get walloped by natural processes just as severe. We can afford to be far better prepared. Why not make at least some of the preparations?
Update: We should also prepare a planetary defense against asteroids.
By Randall Parker at 2009 March 29 11:18 AM Dangers Natural GeneralNote that the magnetic effects reached Earth after a delay of hours. This would allow time to prepare and to shut systems down to prevent damage; it is much quicker to bring powerplants back up after a planned shutdown than to rebuild the transformers and switchgear.
If our grid managers are as smart as I think they are, they're ready for this. They may even be ready to e.g. ground all phases of long-distance power lines to prevent arcing at the ends that might damage the disconnects. Once the event is past, remove the grounding bars, check the systems out, and roll repair crews—but that should be a lot less hassle than fixing major EMP damage.
Say, Randall, any chance of putting permalinks on comments to make it more convenient to bookmark the last-seen spot in a discussion?
E-P,
The full text of the article (it is 3 pages - did you read them all?) says that sometimes the event comes at the Earth too quickly for warning. Also (and see the 3rd page) our warning satellite that might give us the needed 15 minutes of warning is old and could fail at any time.
I also wonder whether the proper procedures are in place to bring down the whole grid before something like that hits.
Permalinks on comments: I'm sure there's a way to do that. If someone who knows MovableType wants to tell me how I'll change the template. I'll see what I can find on my own.
E-P,
I made a stab at comment permalinks (which is something I've wanted for a long time - so thanks for bugging me about it). See if this works for you.
E-P,
I've got comment permalinks working in some places. They'll show up in more places as pages get regenerated. They should show up in all comments views but not on all single post views.
I missed the "only minutes" at the end of the article; the question is, how frequently does the particle storm follow the flare that closely? If it does come too quickly for the decision-making system to proactively shut down vulnerable systems, can we trip safeties before equipment is damaged? This I do not know, but I hope someone's working on it.
Great to see comment permalinks regardless of what it takes to put them on existing pages.
No water from taps in high-apartment. Die of thirst or walk down stairs and get water. Bottled water or go to where working pumps are.
Plus this would only hit on one side of the planet. Plus not every station would get knocked out.
ABB has emergency transformers
http://www.utilityproducts.com/display_article/334836/129/none/none/Indus/ABB-Transformers-Provide-Emergency-Relief-for-Iowa-Flood-Victim
Plus aircraft carriers, cruise ships with water purification and other facilities can be docked at places like New York.
However, it is prudent to put up a few more satellites and make the grid more robust. Robotic systems to rapidly ground the facilities.
New superconductor components for fast handling of power spikes etc...
How much would it cost to built the equipment from scratch as opposed to surrounding the transformers with a faraday cage (just in case)?
Faraday caging the transformers would be ineffective as the overload is induced in the wires, and the overload is conducted into the transformers. Shielding the wires would be uneconomic, requiring more towers to sustain the added weight of insulation and shielding. This would increase the vulnerability of the grid to the more-common ice storm in an effort to protect against the less-common solar CME.
The transformers are nowhere near big enough to induce damaging currents in them directly; if they were, individual humans would be also.
The simple way to prevent damage is to disconnect the transformers from their lines, and ground the lines to prevent arcing. Knowing WHEN to do this, and keeping the control systems up and running as the magnetic storm strikes... aye, there's the rub!
60 or 50 cycle electric current and big fat transformers are old technology now.
The best way to transmit electrical energy long distances now is at high DC voltage using high-frequency DC-to-DC power converters.
If many old, legacy technology transformers were damaged then the quickest way to replace them would be as a forced upgrade to the more modern DC transmission technology.
DC into homes? Why not? It is certainly safer, as Thomas Edison aptly demonstrated over 100 years ago.
I can't tell if you're joking, George. Edison's campaign was deeply dishonest. And I'm not sure how you propose to deal with the resistive losses associated with DC. Switchmode power supplies are great, but DC distribution systems don't make sense for anything bigger than a server room.
High voltage DC != regular DC. The resistances are completely different...
Grounding the power lines at the ends? Watch out - you may have just created a giant CURRENT LOOP consisting of the lines and the earth return path. The huge geomagnetic-induced current in the lines, returning through the earth, would probably burn out the lines instantly - the same current that would burn out the transformers if they were still connected. Leaving the lines open would cause high voltage arcing. No easy solutions exist except possibly large resistors at the ground connections that limit both the closed-circuit current and open-circuit voltage as a balanced compromise, but good luck choosing the resistor value and wattage!
