
How America Could Go Dark - msisk6
http://www.wsj.com/articles/how-america-could-go-dark-1468423254
======
rurban
So they are again beefing up a terrorism drama for simple third world copper
theft problems, as they happen in all third world countries. No terrorist
would try to attack 100 minor power stations, they rather attack 1-2 big lines
or grid stations.

What is much more dangerous is this marketing tactic to attack the problem
("terrorists") and the ongoing erosion of core infrastructure, like water,
streets and the electric grid by simple neglection, probably caused by
outsourcing support for it. The US power grid quality is only comparable to
India. You cannot trust them, and there are constant outages. Over- and
undercurrents happen all the time, and consumers have to pay for the damages
and outages.

Copper thieves are everywhere. Fight them, but don't call it terrorism.
America will go dark, but not by terrorists. Don't blame the foreigners, they
are homemade problems.

------
DrScump
Government indifference (at all levels) to this risk is scary.

"The Metcalf substation (San Jose, CA, USA), while undergoing security
upgrades, was hit _again_ in August 2014. Intruders cut through fences and
burglarized equipment containers, _triggering at least 14 alarms over four
hours_. Utility employees _didn’t call police or alert guards, who were
stationed at the site_ , according to a state inquiry."

The problem is compounded by a large (and growing) number of electrical
outages caused by copper thieves ripping out wiring; it becomes more difficult
to distinguish mere theft from terrorism.

~~~
jaredhansen
If it's difficult to distinguish mere theft from terrorism, then here's a
hint: it isn't terrorism.

The "terror" in "terrorism" is there for a reason. If nobody can tell that you
stole the wiring because you resent the British rule of the Northern
Territories/the French occupation of Algeria/US bases in the middle
east/whatever, then even if you intended your act to terrify others into
getting their government to comply with your wishes, you have failed pretty
badly.

~~~
rconti
Maybe it just didn't work. Or maybe it was a dry run. Shooting up transformers
in Metcalf was clearly not theft, I know that.

~~~
mhurron
> Maybe it just didn't work. Or maybe it was a dry run

You may have crimes, but they aren't terror attacks.

------
musesum
This is a good companion to Gibney's Zero Day Docu:
[http://www.recode.net/2016/7/7/12045334/alex-gibney-zero-
day...](http://www.recode.net/2016/7/7/12045334/alex-gibney-zero-days-stuxnet-
virus-documentary-podcast)

Went to a SmartGrid conference in 2009. What I learned:

. $1T infrastructure is scheduled to be replaced,

. Power Co's operate on a 30 year amortization cycle,

. Utility regulations can not only change from state-to-state, but from
county-to-county,

. The grid is hackable (known in 2009)

[Edit] spelling

~~~
click170
Not to be confused with Zero Days (2016), which is also worth a watch.

Edit: I mis-read, you actually are talking about Zero Days (2016), which - I
meant - shouldn't be confused with an earlier documentary called Zero Days -
Security Leaks For Sale.

~~~
musesum
spell corrected; thanks!

------
teh_klev
Article without the paywall etc:

[http://archive.is/HCwUJ](http://archive.is/HCwUJ)

~~~
Johnny555
Or just click on the _web_ button at the top of the page and click on the
Google result (WSJ allows google clickthroughs to skip the paywall)

~~~
teh_klev
I get intermittent success with that method, only works about 30% of the time.

------
bllguo
It's scary to think about the damage an actually competent force can inflict
in this day and age.

~~~
douche
It really is. I can't imagine the havoc that an actually-trained strike team
with some real equipment could cause.

I was reading _Band of Brothers_ recently, and the description of how accurate
and deadly their mortar-men were in a number of engagements was impressive. A
light mortar is not the most high-tech weapon, is mass-produced by every army
in the world, and does not take a huge amount of training to handle
effectively. Not to mention that it can strike from up to a mile away, from a
position without direct line-of-sight to the target; with an accomplice acting
as an FO to send adjustments by text. Or skip the accomplice, and use a drone
(Is the army doing this? Seems like a natural application). I don't want to
imagine the indiscriminate horror that could be inflicted at any kind of open-
air event.

~~~
pjc50
See
[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_mortar_attack](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Downing_Street_mortar_attack)
\- although in that case the bomb-proof windows worked. The second time the
IRA nearly managed to assasinate the head of government.

The US army already has small portable tube-launched drones that function as a
sort of guided mortar, although I can't remember the name at the moment.

------
taf2
So an obvious maybe long term solution here is to eliminate the need for a
grid. The transition to battery solar powered homes would reduce the need for
the upstream power supply and larger and transmission lines...

