Why experts say a solar storm could cause trillions of dollars worth of damage

[Black Phoenix]

https://www.deseret.com/2023/11/14/23960735/what-is-solar-storm

The sun is beginning to enter a more active time for flares that cause solar storms that can impact the Earth.

As Earth enters this new phase, experts have been discussing how these solar storms could affect modern advancements on the planet and even lead to what a team from George Mason University called an “internet apocalypse.”

“The internet has come of age during a time when the sun has been relatively quiet, and now it’s entering a more active time,” Professor Peter Becker of George Mason University told Fox Weather. “It’s the first time in human history that there’s been an intersection of increased solar activity with our dependence on the internet and our global economic dependence on the internet.”

Do I think is going to be as destructive as they say? I will reply the same way as the Y2K previsions of end of the world.

Yes they will be disruptions, yes probably a ton of old satellites orbiting Earth's will be rendered space junk, specially old stuff from the 80s if there is some still around. But the doom and gloom they are trying to portray? No, absolutely not.

[AndyBeez]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

[Marco]

Without a large blackout I don't see how it should affect internet.

Shame we went with AC in the end, HVDC doesn't care about solar storms. It's just a tiny low frequency load modulation for HVDC.

[langwadt]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

what's wrong with starlink?

[Psi]

Without a large blackout I don't see how it should affect internet.

A totally isolated internet connection using fiber might be ok, but it still has a power feed using copper, so HV arcs getting into fiber routers could take them all out.
Some roadside comms cabinets are combined DSL and fiber. The DSL stuff is toast due to the voltage induced in all the copper phone wires and that may kill any connected fiber routers nearby.  The main issue is you can't just install a replacement because everyone else is trying to do the same at the same time. There's just not enough replacements available. So it would take months, maybe years, maybe 10's of years to manufacture enough replacement electronics depending how bad it was.

The carrington event had reports of sparks showering from telegraph machines, shocking operators and setting papers ablaze. The arcs were pretty extreme and had a lot more energy than a static shock.

The carrington event is not even the biggest, just the biggest in recorded history.  There's some evidence in tree rings of an even large one happening around 14300 years ago.

It really just comes down to how big it is, small ones happen all the time and don't case many issues, they're a bit annoying for power stations to deal with but no big issue normally.
However really big ones have the power to fry a lot of modern electronics if those systems are connected to any long conductive wires. 

It's like taking a car ignition coil to your tech.
Its not going to be happy.

[pcprogrammer]

Without a large blackout I don't see how it should affect internet.

It could affect modems and other equipment when the blast is strong enough. It is not just about voltage induced in cables. In early days the telegraph system suffered from it, and it could disrupt a lot more with nowadays electronics.

Think of thunder, when it hits close enough to your house it can destroy every electronic device in your house even when they are not connected to a power outlet or a cable for TV or internet.

[Psi]

If a big one happens, and hits the side of the earth containing most of the worlds high-tech infrastructure, it as the potential to make the recent chip shortage look like a rounding error.
But we're talking about an extreme one, the kind that does not happen very often.

[Andy Chee]

Shame we went with AC in the end, HVDC doesn't care about solar storms. It's just a tiny low frequency load modulation for HVDC.

From what I understand, it’s the length of transmission lines spanning across the country, which act as a resonant antenna tuned to the ELF solar storm. And it’s the high voltage nodes at the ends of the antenna which cause the damage to connected equipment.

As such, a HVDC grid with long distance transmission lines, would still be impacted.

[tom66]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

what's wrong with starlink?

I personally have no objection to it but I think the objections from others are along the lines of:

- It can affect night photography (because the satellites reflect light, SpaceX tried painting them black but it made barely any difference).  It's my understanding that this can be mitigated in long exposures using software that tracks the orbits of the Starlink satellites, but requires post-processing that some may not like.  Also, such issues exist already with satellites, planes, etc.

- Fears of a Kessler cascade, even though such a cascade has only been theorised and never demonstrated as a practical hazard.

- Irrational dislike of Elon Musk (don't get me wrong, he's a class-A dick, at least on social media, but I don't hate the products his engineers work on;  Starlink is one of those).

[Berni]

Without a large blackout I don't see how it should affect internet.

Shame we went with AC in the end, HVDC doesn't care about solar storms. It's just a tiny low frequency load modulation for HVDC.

DC would have the same problem.

The problem is that when the earths magnetic field swings around during the storm it induces a voltage in any long conductor. Sure if your DC circuit was a battery somewhere far away, two closely parallel wires running the distance to power a load on the other side you are technically fine. Both wires get the same voltage induced and your load is still seeing just the battery voltage. Tho with a storm extreme enough and a long enough wire you might get the common mode of the battery or load lifted so high in voltage that is starts arcing over to near by earthed objects.

The power grid however is as the name suggets... a grid. There are many long transmission lines connecting substations together all over the place, this way they can share the load over multiple lines and provide redundancy in case a line is down, they can also build extra lines when a certain route starts running out of capacity. During a solar storm, each line would have a different voltage induced, so this would cause large circulating currents to flow in them, causing circuit breakers to start tripping all over the place. If the storm is large enough the breakers might not be able to interrupt the amount of induced voltage, causing them to arc over and destroy themselves.

A lot of the internet would likely survive tho. All the long distance communication lines tend to be fiber or microwave. The datacenters running it have careful earthing and surge protection to prevent lightning from blowing up the expensive equipment. So the storm would likely blow the heck out of the switchgear at the mains power feed, having it switch to UPS power and then to the diesel generators.

