[JRandomFreeper]

I worry more about solar flares, like the on in the 1850s that burned up telegraph lines, or the one in the 1960s that took out part of Canada's grid.

Our power distribution system is too fragile, and needs to be upgraded.

/johnny

[aruanan]

I worry more about solar flares, like the on in the 1850s that burned up telegraph lines

The Carrington Event allowed telegraphy without applied electricity, but it didn't burn up the lines. Some telegraph paper caught fire and some operators got shocked.

[Tenacious 1]

What makes everyone think our power grid is so fragile?

We believe it because “they” say so.

The power grid is actually a pretty high tech sophisticated system. Want proof? Think of the Enron engineered rolling black outs. With technology today, we are able to pinpoint outages and reroute power.

The next time someone tells you how vulnerable our power grid is ask them what we need to upgrade? More power generation? More wire? More switches? More substations? New technology? Nobody can answer that question because it's become cliche.