~~~
cylinder
The grid powers a lot more than homes...

~~~
rwallace
So an obvious long-term solution is to _reduce_ the need for the grid. Many
commercial and industrial facilities could run at least partly on local wind
or solar, and the more decentralised capability there is, the less the
vulnerability.

(I'm actually not just thinking about terrorists and suchlike. I'm also
thinking about other risks, such as another Carrington event.)

~~~
niftich
The more decentralized capability, the higher the need to distribute excess
production to places of excess demand, hence a higher need for a grid.

~~~
rwallace
There's an important difference between 'if the grid goes down, we will have
some inefficiency because of excess production here and insufficient
production there' and 'if the grid goes down, everything goes down'.

~~~
evgen
If your local "grid" can't distinguish between your TV usage and the
ventilators at a local hospital then there is no difference between your two
conditions. If such a distinction cannot be made within whatever circle you
use to define "local" then the two cases are identical. The alternative is to
wastefully over-provision each local area.

------
cafard
Let's not forget about squirrels!

Years ago, I would listen to a daylight only AM radio station located in
Boulder, Colorado. If I turned on the radio and didn't hear it, I assumed that
a squirrel had taken out their power. This seemed to happen every few months.
I think that squirrels may have hit upstream from our home or office power
once on twice back then.

Which leads to an interesting question: if I pitch the problem as scary
enough, can I get a DHS grant to deal with squirrels I suspect of aiming to
nest in my gutters or attic?

------
mlinksva
Is there anything in process like the Secure High-voltage Infrastructure for
Electricity from Lethal Damage Act proposed
[https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-
bill/2417](https://www.congress.gov/bill/113th-congress/house-bill/2417) in
2013?

Does any jurisdiction in the world have exemplary practices?

------
spika
The first action of the advance party in the Iraq offensive was to sabotage
the grid and take out all the power which was accomplished by a small team in
short order.

------
synaesthesisx
All the more reason why we need to aim for decentralized (and ideally carbon-
neutral) power.

------
prdonahue
SoMa is dark right now. Lovely little power outage.

------
vinodkumaar
Why do someone send a link that requires a subscription to read?

~~~
unethical_ban
Because sometimes quality journalism is worth finding. If I say I read a
lovely article in a magazine, are you going to fix at me for discussing
something that cost money to access?

~~~
vinodkumaar
If I can get a summary before I pay for access it will be good, than proceed
with buying.

Here the guideline to help us from the FAQs: It's ok to post stories from
sites with paywalls that have workarounds.

------
stretchwithme
I thin the real problem is that we've set up only one grid. If we had
competing distribution providers, the failure of one network wouldn't matter
so much.

~~~
GunboatDiplomat
I dunno, the power grid is an enormous capital investment. It seems like
having more than one would be like having completely independent road systems,
that is, seriously inefficient.

~~~
msisk6
We do.

In the continental US there's three independent grids: East, West, and Texas.
There's some interchange of power between the grids with DC ties, but it's
pretty minimal capacity-wise.

~~~
angersock
God bless Texas. :)

~~~
msisk6
Yeah, occasionally folks ask us why Texas has its own grid. We just answer
"because Texas". ;)

------
hashkb
My dad has been pointing this out for 20 years. He'd be pissed if I didn't
comment here.

~~~
gooseus
Perhaps you should have taken this opportunity to repeat some of those things
he has been saying for the last 20 years so as to contribute to the
conversation...

~~~
hashkb
OK... he's been saying that it would be easy to attack our electrical
infrastructure which is exposed and unguarded all over the place. I can't add
anything that isn't in the article, besides pointing out that we've more or
less been in this state forever and somehow terrorists haven't figured out how
to capitalize.