But given the widespead failiure of the power grid, the internet would likely not get to you. If you get your internet over the phone line or coax, them your modem is likely on fire right now. If you got fiber then it is likely a repeater or multiplexer somewhere might have died, cellular networks might hold up for a bit until the UPSes in the cell towers run out of power.

[wraper]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

The first satellites that get destroyed will be geostationary satellites  . And as a byproduct of being in geostationary orbit, satellites that lost control will stay there forever as a space junk rather than naturally deorbit in a relatively short time period.

[Dan123456]

I reckon we would be pretty screwed as a species in our current form if we did get directly hit by a big solar flare (I.e. something equivalent to the Carrington Event).

We had one of our telcos go down for not even a day here in Aus recently and just that caused major havoc.

Can you imagine if all the satellites and even a good chunk of anything electronic got fried? Good bye banking, communication, logistics (including food and vital supplies - plus probably a lot of the trucks and cars used to transport it)… it would be an absolute nightmare and there would be no quick fix!

May not be world ending but would definitely cause a lot of deaths and would probably take us years to recover I reckon.

[rteodor]

During a solar storm, each line would have a different voltage induced, so this would cause large circulating currents to flow in them, causing circuit breakers to start tripping all over the place. If the storm is large enough the breakers might not be able to interrupt the amount of induced voltage, causing them to arc over and destroy themselves.

Would an early warning system help ? So that many circuit breakers would be activated in advance and the lines grounded in as many points as possible ?

[Dan123456]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

what's wrong with starlink?

- Irrational dislike of Elon Musk (don't get me wrong, he's a class-A dick, at least on social media, but I don't hate the products his engineers work on;  Starlink is one of those).

Indeed  I despise Musk as have always thought that he is a liar, a con man and an absolute pile of shit of a human being but I do respect and feel sorry for all the workers at his companies!

If he didn’t force them to implement his terrible ideas into their products and just left them to do their jobs I bet SpaceX would be much further along and Tesla could have stayed a leader in electric cars 

[Marco]

The problem is that when the earths magnetic field swings around during the storm it induces a voltage in any long conductor.

Varying the current running in the HVDC wire induces a magnetic field swing too. From the generator's point of view it just adds or subtracts from the load to maintain the same voltage and it ain't much.

If it was inducing gigawatts of power into the circuit, even small lengths of wire would be blowing stuff up. It obviously doesn't. The problem with AC is that for very low frequencies the impedance of the roundtrip circuit is very low, so even small amounts of power can induce large currents and drive the transformer into saturation, HVDC doesn't have frequency dependent impedance.

[wraper]

If he didn’t force them to implement his terrible ideas into their products and just left them to do their jobs I bet SpaceX would be much further along and Tesla could have stayed a leader in electric cars 

Like Blue Origin which so far have shown nothing more than a tiny dick rocket that cannot even reach an orbit despite much better funding? As of Tesla, who then is the leader in electric cars in your opinion?
EDIT: If you think BYD, so far nope in numbers of BEV produced, also look at this  As always smoke and mirrors from CCP. https://www.bloomberg.com/features/2023-china-ev-graveyards/

[Berni]

Would an early warning system help ? So that many circuit breakers would be activated in advance and the lines grounded in as many points as possible ?

Well long enough lines might still potentially develop enough voltage to arc over somewhere, or shorting both ends to ground could potentially induce so much current that it damages something. Tho perhaps the solar event would be over before any of the connections overheat and melt, since they are rather big for the high power lines. Would need to do some actual simulations to find out what would really fail.

In either case the power grid would collapse, so you would have to go trough the lengthy process of a cold restart where they slowly sync the power plants back up and gradually pick up the load.

Varying the current running in the HVDC wire induces a magnetic field swing too. From the generator's point of view it just adds or subtracts from the load to maintain the same voltage and it ain't much.

If it was inducing gigawatts of power into the circuit, even small lengths of wire would be blowing stuff up. It obviously doesn't. The problem with AC is that for very low frequencies the impedance of the roundtrip circuit is very low, so even small amounts of power can induce large currents and drive the transformer into saturation, HVDC doesn't have frequency dependent impedance.

It is not practical to have a isolated DC/DC converter at every substation. Most distribution substations are just a glorified "fuse box" at a gigantic scale, switching the various paths while monitoring and protecting them. Transformers are just used to feed smaller substations or costumers from the main grid connections. So you end up with long pieces of wire that are physically connected to each other, as multiple paths connect together they form a large single turn loop of wire that will pick up a huge current going around it from even the smallest changes in magnetic field trough it.  And even if you had DC, such a isolated DC/DC converter would have some sort of limit on the isolation voltage between the sides, the solar storm might induce voltages exceeding its isolation capability and blowing it up. The induced currents wouldn't flow trough the transformer windings, they would flow in the loop areas formed by the wires forming redundant paths that connect the transformer stations.

AC does make a lot of sense on the big scale of power transmission and oldschool iron transformers are incredibly resilient, yes they can saturate too, but that doesn't destroy a transformer. It just makes it draw a massive current for a bit before the fuses blow and disconnect it.

[Marco]

And even if you had DC, such a isolated DC/DC converter would have some sort of limit on the isolation voltage between the sides

Just Earth all low sides, it doesn't matter. A ground loop in a circuit isn't going to burn the earthing straps, it's not a lot of power except to a transformer based system which can saturate. It's the power from the generators which blew up the transformers after they saturated due to current imbalance, not the power of the earth magnetic field flapping in the solar wind. Wouldn't even happen today with automated protection systems, but a large scale blackout and need for a blackstart would be an immense problem regardless.

