N Koreas EMP nuke ?
Topic: General politics
http://www.newsmax.com/KenTimmerman/super-emp-emp-northkorea-nuke/2011/06/16/id/400260
This is a front burner issue lately, so lets look into whats right and wrong with, not the issue, but the reporting on it.
The basic problem I have is that this electro-magnetic pulse (EM-P) is a favorite topic of the crackpot right wing conspiracy theorists, as distinct from legitimate RWCT's.
The "crackpots" are defined here as the ones who talk about extremely complex scientific and engineering related issues (mainly physics) who know absolutely NOTHING about them. No evidence, no proof, just insane hype.
A prime example is the crackpots who scream "the sky is falling" about the "satellite that reads the mark of the beast chip in ones arm'. They are taking shreds of news stories about legitimate technology (satellites and implantable digital/RF devices DO exist) but there is ZERO chance that an implanted chip, which must be read by either a scanner held near or against the skin surface, or by a large machine (NASA developed a biometrics 'pill' that a patient swallowed that was tracked by a machine) being read by a satellite. Sat Comms require several watts of microwave transmit power, and a SAT DISH. Any RF field from an implant will be lucky to be received a few millimeters away from the skins surface.
But, the crackpots :
a.) know nothing of the above
b.) use such evidence to inflame their self fulfilling prophecies as being from those who are hiding the conspiracy.
What puts me on the 'con' side is not that Im somebodys expert nuclear physicist, but I live in an area loaded with them, and know them personally. Some of you would soil yourself if you knew some of the places and people Ive been fortunate to meet in corporations, Government and the classified world. In general, they all laugh at this stuff, so I do too.
"EMP" implies several things
1.) electrical and magnetic energy, not gamma.
2.) "pulse" meaning a very short duration event. (critical)
A nuke discharge is primarily nuclear (stupid statement of the day?) and EM energy is secondary.
The detonation of a nuke is more or less a point source discharge of immense magnitude, but again, very short duration. The residual energy (nuke fallout and heat, mainly) is not "pulse."
Where these stories go wrong, or crackpot, or at best, without credibility thus fuel for irrational hype, is that they NEVER cite credible sources:
"Dr. Pry believes they bore the “signature” of the Russian-designed “super-EMP” weapon, capable of emitting more gamma radiation than a 25-megaton nuclear weapon."
No, such a PhD does not "believe" I can believe in Jesus and the Easter Bunny. Such an individual operates from EVIDENCE, and "belive" is not "evidence."
Cite a source to ME.
"South Korean defense minister, Kim Kwan-jin, told his country’s parliament on Monday that North Korea had succeeded in miniaturizing its nuclear weapons design,"
Smaller things generally emit less energy than larger things, all else being the same. That doesnt tend to jive with "smaller device and much greater destruction" That tends to mean LESS power, not more.
OK, here we jump off the crack pot end of the pool..-
"The Soviet Union conducted an atmospheric test of an EMP weapon in 1962 over Kazakhstan whose pulse wave set on fire a power station 300 kilometers away and destroyed it within 10 seconds.
Such a weapon — equal to a massive solar flare such as the “solar maxima” predicted by NASA to occur in 2012 — poses “substantial risk to equipment and operation of the nation’s power grid and under extreme conditions could result in major long term electrical outages,” said Joseph McClelland of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission in Senate testimony last month."
Not that Im saying all this is false, but Im saying this is where the crackpots jump in and comfuse things, and thats a separate matter. Its up to me to attempt to show you how to distinguish between the two from SCIENCE, not hype.
Claims of a Soviet nuke detonation are likely true, that a big obvious event like someone throwing a turd in the punch bowl.
Problem:
"atmospheric test of an EMP weapon..."
Theres no substantiation or evidence or even claims that allow us to get from that event, to the supposed NK device. Are they implying the two are equal?
A "source" with heavy ties to Govt, Mil and highly classified nuke technology (and thats ALL Im gonna say) told me once that the USSR had a secret pulse weapon that was essentially a focused underground nuke detonation that was, as I recall, intended to be a ground to space weapon, basically to detonate a nuke underground, focus and beam the energy into space.THAT sounds much more plausible than a generalized point source detonation whose energy is GREATLY diminished under the Square Law. a device that ends up as a focused source is much more likely to do localised damage than a source that is spread all over 40 acres.
[The Square Law governs here, in that "energy from a point source radiates equally in all directions and is decreased at a rate of the square of the distance", applies to radio energy in particular.) Its not that the light bulb youre looking at 1/4 mile away isnt the same brightness at all points, its just that ay your viewing position that far away, youre only seeing an extremely small portion of its radiating surface. The portion you see is just as bright (more or less) as if you were standing right beside the bulb, its just that compared to the eye, the light bulb at 1/4 mile is a very tiny speck.]
