
Solar Storm of 1859 - oli5679
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar_storm_of_1859
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t_s_popik
Please read my 2016 testimony to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission on
the threat of solar storms:

[https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/...](https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/resilient_societies_testimony_rm15-11-00_march_1_2016_tech_conference_final_feb_23_2016.pdf)

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anonuser123456
Market these ideas to defense firms that could act as a supplier. A billion
dollar program has to be enticing to someone.

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pal_9000
I like how you think

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nixass
This 19th century miner from rural area is more literate than most of today's
people

>> I was gold-digging at Rokewood, about four miles from Rokewood township
(Victoria). Myself and two mates looking out of the tent saw a great
reflection in the southern heavens at about 7 o'clock p.m., and in about half
an hour, a scene of almost unspeakable beauty presented itself, lights of
every imaginable color were issuing from the southern heavens, one color
fading away only to give place to another if possible more beautiful than the
last, the streams mounting to the zenith, but always becoming a rich purple
when reaching there, and always curling round, leaving a clear strip of sky,
which may be described as four fingers held at arm's length. The northern side
from the zenith was also illuminated with beautiful colors, always curling
round at the zenith, but were considered to be merely a reproduction of the
southern display, as all colors south and north always corresponded. It was a
sight never to be forgotten, and was considered at the time to be the greatest
aurora recorded... The rationalist and pantheist saw nature in her most
exquisite robes, recognising, the divine immanence, immutable law, cause, and
effect. The superstitious and the fanatical had dire forebodings, and thought
it a foreshadowing of Armageddon and final dissolution

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canada_dry
> miner from rural area is more literate

 _Or_... The Perth newspaper editor took the liberty of rewriting his story -
in an early example of _sensational click-bait_.

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runawaybottle
Or maybe GPT2 strikes again!

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londons_explore
It should be noted that many modern systems are quite resistant to solar
flares. Not by design, but mostly by chance.

Specifically, solar flares induce currents in long untwisted pair cables. If
the cables have high impedance loads on the ends, high voltages will result,
frying equipment.

The telegraph was an example of a high impedance long wire.

In modern equipment, long length high impedance lines are rare. Telephones are
one, at around 900 ohms, although nearly all cables are twisted so barely
affected. Power lines have an impedance below 1 ohm. Most Comms goes via
fiber. Cable TV networks have a grounded shield so unaffected. Small household
devices are small, and therefore don't have long lines to get big currents.

I'm sure a solar flare would break some stuff, but the vast majority of
devices are more resistant than people expect.

The most vulnerable thing in today's world is probably actually disused phone
lines, which are currently disconnected from anything else, so infinite DC
impedance, yet very long, and could cause sparks and fires since they
typically have paper insulation which is only good for 1000v or so.

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spdustin
That isn’t actually true. Induced current will occur in nearly any conductor,
and the biggest risk all over the world is in the loss of high voltage
transformers.

This is absolutely, 100% a big problem. While these FOIA’d FEMA docs [0] are
just one source, searching for “solar flare blackout” will net you all the
sources you need. It’s the same as a nuclear EMP.

[0] (PDF):
[http://www.governmentattic.org/24docs/UnpubFEMAgeomagRpts_20...](http://www.governmentattic.org/24docs/UnpubFEMAgeomagRpts_2010.pdf)

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Jeema101
The North American Electric Reliability Corporation apparently doesn't agree
with that assessment:

"NERC recognizes that other studies have indicated a severe GMD event would
result in the failure of a large number of EHV transformers. The work of the
GMD Task Force documented in this report does not support this result for
reasons detailed in Chapter 5 (Power Transformers), and Chapter 8 (Power
System Analysis). Instead, voltage instability is the far more likely result
of a severe GMD storm, although older transformers of a certain design and
transformers near the end of operation life could experience damage."

[https://web.archive.org/web/20150908075507/https://www.frcc....](https://web.archive.org/web/20150908075507/https://www.frcc.com/Public%20Awareness/Lists/Announcements/Attachments/105/GMD%20Interim%20Report.pdf)

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spdustin
Read this transcript [0] of remarks—given to the Federal Energy Regulatory
Commission—at a 2016 hearing on US power transmission reliability. These
remarks directly contradict the relevance and, indeed, the reliability of the
NERC study quoted.