[langwadt]

https://www.deseret.com/2023/11/14/23960735/what-is-solar-storm

The sun is beginning to enter a more active time for flares that cause solar storms that can impact the Earth.

As Earth enters this new phase, experts have been discussing how these solar storms could affect modern advancements on the planet and even lead to what a team from George Mason University called an “internet apocalypse.”

“The internet has come of age during a time when the sun has been relatively quiet, and now it’s entering a more active time,” Professor Peter Becker of George Mason University told Fox Weather. “It’s the first time in human history that there’s been an intersection of increased solar activity with our dependence on the internet and our global economic dependence on the internet.”

Do I think is going to be as destructive as they say? I will reply the same way as the Y2K previsions of end of the world.

Yes they will be disruptions, yes probably a ton of old satellites orbiting Earth's will be rendered space junk, specially old stuff from the 80s if there is some still around. But the doom and gloom they are trying to portray? No, absolutely not.

the absolutely massive amount of work that went into preventing Y2K is why didn't become doom and gloom 

[SiliconWizard]

Note that it's still looming for 2100, as some still haven't learned the lesson. Some significant amount of software/firmware still uses only 2 decimal digits to store years in dates.

[langwadt]

Note that it's still looming for 2100, as some still haven't learned the lesson. Some significant amount of software/firmware still uses only 2 decimal digits to store years in dates.

there's also going to be some stuff left with 32bit time running out in 2038

[coppercone2]

could nations take advantage of disabled communications ? we should not allow for a solar storm gap.

[SiliconWizard]

Note that it's still looming for 2100, as some still haven't learned the lesson. Some significant amount of software/firmware still uses only 2 decimal digits to store years in dates.

there's also going to be some stuff left with 32bit time running out in 2038

Yes, due to the epoch time stored as 32-bit. 1970+(2^32-1 seconds). Brilliant.

[SiliconWizard]

could nations take advantage of disabled communications ? we should not allow for a solar storm gap.

We should not allow the sun to have storms. How dare he.

[edpalmer42]

I've always thought that in the case of a big solar storm, damage/loss to connected equipment is nothing more than a nuisance compared to damage to the grid.

If the substations and/or generators are destroyed by arcing or thermal overloads our entire civilization could be in jeopardy.  All this equipment is either customized or manufactured upon order.  How long will it take to manufacture thousands of transformers and tens of thousands of high voltage switches and circuit breakers?  What happens to society in the meantime?  We've already seen what happens during an ordinary storm or a power outage that lasts for a day or two.

It doesn't matter if the manufacturers try to stockpile equipment - they can't afford to stockpile enough.  The same applies to the power companies themselves.

I'm hoping that the power companies are planning for this and are installing equipment today to allow them to make the hard decision to shut down the grid when - not if - they get the warning that a large solar storm is going to hit their area in a day or two.

Many years ago I heard about a newly installed multi-megawatt generator that was undergoing initial testing at a large power station.  Somebody made a mistake and the multi-million dollar generator had to be shipped back to Japan for months of repairs.  Multiply that by hundreds or thousands.

Ed

[Berni]

The damage to the power grid would likely not be that bad.

There are lots of protection systems in place that would start tripping and disconnecting things. So the major pieces of equipment would not sustain damage. But it might blow up some of the switchgear around it when it is disconnecting to protect things.

So we would not be in the dark ages just yet, but a lot of people would certainly be left without power for quite a while as they slowly restart the grid and repair things.

We had one instance of major power grid problems here about a decade ago where a rare weather condition deposited a few centimeters of ice on everything. This includes power lines, making them become a lot heavier and snap. This left a lot of the population without power for at least hours, some areas for days, or some more remote areas even for weeks.

[coppercone2]

idk the power grid seems pretty bootleg. USA had a gigantic power outage in 2000 that lasted for like 3 days because of 1 fault. I assume if you had 100000 faults simultaneously it would be out for a few years

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast_blackout_of_2003

The blackout's proximate cause was a software bug in the alarm system at the control room of FirstEnergy, an Akron, Ohio–based company, which rendered operators unaware of the need to redistribute load after overloaded transmission lines drooped into foliage. What should have been a manageable local blackout cascaded into the collapse of much of the Northeast regional electricity distribution system.

if this thing went down right there would be no software lol

and you would have partially damaged shit that fails sometimes after its rebooted probobly. hard to inspect that much shit, they would have to guess. Like there would be no way to go that various components are gonna totally failed next time it surges slightly because of lightning or whatever. The amount of testing you would need to do for reliability would be insane. It would really suck. And like if underground things break forget about it, the cities would be construction sites for like a decade. like i think there is a potential for a ridiculous global whack a mole game with electrical infrastructure. And if some under sea cables or whatever overload to some areas too.. damn

what you would need like a civil defense corps of electrical workers, something like the national guard to make it go anywhere near smoothly. that means training tons of people in complicated things for a contingency. super crazy

[SiliconWizard]

Don't give people too many ideas.

[jonpaul]

Solar storm effect is Similar to EMP = Electromagnetic Pulse

See the Starfish Prime nuclear test in 1952.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Starfish_Prime

A 1.4  MT burst (exoatmospheric 400 km alt)

https://www.atomicarchive.com/media/photographs/testing/us/fishbowl.html
https://spaceweatherarchive.com/2022/07/08/starfish-prime-the-first-accidental-geomagnetic-storm/


1000s of miles away in Hawaii the electric grid was out and badly damaged.


