NASA has devised a new tool in the battle against massive eruptions from the sun: an early warning system to protect electrical grids on Earth from extremely powerful solar storms.
The new project, called Solar Shield, is designed to predict the severity of powerful sun storms at specific locations on Earth to help power companies plan responses and limit the potential damage to their equipment.
"It amounts to knowing 'something is coming and it may b
e big,'" said project leader Antti P ulkkinen, a research associate at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., told SPACE.com. But Solar Shield should provide "much more specificity."
e big,'" said project leader Antti P ulkkinen, a research associate at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., told SPACE.com. But Solar Shield should provide "much more specificity." Massive sun eruptions
The chief target for NASA's Solar Shield are huge sun eruptions called coronal mass ejections, or CMEs, which can shoot off billions of tons of ?plasma and charged particles.
The sun is currently going through a more active phase of its 11-year solar weather cycle. It has been emerging from a prolonged lull in activity and is expected to hit the peak of the current cycle in 2013.
When the magnetic field associated with a CME encounters the Earth?s magnetic field, the two merge and an enormous amount of energy is transferred to the geomagnetosphere. This resulting current can affect astronauts or satellites in space, as well as commercial power grids.
If the CME is strong enough, the grids can become overburdened or damaged. The resulting blackout could last anywhere from hours to months, depending on the amount of damage sustained.
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