Grid Attack

People are shooting up key parts of the power grid. It’s happening all across the country. Either it’s a coordinated attack or a bunch of copy cats. The FBI is involved so there has to be suspicion of some serious stuff. It you are in a area that lost power you know it’s serious. 

Our power grid has a lot of big fat targets. Keys parts can be destroyed by something as simple as a high powered rifle. Even random shots can take infrastructure down. If you understand how the components work and their weak points it’s even easier. 

Security has been stepped up, but it’s almost impossible to protect everything. There’s too much to protect and it’s too easy to find weak points. What will probably happen is that when people are caught the government will throw the book at them to make an example. The hope is that harsh prison sentences will deter others. 

So how does that affect you or I? That depends. How important is grid electricity to you? Most people use it everyday for everything. What’s your backup power like? Can you stay comfortable without the grid? How long can you manage without? It might be a long time.

Here’s the thing nobody is talking about. There number of spare components for grid repair is limited. There’s a certain amount set aside of normal issues. Parts wear out and fail. Storms are a concern. Accidents happen. The power companies can swap among themselves if there are normal disasters. 

What they can’t handle is too much going down all at once. There are only so many spare parts and qualified people to install them. What might normally be a few days or a week without power could stretch out for much longer. Large population centers and key facilities will be fixed first. If you are not in a one of those places grid power could be gone for an extra special long time. 

One solution would be a massively decentralized grid. Power generated and used locally avoids much of the vulnerable infrastructure. Instead of a few dozen targets to take down most power it would take thousands of attacks -a much harder thing to accomplish.

In the mean time, better have your backup solutions handy.

-Sixbears