HAVE AN ABSOLUTELY FANTASTIC DAY!
From an optimist in the Nuclear Age
Jon

[Marco]

EMP affects small circuits with a pulse, disturbance of the radiation belts affects large circuits at very low frequency. The fact a nuclear bomb can do both doesn't make them similar.

[tszaboo]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

The first satellites that get destroyed will be geostationary satellites  . And as a byproduct of being in geostationary orbit, satellites that lost control will stay there forever as a space junk rather than naturally deorbit in a relatively short time period.

Actually, geostationary is a bit of a misnomer, they drift out of it over time. As I recall, they need something like 500m/s per decade DeltaV to stay there, which is not insignificant. You can land on the mun with that much in KSP.

[ejeffrey]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

The first satellites that get destroyed will be geostationary satellites  . And as a byproduct of being in geostationary orbit, satellites that lost control will stay there forever as a space junk rather than naturally deorbit in a relatively short time period.

Actually, geostationary is a bit of a misnomer, they drift out of it over time. As I recall, they need something like 500m/s per decade DeltaV to stay there, which is not insignificant. You can land on the mun with that much in KSP.

They drift due to solar wind, lunar tidal forces, and probably other factors such that they need station keeping to stay within your antenna pattern, but AFAIK, not enough that they get "out" of the geostationary orbital region.  A satellite in the geo band that dies without being moved to a graveyard orbit becomes a navigation hazard for other geostationary satellites basically forever.

[wraper]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

The first satellites that get destroyed will be geostationary satellites  . And as a byproduct of being in geostationary orbit, satellites that lost control will stay there forever as a space junk rather than naturally deorbit in a relatively short time period.

Actually, geostationary is a bit of a misnomer, they drift out of it over time. As I recall, they need something like 500m/s per decade DeltaV to stay there, which is not insignificant. You can land on the mun with that much in KSP.

They need periodic correction not due to deorbiting but because they need to move with the same radial velocity as Earth rotation. So they virtually stay above the same area of Earth surface. If there is some desynchronization, satellite will move to another area where it cannot do its intended service for particular region. Think about it the same way as quartz clocks needing periodic time correction. If you don't correct them, they will still work just fine but eventually will be so much out of sync that become unusable. And as ejeffrey said, there are factors that will get it out of sync.

[langwadt]

The damage to the power grid would likely not be that bad.

There are lots of protection systems in place that would start tripping and disconnecting things. So the major pieces of equipment would not sustain damage. But it might blow up some of the switchgear around it when it is disconnecting to protect things.

So we would not be in the dark ages just yet, but a lot of people would certainly be left without power for quite a while as they slowly restart the grid and repair things.

We had one instance of major power grid problems here about a decade ago where a rare weather condition deposited a few centimeters of ice on everything. This includes power lines, making them become a lot heavier and snap. This left a lot of the population without power for at least hours, some areas for days, or some more remote areas even for weeks.

yeh, imagine trying to cold start the grid with various thing broken and  possibly no or very little communication working either

[SiliconWizard]

We don't have to imagine. We have seen how little things can disrupt our organizations in a major way, talk about a severe solar storm...

[tszaboo]

A Carrington level event might just clean space of all the Stariinkjunk satellites. Silver lining.

The first satellites that get destroyed will be geostationary satellites  . And as a byproduct of being in geostationary orbit, satellites that lost control will stay there forever as a space junk rather than naturally deorbit in a relatively short time period.

Actually, geostationary is a bit of a misnomer, they drift out of it over time. As I recall, they need something like 500m/s per decade DeltaV to stay there, which is not insignificant. You can land on the mun with that much in KSP.

They need periodic correction not due to deorbiting but because they need to move with the same radial velocity as Earth rotation. So they virtually stay above the same area of Earth surface. If there is some desynchronization, satellite will move to another area where it cannot do its intended service for particular region. Think about it the same way as quartz clocks needing periodic time correction. If you don't correct them, they will still work just fine but eventually will be so much out of sync that become unusable. And as ejeffrey said, there are factors that will get it out of sync.

These aren't unexpected desynchronizations. What you described here only works in a two body model, where both objects are spherical. Other planets, the moon will pull it out of the orbit, and the Earth isn't uniformic spere. Most satellites would end up in an inclined orbit, and they need to regularly correct the orbit to "stay in place". But on a really long term timescale, they would totally end up somewhere unexpected.

[wraper]

These aren't unexpected desynchronizations. What you described here only works in a two body model, where both objects are spherical. Other planets, the moon will pull it out of the orbit, and the Earth isn't uniformic spere. Most satellites would end up in an inclined orbit, and they need to regularly correct the orbit to "stay in place". But on a really long term timescale, they would totally end up somewhere unexpected.

I said nothing that would indicate only two bodies, and I said nothing about it being unexpected. And yes other sources of gravity do impact their orbit. What I essentially said is that geostationary satellites must be much more precise with their orbit compared to the vast majority of other satellites. LEO satellites on other hand must periodically lift their orbit just to not deorbit relatively quickly and eventually burn into atmosphere. Geostationary satellites while will slowly drift out of their intended orbit, they will never deorbit (to Earth). In other words geostationary satellites need to periodically correct their orbit to be able to do their job but LEO satellites need to lift their orbit just to not fall down.

