POPULAR SCIENCE
July, 2011
SUN STROKE
A catastrophic solar storm isn’t a question of if, but when--and it looks like soon.
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“Imagine 30 Chernobyls across the U.S.” says electrical engineer John Kappenman, an expert on the grid’s vulnerability to space weather.
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In a 2008 National Academy of Sciences report, scientists estimated that a 1921-level storm could knock out 350 transformers on the American grid, leaving 130 million people without electricity. Replacing broken transformers would take a long time because most require up to two years to manufacture.
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Preventing a surge from a CME would be costly. With enough warning (at least a few hours, probably), power companies could shut transformers off entirely, turning them back on after the storm. But shutting down the shutting grid on such a large scale would cost billions. To confidently do so, forecasting must be accurate.
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The Department of Homeland Security is funding the development of an emergency replacement transformer, but it won't be field-ready for several years. [USGov's usual timetable "for the people": "a day late and a dollar short"]
THE FALLOUT
A 1989 solar storm brought down Quebec's power grid, leaving millions in the dark for nine hours. A larger storm will affect hundreds of millions of people.
Traffic signals not equipped with backup battery power (most of New York City's) would also fail immediately.
Without power, gas pumps don't work.
Trains won't run either: During the 2003 Northeast blackout. 400,000 commuters were stranded in the New York City subway system.
Surges knock out landlines and cellular networks. Both have backup systems that run for just a few days at most.
With transportation systems down, hospital generators run out of fuel after weeks, or even days. Ventilators and heart and lung pumps will no longer work. Drugs that need refrigeration will soon spoil. Insulin goes bad after 28 days.
Municipal pumps fail, causing backflows--water runs backward through pipes and its contaminated with bacteria.
Water pumps shut off in residential homes and apartments, leaving millions without potable water.
Cities issue boiling advisories, but most stoves can't work without power or natural gas.
Once outside power is lost, nuclear plants have diesel generators that can pump water to spent-fuel cooling pools for up to 30 days [then] spent fuel rods melt down, and radiation can escape into the air.
The extent of the meltdown threat is well documented. A month before the Fukushima plant in Japan went offline in March, the Foundation for Resilient Societies, a committee of engineers, filed a petition with the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission recommending the augmentation of nuclear plants' emergency backup systems. The petition claims that a severe solar storm would be far worse than a 9.0-magnitude quake and could leave about two thirds of the country's nuclear plants without power for one to two years.
