OT? Protect from solar coronal mass ejection?

Investment Analysis Clubs Macro Economic Trends and Risks
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Our sun sends ionized particles toward Earth every day. The magnetic field from circulating iron in Earth’s core deflects most of them.

But occasionally a gigantic solar coronal mass ejection will reach Earth and cause problems with electrical systems. The first recorded incident was the Carrington Event, the most intense geomagnetic storm in recorded history, peaking on 1–2 September 1859 during solar cycle 10. It created strong auroral displays that were reported globally and caused sparking and even fires in telegraph stations.

A similar massive solar coronal mass ejection today could bring modern society to a standstill. That’s pretty Macroeconomic.

https://www.wsj.com/science/space-astronomy/solar-storm-what-is-stormwall-e2ca1823?mod=hp_lead_pos9

A Plan to Stop Solar Storms From Sending Us Back to the Stone Age

StormWall, which involves school-bus-size satellites and a whole lot of salt, could provide an ionic ‘air bag’ for the Earth

By Christopher Mims, The Wall Street Journal, July 10, 2026

…
Far out in space, where geostationary satellites orbit, a half-dozen school-bus-size satellites crack open and start dumping barium, lithium or sodium. Within minutes, sunlight transforms this material into an ionized gas shield that slows the oncoming massive blob of plasma…

Even its name, StormWall, sounds like science fiction, but authorities on space weather say it could work, mitigating an event that happens, they estimate, once a century. The trio of scientists who conceived of it say an international coalition could build such a system with existing or soon-to-arrive technology.

Back-of-the-envelope math suggests it could cost tens of billions of dollars. Yet with all of the electronics on Earth that increasingly govern our lives, and ever more infrastructure being put into orbit, from internet-delivering satellites to AI-training data centers, spending that much could be a no-brainer, says StormWall co-designer Brian Walsh, an associate professor of engineering at Boston University…

The challenge, he says, is that experts can’t predict space weather the way they can predict weather down here on Earth. We don’t have as many sensors in space, and the processes that trigger solar storms and make them devastatingly potent are much more complicated…

The system would require 838,000 pounds of ionizable material—lithium, barium or sodium—to be lofted to an altitude of 22,000 miles above Earth’s surface. That’s 68 times as high as the orbit of SpaceX’s Starlink satellites.

That altitude is critical because that’s the point in space at which the ionized material could follow what the researchers call “natural highways” in space, giving about six hours of protection before drifting away…

Even if it costs $100 billion, that price tag is only a 10th of the amount tech companies are projected to spend on building out artificial-intelligence infrastructure next year alone. And without a space air bag, any sufficiently large solar storm has the potential to turn all those data centers into inoperable piles of steel and silicon. [end quote]

It’s science fiction right now. But it’s not a matter of if, but when, that the sun will eject another mass of material large enough to penetrate the magnetic field and damage electronics. There have been recent near-misses.

Currently, space weather centers (like NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center) monitor the Sun 24/7. Because a coronal mass ejection takes 12 to 48 hours to travel from the Sun to Earth, we would have an advance warning. This would allow grid operators to shut down power systems, put satellites into “safe mode,” and disconnect vulnerable equipment before the storm hits, drastically reducing the permanent damage. There would still be damage and some satellites would be lost due to friction with a heated/ expanded upper atmosphere.

It’s a lot more realistic to invest in earth-based protective measures, such as emergency drills to disconnect transformers, etc. than a one-shot space-based system. But it’s worthwhile bringing up the subject to keep everyone on their toes vis-a-vis planning. Utility operators have in-depth plans, including ground-based shielding and stockpiling spare transformers. Those plans need to be protected from short-sighted cost-cutting management.

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC), backed by federal authority, issued a mandatory reliability standard called TPL-007.

This regulation legally forces utility companies to conduct vulnerability assessments for geomagnetic storms and mandates that they have operating procedures in place to mitigate the risks. If a company decides to “cost-cut” its solar storm drills or hardware upgrades, it faces massive federal fines. Regulations effectively turn disaster preparedness from an optional expense into a legally required cost of doing business.

Wendy

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When I first read the title, I thought it was an adult film with 3 X’s.

My bad.

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Six hours? Such an event could last longer, which is why aurorae aren’t just a sudden burst. They dance in the sky for hours.

It is an interesting concept. And a real problem. Most hardware up there probably isn’t hardened (maybe just military satellites). It will wreak havoc with communications. Potentially with power grids, too.

I think we would recover from this. The space-based concern I have is big rocks. We don’t spend nearly enough to find them all, map their trajectories, and have a plan in place to move any that threaten us. A big one would cause havoc we may not recover from for decades or centuries (or ever).

Mother Nature reminding us that we aren’t as powerful as we think we are.