[coppercone2]

[David Hess]

AC does make a lot of sense on the big scale of power transmission and oldschool iron transformers are incredibly resilient, yes they can saturate too, but that doesn't destroy a transformer. It just makes it draw a massive current for a bit before the fuses blow and disconnect it.

Yet there are plenty of incidents were the transformers did get destroyed.  With minor geomagnetic events, the transformer may only be damaged and self destruct weeks to months later.  Maybe fuses and circuit breakers can protect the transformers, but that has not generally been the case so far.

[Marco]

The power of the inertia has to go somewhere, just measuring the input current or temperature could be too slow.

Trying to detect the low frequency current will probably give you earlier warning.

[Berni]

AC does make a lot of sense on the big scale of power transmission and oldschool iron transformers are incredibly resilient, yes they can saturate too, but that doesn't destroy a transformer. It just makes it draw a massive current for a bit before the fuses blow and disconnect it.

Yet there are plenty of incidents were the transformers did get destroyed.  With minor geomagnetic events, the transformer may only be damaged and self destruct weeks to months later.  Maybe fuses and circuit breakers can protect the transformers, but that has not generally been the case so far.

Well yes transformers do fail here and there just like any equipment. The extra stress of a solar storm would certainly up the failure rate, especially on units that are already close to failing and just need an extra nudge to finally give up the ghost.

Just saying that it wouldn't be as spectacular as some make it sound where the solar storm would cause most transformers in the grid to suddenly catastrophically fail along with blowing up all the generators in power plants. Yes there would certainly be damage, but most of the transformers should survive just fine, also most of the damage being to switch gear around them (that is easier to replace).

There would certainly be a massive outage, but not like we would have to go rewind all the transformers and generators. It is the copper based communication networks that would have the sensitive electronics on each end blown to beyond repair.

[Andy Chee]

Trying to detect the low frequency current will probably give you earlier warning.

The normal way to detect coronal mass ejections is by placing a monitoring satellite at the Sun-Earth Lagrange point L1. This should give a few minutes of warning to isolate sections of the grid, or indeed shut down the grid gracefully.

[tszaboo]

These aren't unexpected desynchronizations. What you described here only works in a two body model, where both objects are spherical. Other planets, the moon will pull it out of the orbit, and the Earth isn't uniformic spere. Most satellites would end up in an inclined orbit, and they need to regularly correct the orbit to "stay in place". But on a really long term timescale, they would totally end up somewhere unexpected.

I said nothing that would indicate only two bodies, and I said nothing about it being unexpected. And yes other sources of gravity do impact their orbit. What I essentially said is that geostationary satellites must be much more precise with their orbit compared to the vast majority of other satellites. LEO satellites on other hand must periodically lift their orbit just to not deorbit relatively quickly and eventually burn into atmosphere. Geostationary satellites while will slowly drift out of their intended orbit, they will never deorbit (to Earth). In other words geostationary satellites need to periodically correct their orbit to be able to do their job but LEO satellites need to lift their orbit just to not fall down.

I think both of us are trying to explain something to someone, who has a very good understanding of the issue.

[AndyBeez]

Briefly.

The mechanism that kills LEO satellites during a major   GMS is atmospheric drag. During periods of high solar activity, the very tenuous upper atmosphere expands, due to heating. Not enough of an increase to measure on a barometer, but enough to drag on a satellite's orbital circumstances. Even the ISS has to correct for atmospheric drag.

A nice explanation: https://www.hko.gov.hk/en/education/space-weather/effects-of-space-weather/00427-atmospheric-drag-on-the-motion-of-satellites.html

Solar storms also destroy the efficiency of solar panels.
As for Clark Belt satellites, even a minor GMS will 'electrify' the body, turning it into a giant charged capacitor. Internal ESD is an issue.

[Marco]

The normal way to detect coronal mass ejections is by placing a monitoring satellite at the Sun-Earth Lagrange point L1. This should give a few minutes of warning to isolate sections of the grid, or indeed shut down the grid gracefully.

That's likely going to be too conservative. It's not like the entire earth responds the same, sometimes you are just in a nice symmetrical spot where nothing happens.

[coppercone2]

[Andy Chee]

That's likely going to be too conservative. It's not like the entire earth responds the same, sometimes you are just in a nice symmetrical spot where nothing happens.

For a start, this technique is currently in use today right now.

But it’s not a direct link between satellite and grid protection circuitry as you seem to be guessing. There is definitely human(s) in the process interpreting satellite telemetry on a daily basis and then giving the space weather report to the grid operator. The grid operator then decides what the shut down plan is, if anything.

Basically it is analogous to weather stations predicting future forecasts, so that wind turbine operators can furl their blades in advance preparation of a hurricane/tornado.

[Marco]

Where did they black out in anticipation of a solar storm disturbance?

[coppercone2]

atlantis does it

[Andy Chee]

Where did they black out in anticipation of a solar storm disturbance?

Since the first Lagrangian solar observatory was launched in 1996, we haven’t had a strong enough solar storm to warrant grid shut down.

A new solar observatory is due to arrive at the Lagrangian point next year.

Whilst the L1 Lagrangian point is relevant for direct earth impact, there are several other solar observatories in different orbits giving a wide view of the sun’s solar behaviour.

Yes, CME remains unpredictable. But unlike an unpredictable earthquake, the vast distance between Sun and earth offers us some reaction time.

