---

Extreme Solar Events

I will certainly look at that and make the specific connection that my hon. Friend just made. The procedures that National Grid and other utilities have in place for reacting to a major solar flare include steps to increase the generation reserves that can improve voltage levels across the network, and possibly switching out certain transformers at the edge of the network if sufficient information is available to give confidence in the route that the electrical currents caused by the solar storm will take. My hon. Friend asked whether I agree that the fastest storms would not predictable. It is a fact that, if something occurs at a speed that we are not able to pick up in the networks that already exist—in the satellite messaging systems that we depend on—we would be taken by surprise. Generally, however, through satellites, we are certainly getting information within a reasonable time frame. All transformers connected to the national grid transmission network since 1999 have been designed to eliminate the risk of damage presented by solar storms. That answers my hon. Friend's question about more modern facilities with higher voltages. Protection has been built in and there is an acceptance that, as voltages have increased, there is a need to introduce appropriate safeguards. Of course, a wide range of incidents and emergencies might have an impact on all or significant parts of the UK. The national risk register, published in March 2008, sets out the Government's assessment of the likelihood and impact of a range of different risks that may directly affect the UK over the next five years, including accidents such as major fires or technical failures, natural events, including severe weather and flooding, and particularly the threat of international terrorism. Comprehensive plans are in place for handling both a complete national outage of electricity supplies, which, of course, has never occurred, I am glad to say, and regional outages. Although solar storms are not included specifically in the national risk register, the resilience measures in place to deal with the risks I have mentioned would be equally applicable to the effects of solar storms. As my hon. Friend said, solar storms approximately follow an 11-year cycle and are thought to be related to changes in the sun's magnetic field. We are in a quiet phase at present and the latest information from NASA is that the next peak is likely during mid 2013. My hon. Friend hoped that I would take this matter seriously. Indeed, the Government do take it seriously. Solar storms are known to be capable of damaging electricity transmission networks on earth and this has happened, as he said, in both Canada and Sweden. The most significant event occurred on 13 March 1989, when a severe storm caused the collapse of the Canadian Hydro-Québec power grid in a matter of seconds. As he said, millions of people were left without power for nine hours, with significant economic loss. In the UK, there have been at least four peak cycles of solar storms during the existence of modern high-voltage transmission networks. Generally, these have caused no problems, although in 1989 two transformers suffered damage: one in East Anglia and one in the west country. However, in both cases, the impact was limited to the locality. I am glad to say that the UK is not at a particularly high risk of disruption from solar storms, as we are a good way south of the magnetic north pole. The history of extreme solar weather events and the science indicate that the risk of a major impact in the UK is very low. Although the UK may not be completely immune from the impact of solar storms, it is extremely unlikely that we would suffer widespread damage. The damage that could occur is therefore small and well within the scope of the resilience and contingency planning that we have in place to deal with terrestrial weather events and other risks that could impact on the electricity networks. The main risk to electricity supplies during a severe solar storm is that one or more transformers at the edge of the network could be damaged, which would cause a localised loss of supply if the capacity of remaining transformers could not deliver all the demand for electricity in that area. Generally, a damaged transformer can be replaced within about two weeks and it is often possible to take other measures to restore supplies much quicker than that, including an early return to service of equipment being maintained or the re-routing of supplies from a different location. The highest risk areas of the UK are the west country and parts of Scotland, due to the granite rock formation of the ground in those parts. That type of ground is particularly susceptible to electrical currents, so the geomagnetically induced currents caused by the solar storm are therefore more likely to find a path through the electricity networks. That is more likely to happen because of the terrain in those areas. A severe solar storm can also depress the overall voltage of the transmission network by a few per cent. However, that is unlikely to cause damage or disruption and defence measures can be taken to reduce the risk even further. For example, National Grid may be able to increase the number of electricity generators on the network to help support the voltage. These impacts are comparable to the risks faced by the transmission networks in day-to-day operation, for example, by the breakdown of generation or transmission equipment or through the terrestrial weather events that I mentioned earlier. The ability to cope with such events and minimise their impact is built into the design of the networks, operating procedures and the resilience measures available to the grid operators. Emergency planning arrangements are also in place to cover significant and unexpected events. I am grateful to my hon. Friend for raising this important issue. The Department of Energy and Climate Change maintains its capacity to lead the response to energy emergencies and incidents. That means planning, training and exercising alongside those likely to have a stake in a potential crisis. That includes the energy sector, together with local, regional and devolved Administrations, as well as other Departments and agencies whose interests may be affected and whose assistance would be needed. Although there are clearly uncertainties about the impact of a major solar storm, experience to date indicates that the UK is not unduly exposed to such events and, in the worst case, it could be expected that any interruption to electricity supplies would be localised and of relatively short duration. However, as my hon. Friend implied, there is no absolute certainty in this regard. There is clearly a need for continuing scientific research. We cannot be certain: although we have seen events of a certain nature and events for which we could make reasonable predictions, and although we have in place a significant range of measures that are capable of coping with and, to some degree, mitigating the potential effects on our electricity networks, none the less we need to keep such matters under review. The Department needs to be constantly appraised of, and must follow, developments in science. The resilience and defensive measures that network owners take to protect against terrestrial weather events are equally applicable in dealing with solar storms. Where specific measures are appropriate, such as the development of reliable early warning systems, work is in hand to improve our understanding. I am confident that we can, as a country, cope within the range of what we know has happened in other parts of world and in this country, and which may happen here in future. Some hon. Members may be concerned about the Olympics—a major event in this country—which could conceivably be affected if such a storm were to happen, but I say to my hon. Friend, although he did not raise this issue, that we have considered that and we expect that all the measures that I have described to be in place and to be appropriate. We have contingency arrangements for that major national event. However, we are not complacent on these issues. Once again, I thank my hon. Friend for raising an important matter in this debate.