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Hardened electronics have limitations. At some point you shut down to protect the electronics, which may be when you need them the most.

Shielding is heavy. Another method is to use components with larger physical structures, older technology ICs that are physically bigger, heavier, slower. Often these are incapable of performance needed. The solution is to shut down. Heavily protect only circuitry that will wake up the rest of the system when it is safe.

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@MKWas welcome to METAR!

Since you seem to know something about this subject, let me ask:

Can equipment be protected with heavy-duty grounding?

Wendy

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Sounds like a job for the carbon based units.

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The biggest issue with this is that the particles will induce a current into already existing wires (or circuit boards) well past the utility protections. (I just lost a TiVo and a TV to a next-to-the-house lightning strike a week ago, second time that’s happened in 10 years.)

If there’s warning, the best thing you can do is unplug anything you want to protect, including motors (refrigerators, freezers), anything digital (TVs, computers) and everything else if you have time. The utilities would be advised to do the same, except it’s awfully inconvenient to just shut down the entire grid for a couple hours. Even if they do, your personal electrics are still vulnerable to an induced current anywhere along the line that feeds you (those big transformers on the telephone phenomena which, when you put a giant metal stick up in the air, is likely to be hit.

One arrestor my engineer showed me was like a giant slinky, about 2 feet long and the metal was an inch thick. At one end the lightning was allowed to spark across the gap, the other path would take it round and round the slinky metal to be discharged a fraction of a second later. Never really understood why that would make the strike useless, but that’s what it did (supposedly.) There were still a few times when we’d be taken out and then all hell would break loose, with alarms going off and generators starting and whatnot. (The power to the transmitter came from two entirely separate paths: one primary, one backup, and we had 3 giant diesel generators which kicked on in about 30 seconds if both those power feeds failed. Such was the backup to backup to backup for the conelrad/civil defense/clear channel stations I was at.)

Well, that went sideways. Sorry. Anyway, unplug, assuming you get the warning in time.

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Not MKWas, but the answer is “depends”. What Goofy was talking about was EMP (from lightning). You shield for that. A direct hit requires a lot of grounding, and still no guarantees (lightning is scary). I used to work at an observatory. We had lightning rods everywhere. When they started humming, time to go inside and unplug our equipment (we Faraday caged everything, but we had to unplug the cables that went from the outside instruments to the inside electronics through the cage).

For satellites, you can’t really ground them (since they are nowhere near the ground). You’re not really shielding from EMP, but charged particles. They can induce currents in wiring, but also can cause actual damage to ICs. I’m not an expert on hardening, but shielding is generally the best way to stop particles. And that’s heavy (e.g. lead would work).

The ISS has astronauts shelter in their vehicles, primarily because they are designed to survive re-entry (so they’re heavier, better shielded), and because if things go really wrong, they are able to detach and go home at a moment’s notice.

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On a more personal scale, what should we do at home if the government warns that there will be a major coronal mass ejection of a size that electric utilities will shut down the grid to protect it?

Should I put my computer back-up external drive into the steel drawer in my steel fireproof safe? Should I wrap my computer in aluminum foil? Considering the problem is magnetic as well as electrical, would it be enough to turn off the electrical panel and unplug the appliances?

Wendy

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How well (or bad) would it be for Starlink?

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@flyerboys Gemini said it would be particularly bad for Starlink. The solar coronal mass ejection would heat the upper atmosphere, causing the atmosphere to expand. Starlink satellites are in low earth orbit. The expanded atmosphere would overlap the low earth orbit, causing friction which would cause the Starlink satellites to drop to a lower orbit and burn up.

Wendy

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Can’t hurt.

The utilities could shut down, I suppose. Not sure it will do much good unless they disconnect the wiring (which, maybe they can?). Basically, all those power lines are really long antennas. So, in case of an event like an EMP (lightning near-miss, nuke, etc), the current will be induced in the wiring and travel to whatever that wiring is connected to. That’s why you want to unplug everything you can. Then you only have to worry about the currents generated within your device itself (fridge, PC, whatever).

If you have a stucco home, you probably already have a sort of Faraday cage. The chicken wire they attach to it. I don’t think it’s properly grounded, since the intent wasn’t to create a Faraday cage. But it should offer some protection to anything inside the cage as long as it’s unplugged from anything that travels outside the cage (e.g. your house wiring).

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It does. Including cell signals and wifi. Got one of those “bird cams” and had a devil of a time getting the signal inside the house. Eventually got a mesh extender and put it in front of the closest window to the feeder.

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The safe isn’t a great help. What you need is a continuous piece of ferrous conductive metal surrounding the device being protected. You can use a screen but strands must be electrically connected where they cross. The allowable size of the openings depends on the frequency of the threat. The smaller the holes the higher frequency that is blocked. An impulse spreads energy over a wide band of frequencies (Google “Dirac delta function” if interested) so you want no holes.