A carrington event would fry most of the satellites in orbit, The International Space station crew would die of radiation exposure, and if it didn't kill them quick, the sudden and complete failure of all electrical system on the ISS would kill them. The geomagnetic field of earth would go haywire, most likely magnetic compasses would be useless, older aircraft could fly after the initial event, but would have to have good visual flight conditions to follow roads and highways for navigation, or use a vacuum operated gyro compass. Radio communications would be jammed for awhile, and allot of radio equipment would be ruined as well. Ships at see would have to revert to sextants to navigate since GPS, LORAN-C and OMEGA navigational gear would be useless. People with pacemakers would probably die from the interference. Our population density is far too high to loose transport, we'd run out of food quick. Most modern vehicles wouldn't run anyway due to the electronic fuel injections, older vehicles (think VW bugs, and willys jeeps, chevels, etc.) with breaker point ignition would run, electronic clocks, etc would be useless. Grandfather clocks, wind up watches, etc would run.
on the subject of electricity, AC transmits far better than DC, even at high voltage dc loss due to resistance is outrageous. Transformers will fry due to the DC induced in the windings on top of a ac field, large capacitors could be installed on at the transformers to filter some out, and heavy resistors could be installed on the ground lines to reduce the ground current feeding back up the ground lines into the gear, this would allow the electrical grid to operate longer before they would have to shut down.
It always amuses me to see the ill-concealed glee that doomsday predictors use to state that, we will all die horrible deaths in a matter of weeks.
The millennium bug predictors were also so far wrong that I am amazed they haven't crawled into holes in shame. But noooo, they are now in the ranks of solar flare disasters freaks. As was pointed out, we would have hours of warning and could take emergency measures. Yes, some satellites would be damaged, but you would be amazed at how many are hardened against exactly this kind of event.
The universe is a very harsh place and not at all suited for human life. Even the earth is not all the friendly. Most places on this planet could not support human life. That's why we don't live in the oceans on on Mount Everest. So much for the religious rich that claims this universe was created just for us. LMAO!
Is it feasable to shield small electronic equipment from a Carrington type event using lead shielding?
If so, how thick would the shielding have to be?
Nazgul,
You can shield against EMP using a farraday cage. Any electrical conductor will do (it doesn't have to be lead) and it doesn't require any special thickness. Aluminum foil should work.
I am amused by the comments indicating a dependence upon early warning systems and people smart enough to do what is necessary to save the system within hours. How much warning did we have before Hurricane Katrina? What was done? How about the Three Mile Island event? The reactor itself was trying to shut down, and but for incompetent human interference, it might have succeeded and only been an entry in a log book. What makes anyone think that Big Brother/Sister would "do something" to save us in the event of a geomagnetic storm or other disaster? Depending upon others, especially governments to do the right thing within minutes or hours of even a clear warning is folly.
You wanna survive another Carrington Event or any other disaster of that magnitude? Become self-sufficient or at least lay in some stores for tough times. To survive, you need air, water, food, and shelter. You don't need electricity.
The biggest danger in the case of an event like this is the danger we present to each other. Stupid people in large groups cannot be reasoned with. They can only be avoided.... or shot. Shooting down a mob is not practical... you'd need at least three high rate of fire machine guns with expert gunners to deal with even a few hundred people if they were Hell-bent on over-running your position to get to your food. There would be more than just a few hundred, though. Shooting people down isn't especially moral either. Hiding is better. Travel under such circumstances is simply stupid... so don't worry about your car, you won't be needing it.
Even a bare minimum of preparation... some food, first aid supplies, water, salt, some extra blankets... would help immeasurably. Most people would be out of food within a week or less, they'd be out of water immediately, and would start foraging (looting) within a couple of weeks. Cannibalism would probably not happen until a month or so had passed.
Not a pretty picture, is it?
'delivery trucks could only keep running until their tanks ran out of fuel'? Cars and trucks have a lot of electrical and electronic systems. Surely these would be fried and the truck made immobile even though it had plenty of fuel.
I agree with Dale A. Raby about the need to hide. If civilization really would break down it is better to not be found than to do battle with people who are trying to steal your stuff.
May I quote a small portion of your original article in my book, "2012 Survival Guide"? Thanks!
What about Sattelites in orbit? Mobile phones, computers and other electronic devices? will they be fried aswell?
Crystal,
Sure, you can quote an excerpt as long as you attribute it to FuturePundit.com.
Einstienear,
Many (all?) satellites would get fried. They do not have the shielding to protect them.
Small gadgets: It is my understanding that they would survive. Bigger stretches of wire are needed to induce the big damaging current flows. But plugged in stuff would likely be at bigger risk. As soon as you suspect a Carrington event start unplugging stuff.
Dale A. Raby,
The key after a collapse is to avoid looking like you have a lot of resources. Hiding is even better.