This, I consider outright fraud:
" Such a weapon — equal to a massive solar flare such as the “solar maxima” predicted by NASA to occur in 2012"
Attempts to, IMO, equate an EMP discharge near the Earths surface to a solar event 98 MILLION miles away is deceitful at best. A solar flare will start fires here? Not likely.
Now, tell me that the incident energy cutting across a power line from both sources separately is equivalent, I could at least analyse, because there are equations that govern it, but the rest sounds like hype. Hows THAT MUCH solar energy from 98 MILLION milesgoing to find a substantial cross-section of a power line on Earth, 98 MILLION miles away, into which to inject enough energy to set a power station on fire?
Someone, IMO, is an idiot or liar or at best, a poor writer spreading news with consulting with any sources and we KNOW thats the MO of the modern Left media.
Now, if we ignore the HYPE, and go into an arena I have some first hand experience with, power line communications, then we can see a credible threat -power line communications or "Smart Grid"
Power "grids" are not one single entity, since its not possible to transmit electrical power from one end of the US to the other without horrible losses. They are localised entities (if from a State Utility regulation standpoint if nothng else) that transmit power around a City, County, State or maybe Region. There is not "one power grid that some nebulous attack will instantly take all of it down'
There is something that is before 'smart grid" (which is stupidity) and that is called "power line communications." Electric utilities use power lines to communicate data and other info from place to place within their own system. There are digital devices that can, for example, be placed on a remote power line to read current flow and transmit that, across power lines, back to a monitoring station for data acquisition. This is not saying how much this is used, or where, or how far it can transmit data, just that it exists (or did). Ive seen write ups and photos of such equipment in engineering magazines.
Thats related to "smart grid" but where smart grid goes dangerously wrong, and should NEVER be implemented as a pretense to some intelligent National energy policy, is that the purpose of smart grid is to incorporate, at large, businesses and homes into the power line comms systems to allow, for a real example, for the Power Company to do "demand side management" in shutting off Mrs Smiths electric clothes dryer between 4:30 and 6:00 PM so Big Industry has power available to run an aluminum smelter (for example). Some of these operations like smelters turn into disasters if they lose power..
S.G and these comms schemes do not make more power, they are an attempt to manage demand to use generating peaks that are unused to fill in for demand valleys. They actually push the grid (or could) closer to collapse, or past that point, if suddenly Big industry is using power, and the system fails, and Mrs Smiths clothes dryer comes on (x 10,000 dryers) and the grid collapses and suffers real physical damage because transformers or generators go down or are damaged due to overload.
THERE is a path between "EM discharge" and "damage to the grid" but IMO there is NO direct link.
"No direct link" is a statement that in order for a first hand pulse-detonation to damage the "grid" then a point source must radiate enough energy through space to cut across (electrical physics phrase that means an EM field induces current in a conductor) an extremely remote and thin power wire (back to the light bulb analogy, try to see a power line wire from a mile away- you can barely see the TOWER..) to cause such an energy surge in megawatts (crude example) to physically damage a transformer.
Aint buying it. Your local Tee Vee or radio station transmitting 10KW results in micro watts of 'cut across' energy at a few feet / miles. WLW radio in Mason Ohio, at 100KW (?) AM could induce a measurable field in rebar in concrete floors in Mason (I was there and measured it with an oscilloscope) but thats more or less standing right under the tower. Thats probably not even radiated power, that may have been induced ground currents.
" “substantial risk to equipment and operation of the nation’s power grid and under extreme conditions could result in major long term electrical outages,” "
Credible statement by me, but ONLY within the exact context in which it is said. There is NOTHING in that statement about an EMP causing phsical damage to some nebulous entity called "National power grid" as there is no such thing in the first place.
A high powered EM pulse could very easily cause mal-operation or some equipment damage to power line comms devices, but I place no credibility on that 'cutting across power lines and blowing up power substations'
For a real example of that, put a bag of food with a metal baggie tie in a microwave oven, THERE is first hand physical damage from a RF source, except that the source is within a few inches of the source, the source is CONSTANT, not an extremely high speed, short duration PULSE, and is maybe 600-1500 watts. Thats a CONCENTRATED source, not a distant point source.
"major long term electrical outages"
With respect to a power utility, a 10 second outage is a major disaster. Lose power to a smelter operation, let the smelters go cold and the whole works is permanently ruined. THAT is a disater, but only locally.
But, here go the crackpot conspiracy theorists on sites like Info Wars, jumping to wild conclusions about some scientist stating that an EMP will cause massive direct damage to a physical power grid AND some inter-stellar disaster in 2012.
Go to infowars.com and laugh. I do.
A more direct example of a real threat was Fly by Wire/Fly by Light, which was a USAF program that changed some of the control wiring in F-16s, especially that which was routed through ENGINE COMPARTMENTS (noisy places with all that combustion energy) to fiber optics. In theory at least, that would make critical control circuits more immune to such pulses. I have no idea what the test results were.
Posted by Dave
at 11:44 AM PDT
Updated: Monday, 20 June 2011 12:23 PM PDT