[0] (pdf):
[https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/...](https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/resilient_societies_testimony_rm15-11-00_march_1_2016_tech_conference_final_feb_23_2016.pdf)

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kal31dic
The government response to the Royal Academy of Engineering report on space
weather shows remarkable complacency.

The RAE:

Since the last peak of the solar cycle, the Great Britain transmission system
has developed to become more meshed and more heavily loaded. It now has a
greater dependence on reactive compensation equipment such as static variable
compensators and mechanically switched capacitors for ensuring robust voltage
control. Thus there is increased probability of severe geomagnetic storms
affecting transmission equipment critical to robust operation of the system.
The greatest effects of GICs are normally experienced at the periphery of the
transmission systems, as in Figure 9.

The UK government response: Some UK systems are more resilient and robust to
space weather than counterparts abroad:  the GB power grid __network is
highly meshed __and has a great deal of built in redundancy. This potentially
makes it less susceptible to space weather effects than power grids in some
other countries.

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hyko
Just another existential threat to our civilisation that we all know about but
assume someone else somewhere else is dealing with.

A toxic combination of normalcy bias, the availability heuristic, and
hyperbolic discounting?

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iso1631
As seen in Y2K, spend money to fix a problem.

If you are successful, the problem doesn't occur, the population listen to
those who say "it wasn't really a problem in the first place", and mainstream
populists adopt that position to win votes (regardless of their own thoughts).
You don't get to play that card again

If you aren't successful, the problem occurs anyway and you get accused of not
caring

Without Democracy those in charge wouldn't be concerned by trying to win the
population over

Without the ability for anyone to reach millions of people overnight people
wouldn't be swayed en-mass by contrarians

Often you're damned if you do, damned if you don't. We can see the same thing
unfolding in the UK and US over covid19.

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FartyMcFarter
I hope we don't look at this in a few years wondering what should have been
done...

Is there any hope of avoiding huge problems due to solar flares happening in
the near/medium-term? A silver lining from the Coronavirus pandemic is that
people may think about these rare events more.

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ben_w
Despite the low cost, the USA is unprepared:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23061684](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=23061684)

~~~
throwaway_pdp09
Ditto the UK. See my other comment here.

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t_s_popik
For those of you who want to dig deep into the truth of solar storm (GMD)
vulnerability of the North American electric grid, take a few minutes to read
the first part of our comment to FERC during the docket process for NERC
standard setting. And then say what you think on the thread.
[https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/...](https://www.resilientsocieties.org/uploads/5/4/0/0/54008795/docket_rm15-11-000_resilient_societies_nopr_comments_corrected_20150810.pdf)

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bencollier49
Can you imagine the sort of additional havoc that this would cause if it
happened now? We've been somewhat mercifully spared of natural disasters but
C19 and something like this would be horrific.

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gottareply2020
Llyod’s of London released a report in May 2013 on the potential effects of a
significant Coronal Mass Ejection (CME). The projected costs were 0.6 - 2.6
Trillion USD.

[https://www.lloyds.com/news-and-risk-insight/risk-
reports/li...](https://www.lloyds.com/news-and-risk-insight/risk-
reports/library/natural-environment/solar-storm)

As other comments have said, the biggest pain would be the availability of
replacement small transformers.

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t_s_popik
If people are interested, I'll give my opinion on this paper:
[https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/03/190312103717.h...](https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/03/190312103717.htm)
Anyone want me to comment?

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crispyporkbites
Are there any models that estimate the chance of this re-occuring? What do
they look like?

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EthanHeilman
2020 seems like the sort of year that this would make sense happening, at
least from a narrative point of view.

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BurningFrog
This is probably why we're talking about it now.

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marcosdumay
Cue for an article about a census of asteroids that cross the Earth's orbit
tomorrow.

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LargoLasskhyfv
Imagine being able to see the tubes they plow through the polar lights, maybe
their plasma contrails would glow like a rainbow, or maybe you could see
iridiscent vortices!

What a show!

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pgalvin
Perhaps the biggest long-term issue of this (once the immediate damage is
repaired, which would perhaps take years) is the loss of decades of human
knowledge - everything on hard drives, tapes, flash memory, and just about
anything that isn’t an optical disc - with no real warning.

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DamnInteresting
Well, small electronics such as hard drives and mobile phones are not in
direct danger from these sorts of events; the damage is caused by induced
current on miles-long cables. Our flash memories and tape backups will not be
harmed unless they are burned up in power surges from unprotected power
outlets.

