Comment on The U.S. Just Ran a Solar Storm Emergency Drill. The Real Deal Would Be a Catastrophe

• shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

  During a normal power outage, you’re right. That does keep you isolated on your own island. But in a case like this, the voltage is likely to spike to incredibly high levels on wires that aren’t meant to carry it and cause arcing and possibly fires. That’s why you want to be physically disconnected.

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  • curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    Got it, at that point (extremely high voltage) you’d need suppression at the panel. Which I would hope people have inline, but not ex0ect like an LVD.

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    • Aceticon@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      With a high enough voltage the air will ionized and the power will literally jump over many protection mechanisms. Also it can cause certain dialetrics (electrically isolating materials).

      An extreme enough event can be way beyond even the biggest of tolerances of safety systems, even if only because it can jump around the system through the air from the external side to the internal and supposedly protected side.

      So it makes sense that when a massive electromagnetic storm is inducing electric currents along tens or hundreds of miles long wires, the only guaranteed safe system is to not even have a cable from the grid coming into your house.

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      • curbstickle@lemmy.dbzer0.com ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

        At that point, that grid connection will be the least of anyone’s worries. The storm in Quebec in… 1990? Ish. tripped breakers, and shut things down for like a day.

        A storm on the scale youre talking about I am pretty sure would wipe out satellites (maybe even take them down due to atmospheric drag?), impact cables other than power like copper laid for internet and phone, etc. Grid-connected power or not you’d be several impacted and potentially at risk.

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  • anomnom@sh.itjust.works ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

    The breakers at transformers in each neighborhood would surely trip before frying a house I would think.

    They go whenever a tree comes down near our street anyway.

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    • shortwavesurfer@lemmy.zip ⁨1⁩ ⁨day⁩ ago

      The voltages involved are more likely to cause the transformers to explode rather than just tripping the breakers.

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