Posted on 10/27/2013 4:56:01 AM PDT by Libloather
A catastrophic, prolonged failure of the electrical grid—the sort of event whose effects are depicted in National Geographic Channel’s upcoming American Blackout, which premieres Sunday—may seem like just apocalyptic science fiction to some viewers. Unfortunately, though, the possibility of such a breakdown is all too real. (See related interactive: “Survive the Blackout.”)
Government and utility industry officials are so concerned, in fact, that in November, they will stage a massive emergency drill, called GridEx II, that will involve thousands of utility workers, business executives, National Guard officers, FBI antiterrorism experts and government officials from the U.S., Canada and Mexico. They’ll practice responding to a simulated failure of large parts of the electrical system across North America. (See related quiz: “What You Don’t Know About Electricity.”)
(Excerpt) Read more at energyblog.nationalgeographic.com ...
Aren’t blackouts racist?
Just another BS scare tactic from National Geographic. Conflating the Sutxnet virus with a fake video (The Aurora Generator Test” is simply unethical.
Everything is a crisis.
NG is so far out there in left field they have marginalized themselves to anyone with half a brain left to think with. Global warming/climate change controls most of their thinking these days.
We’re all gonna die!!! Arrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr!
There is one real threat that’s not on the list. Since 9/11 absolutely nothing has happened as far as recognition. If that threat materialized, power in many parts of the Northeast would be out for periods up to a year.
The unbelievable fact is everything currently going on increases that threat.
So true.
We had a flood 5 years back, no road, no phone lines or elec for 3 month; it was a change for those 3 months. We did fine with the Honda Generator. It was tough without internet though.
I don' think most of America is as prepared as we were when the Yukon came in 1/4 of a mile from where she usually is.
A lot of people are worried about this GridEx II 'drill' and are concerned that the grid will indeed go down and they won't be able to get it back up. This article sets forth a LOT of good reasons to be prepared to live without electricity for extended periods of time.
Just another BS scare tactic from National Geographic
Guess you weren't around when we had the cascade failure in the United States on the East Coast in 2003 and in 1965. In both events, a "small" error caused a domino-effect cascade that took out a large area of the US and Canada. The cascade occurred because the safety equipment did exactly what it was supposed to do, protect the electrical equipment from damage.
The 2003 error cascade started with a computer error. It snowballed from there.
As for the "danger" of the Sun causing trouble, we already know from prior experience that a coronal mass ejection can cause significant problems. The ejection of 1859 affected telegraph systems around the world, including shocking the operators with the induced voltages. Some of the disruption scenarios that have been postulated are based on extrapolating that event against the current electrical infrastructure.
Is it a "crisis"? No. Is is a major concern? Yes. Research continues on how to prevent the CME from causing widespread damage to the world's electrical networks. Yes, there will be outages, but if the basic gear isn't melted down, recovery would take days instead of years.
One "solution" being floated is to reduce our dependence on long-haul transmission lines, by building small plants closer to the consumers. By distributing power generation, failures would be more localized, and the overall effect of a CME would be reduced. (Another benefit: terrorists would have to hit more targets to have the same effect.) Also by distributing more, smaller, generators, a failure in one place won't translate to failures over very, very large areas. The faults would be contained.
The government is shutting down coal fired power plants as quickly as they can. They are the most reliable and most flexible of all of our power generation capability. If we have a big blackout, this will be the most likely cause.
Guess I was.... We were out of power for a little while, the safety systems worked with little major damage, and power was restored everywhere. No one was killed. No generators "burned up with smoke" because of a virus.
I was also around for the Northeast Blackout of '65. No virus there either. Safety systems also worked. Blackouts are to be dealt with, not feared.
Right on post 11!
Unfortunately we are going in the opposite direction to incorporate remote solar and wind fields
I agree that “they” are trying to make everything a crisis of such magnitude that ONLY the Federal government can help out or protect you. (Along with that protection comes the required taxes, of course.)
That being said, I work in the utility industry and there are real vulnerabilities in the national grid. I know of a few simple things that terrorists could do that would leave many people without power for awhile. Of course, I won’t disclose them, but the fact remains, terrorists have not seriously looked at or attacked the grid...yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we see an attack soon.
This is, however, politically untenable in a communist/fascist/central planed economy.
Central power advocates like, well, central power.
It's much easier to shutoff a city's water supply if it only has one water plant, its food if there is only one rail line, its power if...
_Jim says you are wrong. Wrong. Wrong.
Well, I hope I’m wrong on the grid being attacked in the near future, but I guarantee you that I could take down very large sections of the grid with little effort, little detectability and without using any of my insider access. Of course to those in the government who are reading this...I would never do it and I will never tell anyone what I know, but it doesn’t take a genius to figure some of this stuff out. (I love electricity and my freedom.)
But experience, and the entire history of civilization teaches me that anything one can build, another can destroy.
If there was no crisis, we would have to invent a crisis. The only thing the elites know is how to keep the people stirred up against the ongoing most important threat against security and decency, so we don’t look at the manipulators behind the curtain. So it goes........
Disclaimer: Opinions posted on Free Republic are those of the individual posters and do not necessarily represent the opinion of Free Republic or its management. All materials posted herein are protected by copyright law and the exemption for fair use of copyrighted works.