The door & body of the safe are probably painted, the gap probably has some compressible fireproof material around the door, so it is probably a gaping hole to all but the lowest frequencies.

An alloy called mu-metal is often used for shielding, pricey. Grounding isn’t required, that’s for protection against lightning or to protect people using electrical protection. Heavy shielding isn’t a big issue, we’re at the bottom of the atmosphere so most particles have been stopped - except neutrinos which you have no hope of stopping.

Did your backup drive come in an RFI/EMI bag (a smoky translucent or black plastic bag). If you have it use it, though it’s designed for protection while handling e.g. static discharge. But it also provides physical protection & is better than an ordinary plastic bag. These are used a lot during production, from the smallest components to entire subsystems, but finding them for sale is difficult.

There are lots of products out there with buzzwords: EMI, RFI, Faraday cage. They’re also for low level threats, limited protection for an energetic event. I have some for our vehicles’’ key fobs, they block the low level signal they use. Two active fobs sometimes confuse the car, and blocking the signal eliminates the easiest vector for a thief.

Probably the best solution is get a metal can - buy some Danish cookies or empty that tin full of sewing supplies. There’s usually a coating on the inside, so get some fine sandpaper and remove it from where the lid & can come together. Then clean it well to remove any metal particles, dry it, don’t let it rust.

Aluminum foil? WARNING: do NOT wrap electronics directly in aluminum foil. Foil sheds tiny particles of aluminum. So you’d need to wrap it in something else first -

Avoid anything that might produce static: most plastics especially Styrofoam or similar except there are EMI/RIF protective foams (usually black); synthetic or synthetic blend fabrics; paper; …

And then put it somewhere safe: your safe, safe deposit box, deep underground …

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Crap! It is starting already!

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:smiley: If you’re talking about torrential downpour, yes it has. The downside of satellite internet. The only other option is ADSL or cellphone.

Fiber is coming - to a street where we’re the only English i.e. not Amish! It’ll still be a long run to the cabin, which I’d probably need to pay for. I’m curious what life cycle cost looks like.

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I’ve never seen a “slinky” such as you described, but my involvement with utility power distribution is very limited.

The arrestor can’t eliminate all the effects of a strike, some energy still continues to the equipment being protected. So you add arrestors, and overdesign your equipment, and at the end play the odds because you have limited funds available.

I would guess that they spreading the energy they get hit with over more time is to reduce power. *** Lower power means lower voltage and current, and tradeoff is you are discharging the energy for a longer time.

What you gain from reduced power is lower peak voltage and lower peak current. Insulation has a maximum voltage rating, overvoltage will break down insulation causing degradation or failure. Overvoltage can also cause arcing creating a carbon deposit - degradation or failure. Conductors have a maximum current limit, overcurrent can partially melt or completely destroy a conductor - degradation or failure.

These effects can occur at many levels, anything from major power cables to within integrated circuits.

Power is measured in Watts, it is an instantaneous measure of work being done. Power [Watts] = Voltage [volts] x Current [Amperes]

Energy is power over time, measured in Watt-hours. Energy [Watt-hours] = Power [Watts] x Time [hours]

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Wendy - about hard drives:

Is your backup hard drive an older unit - magnetic media, spinning platters, electromechanical? Or is it a newer unit - a solid state drive?

Powered down solid state drives will only retain data for a short time, a few years. When powered up the data is periodically refreshed. If you want to keep data longer a magnetic hard drive may be a better choice. Powered down they will survive a few decades.

Under heavy use solid state drives are the way to go, they will survive decades - under the same conditions the mechanical components of a magnetic drive may fail in a few years. Solid state drives are also faster, use less energy, are quieter.

BTW - burning to CDs or DVDs isn’t the way to go either. The original CDs & DVDs were stamped. They make physical divots in the plastic. As long as they aren’t physically damaged they’ll last until the plastic degrades, many decades. Burners use media that has a dye embedded in them. The laser causes a transition, the dye changes color, in rewriteable media this can be reversed. Data may last only a few years.

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@MKWas my backup hard drive is a 2 TB Seagate portable SCSI disk drive. It’s a lot quieter than my old disk drives but it does whisper. I have this plugged into my desktop tower continuously.

I also back up files intermittently onto two flash drives. I keep one in the bank safe deposit box and swap them every few months.

Wendy

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I would encourage encrypted Cloud backups as well. I use Backblaze. Local backups are great for when you accidentally delete a file, or a drive fails entirely. It’s fast for recreating a file or an entire drive. It can be problematic in the event of theft, fire, etc, where your local drive is damaged (burned, flooded, stolen, etc.). So your last resort is off-site backups. Slow to recover from, but protects you from fire, etc.

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