Gone in 90 Seconds (New Scientist)

In searching around for something to write an article about I return to an old favourite of "the end of the world". This is one that keeps popping up every so often and is about how susceptible our electricity transmission grid is to solar storms. Its not just the electricity network either, its satellites and communication systems.

Of course there is a bit of movie fake realism to the start of the article, you can imagine movie voice over man coming on and saying:

"It was a time when our best friend became our worst enemy... it was a time when the life giving light became the plague of darkness...mankind at its darkness hour... a future in which people fear the dawn... Solar Storm 2012 coming soon to a screen near you. Certificate 15 with mild violence and on screen nudity."

Any way ... returning to reality and the new scientist article they have a much more sensible scene setter:

"It is midnight on 22 September 2012 and the skies above Manhattan are filled with a flickering curtain of colourful light. Few New Yorkers have seen the aurora this far south and their fascination is short - lived. Within a few seconds, electric bulbs (note from zephyrist: is that as opposed to gas bulbs?) dim and flicker, then become unusually bright for a fleeting moment (Another note from zephyrist: or in one word "blow"). Then all the lights in the state go out. Within 90 seconds the entire eastern half of the US is without power."

Just like in Hollywood the rest of the world doesn't seem to exist as usual the world ends in New York. Seriously can a UK director not come up with an end of the world film set in Bristol or something that isn't cheesy or just a comedy. Why is the British film industry based on period dramas or rom-coms with Hugh Grant or cheap comedies or gritty low budget crime thrillers. Where is the British block buster disaster movie?

Any way back to New Scientist again, rather than just a ramble through a myriad of thoughts about nothing much in particular.

The article goes on to mention 3 big hits about the days and years after the solar storm when the electricity network fails in the US:

4-10 years for the US to recover
72 hours of healthcare remaining
30 days of coal left (although if no power grid why would you need coal for power stations)

A Solar storm will spew out plasma balls from the surface of the sun which will hurtle towards earth and create a massive interference with the earth's magnetic field which in turn induce currents in wires of the electricity grid. Which will in effect overload the system blowing virtually every transformer in the system. With few spares and every transformer needing to be replaced it could take up to 12 months to manufacture and replace them. In the mean time how would we survive without a fully functioning grid network. Every aspect of our lives from fuel, transport, food, healthcare, water and heat depend on the electricity grid. It would be the end of the world as we know it.

Such events have happened before all be it before technology was so embedded in life. In 1859 the Carrrington event disrupted telegraph networks across the globe. In 1989 six million people went without electricity for 9 hours in Quebec during a minor storm.

Solar storms follow a cycle and the next maximum after this current period of calm is expected in 2012 and the question that new scientist asks is are we prepared?

We do have NASA's Advanced Composition Explorer(ACE) which can give us up to 15 minutes of warning before a solar storm hits, just enough time to minimise the effects of a solar storm on an electricity grid. However, ACE is coming to the end of its life, it becomes less reliable as time goes on and eventually it will fail. With no imminent replacement on the cards our early warning system would be gone and we might loose our last chance to avoid planetary disaster and the end of the first technological age of mankind.

Until then lets face the moonlight and dance...