Solar Storms: What's the reason? The Impact of Solar Storms on the Internet and Life on Earth

Solar Storms: What's the reason? The Impact of Solar Storms on the Internet and Life on Earth

Our world is inherently dependent on technology today, whether it's electricity or something as critical as the internet. Thousands of businesses in every nation use every single day to perform their tasks. 

Imagine, however, if the whole world lost all power, had no internet or was completely cut off from digital networking. There's something scarily dystopian about this dystopian future that no one wants to be a part of, but what's worse is that this could happen sooner rather than later. Do you know why this would happen? Storms resulting from solar activity.

Solar Storms: What are they?

The sun's peak solar activity triggers solar storms. Solar flares and solar winds are formed by solar plasma, which is hot and boiling. The sun releases huge amounts of charged particles straight into space, which include huge bursts of particles. Earth's magnetosphere is affected by these events, which can produce auroras in areas where they would ordinarily not be seen.  Massive bursts of charged particles can create severe interference with electronics, which could render them useless. 

Solar Storms: Why do they occur?

Likewise, NASA has reported that the Sun, like Earth, is experiencing its own types of activities, however, since it is the star of our solar system, its activity has a tremendous impact on all planets, including Earth. As solar activity occurs on the surface of the sun, solar storms occur. 

Coronal mass ejections are large clouds of plasma and magnetic field that emerge from the sun, solar flares are intense bursts of radiation generated by the release of magnetic energy associated with sunspots, and solar wind is the high-speed wind produced by coronal holes. 

Solar activity peaks when the Sun enters an active period (which happens every 11 years), and the Sun just entered a new period in November, indicating that we will soon see higher levels of solar activity for the next few years. 

Damage caused by Solar Storms:

During solar storms, solar particles interact with Earth's magnetosphere and can cause blackouts, as they bombard our planet's electronics with an abundant supply of charged particles, which can damage our electronics. 

The presence of these particles on Earth poses no major risk to humans because the Earth's atmosphere protects us. Space astronauts, however, do not have that kind of luck. Solar winds contain charged particles that travel towards Earth, increasing the likelihood of them taking in harmful radiation. Additionally, the chances of their spacecraft getting damaged are increased.

The human race still knows very little about the Sun and its activities, and solar storms are so rare that we know almost nothing about them. Solar storms have only been recorded on Earth a few times, and very few have demonstrated the extent of destruction they can cause to the electrical grid.

On September 2, 1859, a solar storm led to the complete disruption of telegraph service. It also shocked people on the other end of the telegraph lines. Additionally, electricity was relatively uncommon across the globe at this time. 

Throughout history, massive solar storms have demonstrated the potential for disaster. A coronal mass ejection from the Sun on March 9, 1989, caused geomagnetically induced currents (GICs) to cause Hydro-Québec to lose power on March 13, 1989. 

Over 6 million people were affected by a general blackout that lasted over 9 hours and destroyed a transformer. 

Due to its rarity, we cannot know what kind of impact it might have in today's world due to our lack of understanding. Thus, we are ill-prepared for what the future holds. 

What is Earth's best course of action for surviving solar storms?

Power grids could be destroyed by solar storms, posing severe challenges for our planet in terms of social and economic well-being. A lack of power will prevent hospitals from caring for the sick, businesses will stop operating, resulting in an economic collapse, and humans will have no means of contacting each other.

Researchers have indicated that solar storms may also take us offline due to their interference with internet connectivity. Solar storms can occur at any time, so we must be prepared. 

In order to study and understand the patterns of solar storms, researchers are sending probes to the Sun's star in order to predict their occurrence and shut down the electricity grids when charged particles are approaching Earth so that the planet will not be destroyed by the charged particles. 

Defending the Solar Storms 

In a statement with NBC News, Electric Power Research Institute's vice president for transmission, Rob Manning, said that innovators are trying to prevent electrical hardware from going down easily. 

Furthermore, engineers are also designing capacitor banks, which act like batteries, absorbing and dissipating excess electricity. In some cases, electrical devices are designed that dampen electricity and act like force fields protecting and surrounding critical equipment, known as Faraday cages. 

US Department of Electricity scientists is working on developing better flywheels that can spin faster or slower depending on the amount of charge they carry. These flywheels are intended to physically drain excess electricity off of the grid, creating motion and heat from the sun's electrons. All of these solutions, however, have their shortcomings, according to Manning. 

According to him, some devices allow you to ground this current and remove it from the system, though there are some unintended side effects. This is like taking a drug that might solve the issue you were having, but it has unintended side effects.

Solar Storms: Prevention 

Rather than trying to predict or forecast solar storms in advance, experts recommend shutting down the grid before the storm strikes. 

In order to offer these warnings a few hours before the storm, researchers are working on improving the forecasts. DSCOVR offers a great deal of information about the timing and speed of solar bursts, which is possible with the Deep Space Climate Observatory (DSCOVR). 

Even the Parker Solar Probe, that’s on its journey to study the Sun, will offer data in never-before-seen detail, offering a new perspective about how the sun’s atmosphere heats up to release coronal mass ejections.