[Marco]

I'm sceptical. AFAICS just the modeling of generator response to bias current is very recent, with models for regional bias current prediction from solar observation at the conceptual stage. When I read stuff like "There is no commercial product dedicated to GIC measurement." in a 2021 paper I'm going to say the industry isn't quite ready. Certainly not to the point of responding to space weather forecasts with a blackout.

You need good estimates for bias current limits for every generator on the grid, you need good bias current measurement systems everywhere to calibrate a model with and then maybe if you're lucky and the observations gives you high reliability model to predict the currents you can use it to black out regions. I don't think they are there.

PS. I suspect the models will have too poor predictive value to be used for a blackout decision.

[Andy Chee]

I'm going to say the industry isn't quite ready. Certainly not to the point of responding to space weather forecasts with a blackout.

You need good estimates for bias current limits for every generator on the grid, you need good bias current measurement systems everywhere to calibrate a model with and then maybe if you're lucky and the observations gives you high reliability model to predict the currents you can use it to black out regions. I don't think they are there.

PS. I suspect the models will have too poor predictive value to be used for a blackout decision.

You're correct about long range forecast of solar weather, the modelling is nowhere near ready for a planned shutdown (e.g. analogous to the nightly news 7-day weather forecast).

However, the observatory located at L1 can be used to give advance warning for an emergency shutdown (in the order of a few minutes).  As I said, since the L1 observatory was launched in 1996, there hasn't been a strong enough storm to test the fast reflexes of grid operators.

For example, a fast CME takes 15 hours to reach earth.  Sun to earth distance is 147 million kms.  L1 to earth distance is 1.5 million kms.  When a massive CME is detected at L1, that means it will be 100% guaranteed to hit earth in 9 minutes time.

What can grid operators do in 9 minutes?  Not much I would've thought!  Fortunately, most CME usually takes days to reach earth, not hours, which gives grid operators even more time to react to L1 detection.

[Marco]

If it's truly catastropic, they might be liable to prepare to shutdown (though I doubt they will actually do it till the first grid shuts down without manual intervention).

If it's only slightly superior to March 1989, everyone is just going to wait and see.

[Psi]

It's very hard speculate on the damage, or mitigation needed, without deciding on the exact level of solar storm we're talking about.
The problem with that is the really big solar storms happened too long ago to have much useful technical info recorded about them.

We know people were getting arcs and shocks off metal objects in the street, like light poles etc, due to voltage induced in overhead lines, but we don't know if those arcs were like 3mm or 30mm long. 
Modern electronics can handle some surges and small HV arcs but only too a point and not continuously. Solar storms can last for hours.

If you had enough warning to flip your main house breaker off and unplug any copper phone lines you would at least be somewhat protected, so long as the voltage couldn't arc over the breaker, but I'd expect all that induced power to take the easier path of going through every other house that didn't have their main breaker tripped. Rather than getting high enough to arc over your breaker.

[Marco]

It won't generally induce significant voltage on the mains. The cables from distribution transformer to homes are too short (or in my case, buried) and the distribution transformer doesn't pass DC unless things go catastrophically wrong. I'd say that if the distribution transformer does pass DC due to a solar storm you probably need to be in a bunker.

[coppercone2]

if you get a shock off a metal object on the street why on earth wont the long wire be energized? I assume that means people found that mailboxes and signs were arcing (if they had metal signs)

[johansen]

Allegedly most of the high voltage long distance transformers are delta and will not be affected by 10 volts per mile of dc on either end


The rest of the grid with grounded Y transformers, the issue is the electrical metering equipment is not setup to measure dc current, so the transformer saturates and the grid does not even notice the extra load, and what happens is the transformer catches fire internally. Not due to failure of conductors due to overcurrent, but by the saturated transformer overheating steel components located near the core, which normally have very minimal magnetic flux flowing around them.

Us congress investigated this extensively for many years and you can read the reports that concluded that about 50 million bucks for the 1,000 largest substations is all it would cost to cut the neutral, install a capacitor and lightning spark gap.

[coppercone2]

does anyone have the first hand anecdotes about voltage? because if metal objects in the 1800's are arcing, thats pretty small stuff. 10 v per mile does not sound like it could cause citizens to see random arcs

[johansen]

does anyone have the first hand anecdotes about voltage? because if metal objects in the 1800's are arcing, thats pretty small stuff. 10 v per mile does not sound like it could cause citizens to see random arcs

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carrington_Event

10 volts per mile also depends on how high the line is off the ground and what direction its run, that's the highest number i've seen anyone suggest is possible.

10 volts per mile is not enough to melt anything. it will not destroy anything.. the issue has always been transformers saturating because they are grounded on both ends. cut the ground, problem solved.

[NiHaoMike]

Now the question is how to get the utilities to do it. Remember how PG&E neglected to do maintenance which led to some forest fires?

[Psi]

does anyone have the first hand anecdotes about voltage? because if metal objects in the 1800's are arcing, thats pretty small stuff. 10 v per mile does not sound like it could cause citizens to see random arcs

There was conflicting and odd reports with no real way to know what is true vs not.

So, as with most things like this it is looked at, after the fact, with a filter on of...
"what actually makes sense given what we know about the subject" and any reports that go against that tend to be ignored or treated as false.
Which may be correct, but is not a certainty.

Like there were reports of people getting shocks from door knobs.  Which really makes zero sense given what we know about CMEs and induced voltages, given how small a door knob is.  Did that actually happen often, or was it just one door knob at a telegraph office somewhere, or is there some mechanism at play that we're not aware of.

