Brittle Power- PARTS 1-3 (+Notes) - Natural Capitalism Solutions

Chapter Seven: War and Terrorism 73high (or, with limited range, at low) altitude. The pulse reaches its full intensityin about ten millionths of a second—a hundred times as fast as lightning—and hence cannot be stopped by ordinary lightning arrestors, but only by specialcabinets and other equipment designed for this purpose. Its peak strengthmay be fifty thousand volts per meter, or six million watts per square meter—six thousand times the peak density of sunlight. And a single one-megatonhydrogen bomb exploded at an altitude of sixty to three hundred miles canproduce this electromagnetic blink over a radius of five hundred to fourteenhundred miles. 43 A single blast high over the central United States could blanketalmost the entire lower forty-eight states with an intense pulse—at leasttwenty-five thousand volts per meter. 44Any metal object—power lines, telephone lines, wires, instrument cabinets—would pick up the pulse like an antenna, focusing its energy into any delicateelectronic circuitry in the area. The results: instantaneous, simultaneous failure ofall unhardened electrical and electronic systems, including electric grid andpipeline controls, telephones, and other telecommunications except fiberoptics. Many of the failures would require major repairs. Most power gridcontrols would be damaged functionally (burned-out transistors) or operationally(erased computer memory): 45 integrated circuits are about ten milliontimes as prone to EMP burnout as vacuum tubes. 46 Power lines act as longantennas, collecting the pulse over great distances. The induced surges—ashigh as thirty thousand megawatts 47 —could damage insulators and transformerwindings, and would probably burn out many end-use devices thathappened to be operating from line voltage at the time. 48With the prospect of grid controls knocked out, transmission and distributionsystems themselves damaged, and power plants probably damagedtoo, it is no wonder that the Defense Civil Preparedness Agency concludedthat, because of EMP, “no reliance should be placed on the presumed availabilityof electric power during and immediately following a nuclear attack.” 49Design trends in the power industry are tending to increase the likelihood ofEMP damage, 50 and “the extreme difficulty and expense of protecting thegrids has discouraged utilities from taking virtually any action.” 51EMP may have another, even more dramatic effect. Especially in newernuclear plants which use solid-state electronic devices extensively, 52 the safetyand control systems on operating nuclear power reactors may be disabled. 53This could cause a simultaneous epidemic of uncontrollable core meltdowns indozens of plants across the country. 54 Although this possibility is very hard toanalyze, it cannot be excluded on the basis of present knowledge. 55 A fullerreport to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission is due in 1983. 56 (This problemhas apparently not been analyzed at all in Europe, or in Canada, whose reac-