Home » Posts tagged 'grid loss' (Page 2)

Tag Archives: grid loss

The largest solar storm in recent history struck in 1859 and the auroras could be seen across the globe. But a solar storm of that magnitude today would cause devastating blackouts in major cities on the East Coast of the United States.

An upcoming report from the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) warns that a region of the Eastern Seaboard will be particularly vulnerable to devastating blackouts in the event of a solar storm thanks to the rocks beneath the surface. It’s widely believed that the type of geomagnetic storm capable of wiping out the grid happens once every century, but a worst-case scenario might result in widespread blackouts that could last for months, the Space Weather Prediction Center told Bloomberg.

According to Bloomberg, the soon-to-be-released report found a 300-million-year-old rock beneath the surface of the Eastern Seaboard could amplify the next big solar storm from Washington D.C. all the way to Maine. The makeup of this rock wouldn’t allow the solar energy to go through it and would instead ricochet it back up to the surface, doubling the impacts in this region, the report also said.

But that isn’t the only problem facing those who live on the East Coast. According to USGS research geophysicist and study lead author Jeffrey Love, the Eastern Seaboard is at risk for blackouts not only due to its abundance of insulating rocks but also due to the region’s proximity to the North Pole, where intense solar activity is most likely to strike.

“It’s an active problem that a lot of people are trying to solve and understand,” Space Weather Prediction Center scientist Christopher Balch told Bloomberg, according to The Weather Channel.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Puerto Rico: Hurricane destroyed wind, solar. Plus five months on, 15% still blacked out.

February 28, 2018

Puerto Rico: Hurricane destroyed wind, solar. Plus five months on, 15% still blacked out.

In South Australia, when the lights went out, Olympic Dam took two entire weeks to get operational again. Spare a thought for those in Puerto Rico. Right now, five months later, and one in 6 still don’t have electricity. That’s five full months of blackout – surviving off candles, car batteries, small diesels and whatever anyone can get. Some people will be waiting til May. Though that’s “95%” connected, so still no joy or lights, for one in 20 people. How do you put a roof back on your house when you can’t even power up your drill? (See The Atlantics photo montage from January 27th to get some idea of what life is like, months after the storm).

Puerto Rico has 3.6 million people, was poor and corrupt, with failing infrastructure and huge debts before Hurricane Maria hit on Sept 20th. The government has a budget of $10b per year, but owes more than $70b. The hurricane wiped out 80% of the infrastructure, completely trashing some of the solar and wind “farms”, and bringing down transmission lines.

The remains of one solar plant:

Solar Panels, damaged, Puerto Rico, Hurricane Maria.

…

See the complete destruction here:

Brett Adair with Live Storms Media

One wind farm that survived the hurricane sat idle for weeks because there was no grid running and a wind farm can’t start a grid up (so much for microgrid resilience). Puerto Rico Electric Power Authority, or PREPA had oil powered generation plants which were 44 years old on average, and not surprisingly (with no access to coal or nuclear power) the people paid very high electricity rates. Government entities and a few chosen private industries got it for free though.

Puerto Rico in the Caribbean was right in the path.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Chaz Peling: Backup Power Solutions

September 25, 2017

Chaz Peling: Backup Power Solutions

Be prepared if the lights suddenly go out

Over the past month, the Americas have sustained extensive damage from 3 major Atlantic hurricanes and 2 major earthquakes in Mexico. In terms of destroyed houses and businesses, ruined cars, and lost lives, it has been an extremely costly couple of weeks.

One common factor present in the aftermath of each of these disasters has been the loss of electrical power. Harvey knocked out power for 250,000 people. Irma topped 4 million. Maria has deprived 3.5 million people of electricity in Puerto Rico alone. The earthquakes in Mexico City and Oaxaca resulted in blackouts for well over 5 million.

Without electricity, our capability to conduct our modern way of life becomes immediately and severely curtailed. Communication instantly stops. Food quickly spoils. Sundown puts an end to all activity. Air conditioning and water well pumps no longer function.