[SeanB]

Most high voltage power lines have ground fault detection, generally provided by having a Peterson transformer connected to provide a Y connection to ground, and a great big inductor in series with the tap, so that any fault to ground will cause a voltage drop across this coil. AC or DC plus AC, not really any difference, as the current flowing in the coil as a result of imbalance will pull in a solenoid, and close a contact to the SCADA system of the line, telling of a ground fault. Might take 5 seconds to respond, so as to ignore transients, as the voltage will kind of self clear the general fault, by flash cooking the big bird or errant tree branch, or the metal kite string somebody flew into the power line. But a prolonged fault will trip out the line, and, so long as the sending end and receiving end still have power available, they can be commanded remotely, using the fibre networks most utilities have now, run along the middle cable of the long transmission lines as they have no need then to do any EIA report on installation, and also it is easy to install, as they have the equipment and pulleys to draw along the line, and droop down by pylons to follow the existing cable, and then tie off to the existing as well. Long lines will have issues, unless they are HVDC, which already have DC fault blocking and detection, and long AC lines will merely need a few minutes notice to cut power, island the power plants to local generation supply only, and thus not need them to go offline fully, but keep a low spinning load, and run with a largish circulating current instead, excess supplying local loads. Otherwise you need to black start them, and most power plants cannot do this, they need power to run.

By me not an issue, 15 years of rotational load shedding means there is a pretty robust system of alternative power already, thanks to this. USA and Europe has never really had this except short term over relatively small areas, but by me being without power a quarter of the time is somewhat accepted to be normal.

[coppercone2]

I recall reading somewhere of arcing from a scaffolding on a building. no idea wtf that was from. i think they said it had something to do with stars or bombs

maybe it was some survival manual saying to stay away from large metal objects like buildings under construction. or some news story.

[Marco]

Us congress investigated this extensively for many years and you can read the reports that concluded that about 50 million bucks for the 1,000 largest substations is all it would cost to cut the neutral, install a capacitor and lightning spark gap.

I don't think spark gap works. Once it starts arcing it's a short and then what's point? Can't they just handle it by programming a TCSC a little differently? Let bias voltage build up on the capacitor and use the thyristors to bleed off some voltage when necessary (or rather, one of the two).

[coppercone2]

I think the confusion is with HEMP. I am reading that its alot worse. So the carington event was like a little hemp.

[EPAIII]

Thunder? Do you mean lightning? Thunder is just a lot of noise.

Without a large blackout I don't see how it should affect internet.

It could affect modems and other equipment when the blast is strong enough. It is not just about voltage induced in cables. In early days the telegraph system suffered from it, and it could disrupt a lot more with nowadays electronics.

Think of thunder, when it hits close enough to your house it can destroy every electronic device in your house even when they are not connected to a power outlet or a cable for TV or internet.

[Marco]

Even in countries with overhead phone lines, the last mile is mostly very short relative to telegraph lines of old and are twisted pair. Open voltage and short circuit current won't be any where near what they were for telegraphs and are for the grid. Next to nothing. With buried cable it will be even more next to nothing.

[johansen]

Us congress investigated this extensively for many years and you can read the reports that concluded that about 50 million bucks for the 1,000 largest substations is all it would cost to cut the neutral, install a capacitor and lightning spark gap.

I don't think spark gap works. Once it starts arcing it's a short and then what's point? Can't they just handle it by programming a TCSC a little differently? Let bias voltage build up on the capacitor and use the thyristors to bleed off some voltage when necessary (or rather, one of the two).

Spark gap is to discharge lightning transients

[coppercone2]

what is this telephone line. you mean a shielded coaxial cable or  fiber line?

[Psi]

Even in countries with overhead phone lines, the last mile is mostly very short relative to telegraph lines of old and are twisted pair. Open voltage and short circuit current won't be any where near what they were for telegraphs and are for the grid. Next to nothing. With buried cable it will be even more next to nothing.

That is a fair point.

[Marco]

what is this telephone line. you mean a shielded coaxial cable or  fiber line?

Pcprogrammer mentioned modems, so I assumed he meant ADSL. Guess there's cable modem too, either way not going to be much induced current. Earth return telegraph makes a nice big loop for the magnetic field to play with, twisted pair and coax not so much.

[Psi]

I wonder if anything else might cause a problem that we don't really think of as electrical.
Miles and Miles of underground metal water pipes for example.

[Dan123456]

I wonder if anything else might cause a problem that we don't really think of as electrical.
Miles and Miles of underground metal water pipes for example.

That’s a really good point actually!

I’m just imagining the poor souls on a train if it were to happen as they could be sitting on 1000’s of kms of track 

[NiHaoMike]

I’m just imagining the poor souls on a train if it were to happen as they could be sitting on 1000’s of kms of track 

Nothing would happen inside the train, it's an enclosed metal box. Things might get more interesting when loading or unloading the train but I would expect there to already be a system to detect a large voltage between the (grounded) rail and ground which might arise from an electrical fault. (Besides the many systems that use a rail for power, I assume most overhead systems use the rail for return? Having an additional overhead line adds maintenance costs.)

[Marco]

The tracks are earthed, the only real problem is transformer saturation same as grid.

[audiotubes]

As Earth enters this new phase, experts have been discussing how these solar storms could affect modern advancements on the planet and even lead to what a team from George Mason University called an “internet apocalypse.”

