EMP-Shielded Power Grids Under Development 111
An anonymous reader writes with this excerpt from MarketWatch:
"A one-megaton nuclear bomb detonated 250 miles over Kansas could cripple many modern electronic devices and systems in the continental US and take out the power grid for a long time. ... A solar storm similar to the one that occurred in 1859, which shorted out telegraph wires in the United States and Europe, could wreak havoc on electrical systems. Each of the above scenarios can create a powerful electromagnetic pulse that overloads electronic devices and systems.
IAN staff and Frostburg State University physics and engineering professor Hilkat Soysal are teaming — through a $165,000 project recently approved by the Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program — to create renewable energy-powered, electromagnetic pulse (EMP)-protected microgrids that could provide electricity for critical infrastructure facilities in the event of a disaster."
Also available are an EMP threat assessment (PDF) written for the US Congress and an estimate of economic impact (PDF).
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Exactly (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Exactly (Score:5, Insightful)
A one-megaton nuclear bomb detonated 250 miles over Kansas could cripple many modern electronic devices and systems in the continental US and take out the power grid for a long time.
I don't mean to troll, but you don't need a nuclear bomb to take out the power grid [1,3]. Instead, the money should be invested in renewing the outdated grid in the USA [2,3].
[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2003_North_America_blackout [wikipedia.org]
[2] http://www.iht.com/articles/2008/08/26/business/grid.php [iht.com]
[3] http://www.pubrecord.org/nationworld/239-5-years-after-blackout-power-grid-still-in-dire-straits.html [pubrecord.org]
Re:Exactly (Score:4, Insightful)
There arn't too many people who have both 1MT nuclear weapons and the ability to get them to 250 miles above Kansas either. Also AFAIK none of those with such an ability are likely to only use one weapon. This is something which is unlikely to happen, but should it happen the US is likely to have bigger problems than a non functional power grid.
Instead, the money should be invested in renewing the outdated grid in the USA [2,3].
That actually makes sense. Especially if at the same time you also add generating capacity where it has not previously been. Regardless of if this is of a new form, e.g. wind/solar/etc. or coal/methane/nuclear/etc.
Omega Man (Score:5, Funny)
Re:Omega Man (Score:5, Insightful)
Re:Omega Man (Score:4, Insightful)
And technology doesn't cause stress, we do.
Fixed that for you.
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And stress doesn't cause technology, we do.
I may not have "fixed" that for you, but it's true when you think about it...
And of course the critical power lines would.... (Score:5, Insightful)
... be supporting the governments and their military for which an EMP would most likely come from.
Just more terrorism from those we pay taxes to.
Re:And of course the critical power lines would... (Score:3, Funny)
Just more terrorism from those we pay taxes to.
It's a trick! He's from the USSR, just trying to get us to stop paying our taxes, THEN the commies will win!
Shielded grid? (Score:3, Interesting)
If the grid was shielded, could it be used for broadband Internet?
Transporter_ii
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Even unshielded, it can be. It's just expensive to protect your modem from 10kV and up, and the bandwidth of long aluminium cables isn't very impressive.
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I'm not really sure where you heard that, but over short distances fiber is definitely conductive. Enough so that lightning can enter a building through the fiber optic line.
Over the longer distances yes that's probably true, but it's largely pointless since you can't use a continuous stretch for long distances without additional hardware in the middle.
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10kv is nothing near what a lightning strike will do. You might get a spike via fibre on a strike, but it will end up as a melted mess before the strike fully discharges - by which time it will have "found" a more efficient route to ground.
To say equate fibre conducting a gigavolt or two is the same as conducting 10kv is just silly. Do we ban wood in homes? You know, trees get hit by lightning all the time, and, well, we've got 240v (or 110v if you're in the US) going all through the walls.
Actually, I'm sca
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Yes, it can be...but because it is unshielded, it creates RF Interference with radios (mostly HAM bands). It is my understanding that if they weren't causing interference, Broadband Over Power lines would be just about ready to roll.
Don't think a lot of money is being put into this?
-=-=-=-=
http://broadbandoverpowerlines.blogspot.com/2006/05/google-gs-sensustxu-ge-earthlink-put.html [blogspot.com]
Google, GS, SENSUS,TXU, GE, EarthLink put $230M in Current Communications ~ 10 Mbps Symmetrical speed
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Yes, it can be...but because it is unshielded, it creates RF Interference with radios (mostly HAM bands). It is my understanding that if they weren't causing interference, Broadband Over Power lines would be just about ready to roll.