And as prolonged blackouts often go hand-in-hand with gas shortages, disaster victims are often truly forced into a “dark ages” lifestyle.

This week, Chaz Peling, founder of Sol Solutions, joins the podcast to share his expertise on residential backup power options. The good news is that recent technology advancements offer more robust and affordable solutions than ever before. The bad news is, you have to invest the effort to procure an install them in advance ofthe next crisis for them to be of use.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

FEMA Is Preparing For A Solar Storm That Would Take Out The Grid

June 23, 2017

FEMA Is Preparing For A Solar Storm That Would Take Out The Grid

power-grid1

FEMA (Federal Emergency Management Administration) is planning for a massive solar storm that would be so strong, it would take down the power grid. Noting that the rare, yet “high-consequence” scenario has “the potential for catastrophic impact on our nation and FEMA’s ability to respond.”

According to unpublished FEMA documents obtained by Government Attic, a FOIA (Freedom of Information Act) database and non-profit organization, the Department of Homeland Security agency once mapped out a disaster plan for the occurrence of another geomagnetic “super storm” like the one the occurred in 1859.

Back then, the sun flung a giant plume of magnetized plasma out into space. The coronal mass ejection (CME), the sibling of a massive solar flare, traveled the 93 million miles between the Sun and Earth in only 17.6 hours. Today, it’s known as the Carrington Event and is remembered by the largest geomagnetic storm in the history of recorded space weather.

No other storm has matched it in speed or magnitude. When the shock wave of accelerated particles arrived on September 1, 1859, the disturbances to Earth’s magnetosphere were so great that telegraph communications across Europe and North America went on the fritz. Sparks leaped from the telegraph infrastructure, and machinery was so inundated with electric currents that operators were able to transmit messages while disconnected from battery power. Compasses even wiggled, and brilliant auroras were reportedly seen as far south as the Caribbean.

But that doesn’t mean the ill-equipped government isn’t preparing for the inevitability, in fact, they are. Despite our superior ability to predict these events, the stakes are exponentially higher in a modern, hyper-connected world. FEMA predicts that a geomagnetic storm of this intensity would be “a catastrophe in slow motion.”

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Prepping With Herbs – Tips For Better Health Now And After The Grid Goes Down

March 6, 2016

Prepping With Herbs – Tips For Better Health Now And After The Grid Goes Down

My wife and I have for some time been researching and attempting to approach the issue of medicine in our preparedness. There are several websites that are dedicated to grid down medicine from a preparedness mindset. The information and instruction many of these sites offer are just as important as your water, food, and safety preps. There is the option of ordering medicines in powder form that are produced for exotic fish. No prescription required and available in bulk. This is a great source of antibiotics. I know of doctors who are aware of the dangers that we face in society today that will write prescriptions (non-pain meds) with an extra refill for their patients to put back. If you are one of these people that think this is unethical and illegal, you just go ahead and sign up for Obamacare and wait for the government to come and rescue you and everything will be okay.

The above-mentioned ideas are great and should be implemented into your preps. The encouraging thing that my family faced in looking into medicines is that everyone in our household is currently healthy and not required to take any medication on a regular basis. Those that rely on medicines have to deal with a different set of circumstances. We were also curious about the regular over the counter preventative medicines that we sometimes consume. Medicines for basic ailments such as colds, flu, sore throat, headache, etc… Yes we could just purchase some of these medicines and stock them, but we wanted to get away from anything mass produced by a pharmaceutical company. We are not anti-doctor, but we do avoid any doctors who just want to subscribe multiple pills to take when we get sick.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

These People Were Prepared During Snow Storm Jonas, But They Died Because of This Mistake

January 27, 2016

These People Were Prepared During Snow Storm Jonas, But They Died Because of This Mistake

winter-storm-prepping

Lessons from the massive snow storm Jonas, where at least 48 people have been reported killed, are important to take away here for future prepping in our quickly declining and increasingly vulnerable society.