Probably after the sheeple recover (is that too much to hope for?) from rotting green deals and climate crisis (yawn) there needs to be a new global threat. Without that, there is no new funding, no new government agencies, no new legislation etc.

We can't allow that to happen! 

[SiliconWizard]

As Earth enters this new phase, experts have been discussing how these solar storms could affect modern advancements on the planet and even lead to what a team from George Mason University called an “internet apocalypse.”

Probably after the sheeple recover (is that too much to hope for?) from rotting green deals and climate crisis (yawn) there needs to be a new global threat. Without that, there is no new funding, no new government agencies, no new legislation etc.

We can't allow that to happen! 

 

[VK3DRB]

When a Carrington Event happens again, it is all over folks. You won't be able to buy food, fuel, get your cash out of the bank, get the news. The west will fall into chaos. If is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when. The world will take at least 20 years to recover, and it won't be the same. On the positive side, you won't need to repay your mortgage.

Think about it.

[pickle9000]

My furniture should be ok. So I'm good.

[Dan123456]

While not a major one, it could be interesting to see what this one does over the next couple of days.

https://www.swpc.noaa.gov/news/g1-g2-minor-moderate-geomagnetic-storm-watches-16-17-dec-2023

[lezginka_kabardinka]

“Experts”

…. Next.

[Psi]

When a Carrington Event happens again, it is all over folks. You won't be able to buy food, fuel, get your cash out of the bank, get the news. The west will fall into chaos. If is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when. The world will take at least 20 years to recover, and it won't be the same. On the positive side, you won't need to repay your mortgage.

Think about it.

I don't think a Carrington level event happening now would be quite that bad, maybe on the same scale as 1x-3x of what COVID was in terms of disruptions to society.
However the Carrington event was just a big'ish one we know about, it's very likely much bigger ones can and do occur less frequently.
1 in 1000 year storm vs 1 in 10,000 vs 1 in 100,000 etc..


It kinda depends how well the government can cope with the rapid law changes needed to stop things spiraling out of control as one failure starts to cause other things to fall like dominos
Smaller countries with governments that can respond quickly to change will be much better off.
Countries with higher levels of government corruption and less public trust in government will be less well off.

[johansen]

When a Carrington Event happens again, it is all over folks. You won't be able to buy food, fuel, get your cash out of the bank, get the news. The west will fall into chaos. If is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when. The world will take at least 20 years to recover, and it won't be the same. On the positive side, you won't need to repay your mortgage.

Think about it.

I don't think a Carrington level event happening now would be quite that bad, maybe on the same scale as 1x-3x of what COVID was in terms of disruptions to society.
However the Carrington event was just a big'ish one we know about, it's very likely much bigger ones can and do occur less frequently.
1 in 1000 year storm vs 1 in 10,000 vs 1 in 100,000 etc..


It kinda depends how well the government can cope with the rapid law changes needed to stop things spiraling out of control as one failure starts to cause other things to fall like dominos
Smaller countries with governments that can respond quickly to change will be much better off.
Countries with higher levels of government corruption and less public trust in government will be less well off.

there is enough fiber infrastructure which will not be damaged, to keep the power grid up.

[Psi]

When a Carrington Event happens again, it is all over folks. You won't be able to buy food, fuel, get your cash out of the bank, get the news. The west will fall into chaos. If is not a matter of if, it is a matter of when. The world will take at least 20 years to recover, and it won't be the same. On the positive side, you won't need to repay your mortgage.

Think about it.

I don't think a Carrington level event happening now would be quite that bad, maybe on the same scale as 1x-3x of what COVID was in terms of disruptions to society.
However the Carrington event was just a big'ish one we know about, it's very likely much bigger ones can and do occur less frequently.
1 in 1000 year storm vs 1 in 10,000 vs 1 in 100,000 etc..


It kinda depends how well the government can cope with the rapid law changes needed to stop things spiraling out of control as one failure starts to cause other things to fall like dominos
Smaller countries with governments that can respond quickly to change will be much better off.
Countries with higher levels of government corruption and less public trust in government will be less well off.

there is enough fiber infrastructure which will not be damaged, to keep the power grid up.

Not really sure what you mean by that.

 

[vad]

The issue is exaggerated. It takes several days for charged particles to journey from the Sun to Earth, offering sufficient warning to disconnect critical infrastructure, including generators, transformers, and critical loads, from transmission lines.

[Marco]

As I've said before they don't have a clue how bad the impact will be, no one is going to pre-emptively shut down until the transformer temperature rises.

[SiliconWizard]

With about 30 minutes of advance warning, with the current models, apparently: https://www.nasa.gov/science-research/heliophysics/nasa-enabled-ai-predictions-may-give-time-to-prepare-for-solar-storms/
Or (even though they don't talk about that), maybe the models can predict with a bit more advance that a solar storm will hit Earth altogether, without predicting exactly where. In which case, that would mean shutting down everything on the whole planet for hours or maybe days until something happens. Either way, that would probably not be real fun.

[coppercone2]

that is the benefits of a advanced deep space satellite network

keep something between the sun and the earth at 2/3, 1/2 and 1/4 way to issue a signal

[Marco]

They can predict something hitting, they can't predict the per transformer induced GIC (depends on the exact reshaping of Earth magnetic field, local soil, orientation of lines, in-line capacitors etc) or how sensitive those transformers are (should long have been a design spec, but wasn't). With so little predictive value, I can't see many operators shutting down pre-emptively.

[coppercone2]

probobly easier to stockpile liquor and rice then get the power company to specify something because of space