They aren't going to shield the last mile to you. Sorry. Anyway, if they have to dig up the last mile they might as well put in fiber at the same time.
Broadband over power lines is obsolete before it got started.
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underground (Score:3, Interesting)
will burying the cables under ground help? sorry if its a dumb question
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It also costs a lot more to install underground cables. Even if you had superconducting cable it comes down to the difference between digging a trench vs posts or concrete foundations every so often.
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No extra losses if you bury high voltage DC power-lines. Since we got the tech to do DC now, and it should work better for solar anyway. ( the alternating current causes a ringing current between any capacitance and inductance, DC only during load changes would you have to pay the cost of inductance, not constantly like AC.
Re:underground (Score:4, Informative)
Not unless they are very very deep. Cables are usually more conductive than the ground. The EMP will continue deep into the ground, and will be picked up by cables like a several miles long antenna.
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So put the cables in non-conductive conduit and suspend them in the middle of the tube, so that (other than mounting apparatus) they are not in contact with anything but air.
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The materials making up the walls of the conduit itself should be conductive, but the interior of the conduit should be non-conductive.
Actually, air is a fairly good insulator, but at high voltages, it can still become conductive.
So it may be best to fill the conduit with a less-conductive inert gas, pressurize and isolate segments of the conduit, to discourage things like water dripping in, if the conduit is ever breached somewhere, or to make incursion less likely and minimize the length of conduit
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Conductive conduit (i.e. steel) is expensive! So what you do is to make cables surrounded with a conductive, grounded shield ...
...which is exactly how medium and high voltage underground cabled produced today are constructed.
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Conductive conduit (i.e. steel) is expensive! So what you do is to make cables surrounded with a conductive, grounded shield ...
Well, conduit in general is not cheap. You can line your PVC conduit with a foil shield covering the wall and it becomes conductive.
The added expense of rigid conduit has benefits like being able to bring additional cables through it, for example fiber, which could be leased out at a profit to other users.
Moreover, you have additional protection against the wire being broken
Pork (Score:4, Funny)
through a $165,000 project recently approved by the Maryland Industrial Partnerships (MIPS) program
Sounds like pork to me... I hope McCaine shuts this down!
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Sounds like pork to me... I hope McCaine shuts this down!
There's pork and then there's National Security Pork.
All the Candidates are proposing to attack the first.
I'm not sure any of them have even discussed cutting the flow of money for the 2nd.
Still inventing war-tech, guys? (Score:5, Funny)
Soon nobody will want to waste an expensive bomb on your broke asses anyway.
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If only there was some kind of Adamsian Perspective Ray [wikipedia.org] we could shoot these people with.
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Especially when there are far more sensible things to research as well as a power grid which could do with some major maintainence.
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But as TFS said, a solar flare (like the one in 1859) could do the same thing.
You can't be use diplomacy against nature.
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So you REALLY didn't mean "assets".
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Well, we have plenty to waste on you.
Some /. pages load slowly (Score:1, Offtopic)
Anyone else having problems? Content from genweb.ostg.org (or .com?) takes forever, holding up page loading.
boom! (Score:1, Insightful)
So if someone wants to screw up the US, and they have one atomic bomb to do so, doesn't defending against an EMP attack just make it more likely they'll go the traditional route and nuke a big city.
IAN? (Score:4, Funny)
Am I the only one who read "IAN staff" as "I Am Not staff" and then thought I am not staff? That doesn't make sense. Fucking slashdot summary!
Ohhhhh... wait a minute... I.A.N... fucking slashdot abbreviations!
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I.A.N... fucking slashdot abbreviations!
... Thank god.
How about solar flares? (Score:3, Insightful)
solar flares need to be shielded from as well.
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Solar flares cause problems because they induce an extermely low frequency charge on a transmission line. This low frequency is practically a DC voltage which can saturate the core of transformer thus causing a blackout. Coupling the line through a large capacitor bank filters out this DC component thus negating much of the effects of a solar flare.
Nice (Score:3, Interesting)
that could provide electricity for critical infrastructure facilities in the event of a disaster."
"Critical infrastructure" had better include the Wal-marts, fire, police, gas stations...
And most importantly: the internet.
The potential effects of a massive EMP or power outage are so bad, that the traditional notion of "critical infrastructure" may not be enough.
I.E. If businesses are down (no power) for months, then you have a situation where people can't purchase essential supplies, AND since a large EMP would effect a large area, noone nearby can spare them.