The use of martial law to shut down travel, including air traffic and highways, is now standard issue for major cities – like those on the East Coast that were hit hard by record snow levels.

The storm itself caused less damage than responders and authorities expected to deal with, but the media delivered a stern warning coupled with significant fear. This snow storm was forecast to be the worst in history, and most people hunkered down as they were instructed.

Grocery shelves were quickly emptied, and people started a last minute hoarding days ahead in accordance with the weather reportage.

And the power went out for hundreds of thousands of residents…

Tens of thousands of customers are still without power but service has been restored to many hit hard by the storm.

In the Carolinas, utilities reported about 50,000 customers without power… 20,000 are still without power in New Jersey, down from about 58,000 on Saturday night.

Most service was back on in Washington, D.C., Maryland and Virginia, where more than 50,000 had lost power. In Georgia, about 600 customers were still waiting for service — down from more than 125,000.

But the power outage itself was to be expected. Most of the service was restored relatively quickly after a day or two. Pretty routine, but it definitely could have been worse. If Washington or New York had been without power for several days, there would be instant rioting and looting. This much is understood.

In this case, the power outages didn’t cause much damage directly, but indirectly it caused the death of one elderly couple.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Preparedness Tip: Cooking Without Power, Part 1

September 20, 2015

Preparedness Tip: Cooking Without Power, Part 1

Thanks to a reliable power grid Americans aren’t used to the “lights going out” often, but when they do many are surprised to also lose their cooking means—stovetop elements, ovens, microwaves, toasters, and coffeemakers. Everything Americans use on a daily basis for food preparation needs a plug. Even gas stoves rely on power to light the burners (a few gas ranges have battery-powered igniters). In the coming hard times power will be down for at least several months and possibly several years depending on your area.

Worse, the best retreat sites are in rural areas which won’t merit priority for restoring power. Even natural gas, which relies on electric power to operate its pipelines and distribution, will fail—unless your service is one of the few that use natural gas generators to keep pumps going.

A 1000 gallon propane tank is the easiest way to store a lot of cooking fuel: it is cheap, lasts indefinitely and is easy to put in and have filled. Propane is cheapest in the summer so get enough propane on-site that you can go a whole year without having to dip into your reserves—preferably several hundred gallons.

If you need to get another tank as backup now is a good time—propane prices have been so cheap recently, you can install another tank for 1/3 the cost. Connect both tanks together with an isolation valve between them so a leak in one doesn’t empty both tanks.

Even if you have natural gas, it is worth getting propane as a backup. You can buy replacement jet nozzles for all your natural gas appliances like the stove, oven, dryer and water heater and convert to run on propane. Many modern gas appliances already also have an “LP” (liquid propane) attachment point and have two sizes of jets inside, so switching over is easy.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

How to Prep for a Summer Power Outage

July 3, 2015

How to Prep for a Summer Power Outage

Sometimes people think that a sumer power outage is easier to deal with than a winter one. After all, in the summer, you don’t have to worry about freezing to death, which is a very real threat during a long-lasting winter outage.

However, a summer power outage carries its own set of problems. Foremost are heat-related illnesses and the higher potential of spoilage for your food.

Even if you aren’t convinced that hardcore preparedness is for you, it would still be difficult to argue against the possibility of a disaster that takes out the power for a couple of weeks. Basic emergency preparedenss is important for everyone, not just us “crazy preppers.”

Just ask the people who lived through the Derecho of 2012 how unpleasant it was. Severe, fast-moving thunderstorms (called derechos) swept through Indiana, Ohio, Virginia, West Virginia, Pennsylvania, Maryland, New Jersey, and Washington DC. Millions lost power, an estimated 4 million for an entire week. As if a week-long power outage wasn’t miserable enough, that part of the country was in the midst of a record-setting heatwave during the time period.

