ISWI Newsletter - Vol.5 No.49
23 April 2013

Dear ISWI Participant:

The attached paper looks into how much the U.S. electric grid is adversely affected by space weather events.

ABSTRACT

Large solar explosions are responsible for space weather that can impact technological infrastructure on and around Earth. Here, we apply a retrospective cohort exposure analysis to quantify the impacts of geomagnetic activity on the U.S. electric power grid for the period from 1992 through 2010. We find, with more than 3-sigma significance, that approximately 4% of the disturbances in the U.S. power grid reported to the U.S. Department of Energy are attributable to strong geomagnetic activity and its associated geomagnetically induced currents.

If your country has performed a similiar analysis, it would be great if this newsletter could circulate it.

Attachments:

(1) Carolus J. Schrijver and Sarah D. Mitchell Disturbances in the U.S. electric grid associated with geomagnetic activity Preprint as accepted by the Journal of Space Weather and Space Climate 19 Apr 2013 139 KB pdf, 12 pages, (click link to document)

Faithfully in the service of ISWI,
George Maeda
Editor of ISWI Newsletter

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