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I hate to rain too much on your parade but, if my sleep deprived memory serves me correctly, an EMP would render permanently inoperable any device within the effect area controlled by a semiconductor. This obviously includes computers and routing equipment, but also most cash registers, motor vehicles, kitchen appliances, traffic lights, programmable controllers, etc. Not to mention the approximately 5,000 airliners in the air during peak times.
In addition, communication equipment and other types of receive
Umm (Score:2)
create renewable energy-powered, electromagnetic pulse (EMP)-protected microgrids that could provide electricity for critical infrastructure facilities in the event of a disaster
Ummm. Might they be referring to shielded backup generators? Can I have a $160,000 grant now too?
Buzz-word compliant (Score:2)
No part of the objective seems to require the solution to be renewable energy-powered. It wouldn't be unconscionable to power the thing by burning caribou in order to preserve the nation's power grid, and communications...
But somebody had money earmarked to "renewable energy" and somebody else knew, how to craft a proposal.
Your
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That's cool. I'll use that to defend a new Alaska drilling project as "using renewable energy".
But allow me to rephrase my point, lest it may be lost in the debate on whether caribou are renewable (and at what rate). How about: It wouldn't be unconscionable to power the thing by waterboarding caribou in order to preserve the nation's power grid and communications?..
Wel
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I have some ideas, but Rudolf Diesel appears to have had them first
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That's cool. I'll use that to defend a new Alaska drilling project as "using renewable energy".
Please do. And post the video. I think there's a lot of different between a source that is renewable on the order of a generation of caribou (geothermal is something like this as well) and renewable on the order of millions of years.
Well, if the result of their work ends up using a renewable energy source for this reason, that's fine with me. What I object to is their ruling out all other energy sources a priori.
That's reasonable. It does sound a bit feelgoody. I'm just pointing out that there are practical reasons for considering "renewable" energy sources.
Neither is likely to survive a nuclear bomb, however... The energy source needs to be compact and well-protected. Whether it is renewable is (or ought to be) irrelevant -- the system is not supposed to work forever -- only for a short time after the disaster.
I don't get what you think is going on here. We're not speaking of a surface nuclear blast. Yes, solar cells due to their large siz
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You are still likely to need a power grid, because the best place for generating power may not be where you want to use that power.
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Practical uses (Score:1)
Ok, let's all calm down. (Score:1)
We're all panicking because some streetlights went out in Hawaii after one test. (Oh look it up!)
I agree, EMP=bad, & solar flares could do darn near the same thing.
BUT let's try to remember: a megaton class weapon exploded at the edge of the atmosphere is the work of a grown-up nu-ku-ler power. The Axis of Eagerness is not likely to generate this threat anytime soon. By that time, we'll have other solutions and problems.
Let's just try NOT to piss off France, 'k?
Nice, but... (Score:2, Insightful)
Personally... (Score:2)
Stupid Priorities (Score:2)
That money spent "upgrading" the electrical grid needs to be spent right now on better failovers in conventional incidents. More redundancy and distribution around bottlenecks, more intelligence and messaging. We just watched the 2003 Northeast Blackout [wikipedia.org], and others are all too common [wikipedia.org]. If the grid upgrades are to be focused on individual cities, like with this EMP shielding project, they should first protect cities from blackouts that happen inside them [wikipedia.org] during heat waves.
If there's money for EMP shielding, t
How about Hurricane Resistant Power Grids? (Score:5, Interesting)
Hurricane Ike knocked out power across Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio. We need to divert this money away from worrying about preventing a power grid outage due to an extremely unlikely nuclear strike and towards finding ways to keep natural, regularly occuring forces from bringing down power for 6 million people across the center of the US.
IKE was preventable (Score:3, Interesting)
Hurricane Ike knocked out power across Texas, Arkansas, Louisiana, Tennessee, Kentucky, Indiana, and Ohio. We need to divert this money away from worrying about preventing a power grid outage due to an extremely unlikely nuclear strike and towards finding ways to keep natural, regularly occuring forces from bringing down power for 6 million people across the center of the US
The outages caused by Hurricane Ike WERE PREVENTABLE!
In Houston, there are trees completely growing around power poles. The news doesn
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Renewables + critical infrastructure = bad idea (Score:2)
(...) renewable energy-powered, electromagnetic pulse (EMP)-protected microgrids that could provide electricity for critical infrastructure facilities (...)