Also keep in mind that summer stresses our fragile power grid to the max, as everyone increases their usage of electricity to try and keep cool with air conditioners and fans. This ups the chances of an outage even when there’s not a cloud in the sky.

Back in 2003, a software bug caused an extremely widespread power outage in the middle of August. It was a very hot day, and increased energy demand overloaded the system. Because of the issue with the software, engineers were not alerted of this, and what should have been a small local outage turned into an event that took out power for over 10 million Canadians and 45 million Americans. I remember this one clearly because the little sub shop beside my workplace gave away all the perishable food that they had out at the time before it spoiled and I took home fresh sandwiches for my girls’ dinner that night. We sweated uncomfortably through the next two days until the power was restored.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Former CIA Director: We’re Not Doing Nearly Enough To Protect Against The EMP Threat

June 8, 2015

Former CIA Director: We’re Not Doing Nearly Enough To Protect Against The EMP Threat

It’s a BIG risk. And we’re doing little about it.

On Monday we covered the release of an open letter written to President Obama, issued by a committee of notable political, security and defense experts — which includes past and present members of Congress, ambassadors, CIA directors, and others — on the country’s concerning level of vulnerability to a natural or man-made Electro-Magnetic Pulse (EMP).

An EMP has very real potential for crippling much of our electrical grid instantaneously. Not only would that immediately throw the social order into chaos, but the timeline to repair and restart the grid in most estimated scenarios would take months to a year or more. Those curious on learning exactly how devastating an EMP can be can read our report on the topic from last summer.

This week, we’ve been fortunate enough to get several of the authors of that open letter to join us and explain in depth what they conclude needs to be done to protect against the EMP risk: former CIA Director and current Ambassador James Woolsey, Executive Director of the EMP Task Force Dr Peter Pry, and security industry entrepreneur Jen Bawden.

What’s frightening in this story is not just the carnage an EMP could wreak, but the apparent rabid intransigence with which the electrical power lobby is fighting any responsibility for defending against one:

Chris Martenson: Now, we’ve had a commission to assess the threat to the United States from an EMP attack, which delivered a report back in 2008. In fact, I found no less than two congressional commissions, a National Academy of Science report, other U.S. government sponsored studies, including your own. All have raised heightened concerns about this issue. All have found, all of them, that the EMP threat poses a significant and existential threat to the United States, and yet here we are still talking about this. Why is that?

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Is There Something Behind the Power Outage in Washington DC?

April 10, 2015

Is There Something Behind the Power Outage in Washington DC?

The April 7th, 2015 power outage in Washington DC is curious to say the least. Virtually instantaneously, the government declare it was not a terrorist attack. After all, how could that possibly be when the NSA guards the country. If there was an attack on the power-grid, then the NSA would have to answer for their failure. So clearly, if it was an attack, they would never admit it.

Instead, this has been attributed to a piece of metal breaking loose from a power line 43 miles southeast of the District of Columbia, which knocked out electricity to the White House, State Department and wide area including parts of Maryland. Can a simple piece of metal break and shut down that much power of a strategic area as DC? That seems to be an excuse like some drunk driver knocked over a power pole.

Only six days before Obama had to switch to emergency power was on April 1st in Rome where the power supply was out for hours effecting the Lazio region. That included the major Roman airport of Fiumicino. The cause of that event somehow remains unknown.

Just the day before in Turkey there was another power failure. That was the worst blackout since the devastating Marmara earthquake of 1999. Chaos in the capital and much of the country drew more than 70 million Turks into chaos. Public transport was paralyzed, traffic lights were dark, conveyor belts continued. Elevators halted and mobile phones were silent. Even hospitals switched to emergency mode and the NSA style surveillance cameras in the capital Ankara went black.

…click on the above link to read the rest of the article…

Tag Archives: grid loss

Content

Post categories

Economic Links

Energy/Resource Links

Environmental Links

Geopolitical Links

Liberty Links

News Links

Other Links

Survival Skills

Post Archives by Category

Post navigation

Latest Posts