Critical infrastructure facilities powered by renewable energy? So you'll be protected from extremely rare solar storms and high-altitude nuclear explosions but not from weather? That doesn't sound very clever to me, unless we're talking about hydro power. It seems that they thrown in "renewable energy powered" to be buzzword compliant. On top of that, if the goal is reliability, it's generally better not to go with bleeding edge technology.
Don't need a nuke to make an EMP (Score:4, Informative)
There are many other ways to form EMPs. The problem is making them powerful enough. A shorted out magnetotron in a microwave generates enough EM to screw up any nearby electronics (blew out my microwave, killed my computer, TV, router, and stereo. Everything else in other rooms were fine, just the kitchen and living room were affected, and they're on separate circuits.)
Duh, wrong (Score:2)
Most new cabling, even high voltage up to a point is underground, ie no EMP. The EMP pulses are so short anyway (like ns) that they aren't likely to propagate very far on overhead wires either, as the energy is just radiated back out into space or turned into heat down the line a bit.
I would worry more about unshielded smaller scale electronics like server farms, consumer electronics, wireless communications of all types including public service. Anything that has an antenna that receives in the ns range
EMP threat is way exaggerated (Score:2, Informative)
http://www.alternet.org/story/25738/ [alternet.org]
A 1.4 megaton thermonuclear weapon detonated 250 miles above Johnston Island in the Pacific affected street lamps, circuit breakers, cars and radio stations in Hawaiian, 800 miles to the north. Starfish Prime was a thermonuclear device with a yield over a hundred times that of the bomb dropped on Hiroshima. Minimal damage 800 miles away. 1% of street lights and some fused ignitions in cars.
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Please, please, PLEASE let the terrorists be this stupid. PLEASE waste that nuke on an EMP, please. I guess you've never heard of a low tech option called a blanket. Some of us growing up were too poor to use the heater.
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The Starfish Prime test was conducted in 1962, back before "street lamps, circuit breakers, cars and radio stations" were all packed full of semiconductor devices.
Older electromechanical or vacuum tube based systems were far more robust against EMP than modern VLSI electronics would be.
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I would tend to agree, but a worst-case EMP event over the US wouldn't exactly be a victimless event. We have become so dependent on technology that in many cases it is literally a matter of life and death. Hospital life support systems, control/cooling systems at nuke plants or chemical plants, aircraft in the air at the time of the blast, emergency communications and response vehicles, etc.
Such an event would cause a substantial loss of life almost immediately, with residual losses ongoing for quite a whi
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DIY Power Generation. (Score:1)
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Umm, nice trolling. Yes it would disable cars in Kansas, but the vast majority of people are not located in Kansas and it wouldn't really take that much time to get unaffected cars from elsewhere.
Re:Stupid scaremongering (Score:4, Informative)
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What do they teach kids in schools these days.
Obviously not enough about punctuation or weapons of mass destruction.
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It wouldn't make much difference. A car that doesn't work and a car driven by your average Kansan both move at about the same speed.
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From the Wikipedia page on EMP [wikipedia.org] (which quotes a Federation of American Scientists article):
"The pulse can easily span continent-sized areas, and this radiation can affect systems on land, sea, and air. The first recorded EMP incident accompanied a high-altitude nuclear test over the South Pacific and resulted in power system failures as far away as Hawaii. A large device detonated at 400â"500 km (250 to 312 miles) over Kansas would affect all of the continental U.S. The signal from such an event extends
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Yes, disabling a power plant in Kansas would make your gasoline powered, computer controlled, car fail to start.
If you happen to live close enough to the blast.
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Yes, disabling a power plant in Kansas would make my gasoline powered car fail to start.
Yes, disabling a power plant in Kansas would make your gasoline powered, computer controlled, car fail to start. If you happen to live close enough to the blast.
No, disabling a power plant in Kansas would not make your gasoline powered car fail to start. The EMP blast itself would cause all the electronic parts to keep the car from starting. It's important to use cause and effect and not correlation and effect.
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Yes, disabling a power plant in Kansas would make my gasoline powered car fail to start.
..um don't most/all cars have electronic emission systems...? *eyeroll*
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*whoosh*
To all the dumb asses who modded me down: please read the article before moderating. Same to all the ACs who replied with "your car is electronic" - no duh. But the article is about an EMP protected power grid, so it has nothing to do with my car, which is neither in Kansas, nor connected to the power grid.
I was making fun of the stupid journalism, and anyone actually read the article noticed that.
The article, once you get into it, is about some grant awards to universities for studying a second p