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<ul><li>India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has called for the country’s 1.3 billion citizens to switch off their lights on Sunday, April 5. </li><li>State load power centres are concerned that the sudden drop in demand could trip the system. </li><li>The last time India’s power grids failed, it left over 600 million people without electricity for more than 10 hours.</li></ul>This Sunday on April 5 India’s Prime Minister Narendra Modi has asked the country’s 1.3 billion people to switch off their lights to show their "collective resolve" in the fights against Coronavirus. This has led to concerns that the sudden fluctuation in electricity could lead to a blackout — like the two massive outages of 2012. Unlike past blackouts in the country, this would be the first time that a blackout has been a result of surplus power supply rather than excess demand. State load dispatch centres (SLDCs) and transmission utilities are <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/indias-power-grids-gear-up-for-1-3-billion-people-switching-of-their-lights-on-april-5/articleshow/74980245.cms">gearing up</a> to deal with the sudden fluctuation in power supply. <div type="image" title="power7" msid="74981500" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;The sun rise through electrical poles of power grid at Nunna village near Vijayawada&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> The concern is that the peak power demand was already 25% lower on April 2 as compared to the a year ago at 125.81 Gigawatts. According to the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/the-indian-electricity-grid-is-robust-and-stable-indias-apex-power-agency-asserts-that-april-5-blackout-wont-cause-any-damage/articleshow/74983880.cms">Power System Operation Corporation Limited</a>, the agency responsible for managing the country's electricity grid, power demand will only fall by around 10 to 12 Gigawatts and will have no breaking on the stability of the national grid. "This sharp reduction in load and recovery, which is unprecedented, will need to be handled through hydro and gas resources," the company explained in a statement. This isn’t the first time that the country is going through a voluntary blackout, officials told <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/indias-power-grids-gear-up-for-1-3-billion-people-switching-of-their-lights-on-april-5/articleshow/74980245.cms">PTI</a>. Such exercises have also been conducted in the during initiatives like ‘Earth Hour’. However, this is the first time that all 1.3 billion people will be acting collectively, albeit voluntarily. The last time there was a blackout in India, most people were left without electricity for nearly 10 hours while others had to go over 24 hours without any power. The two biggest blackouts of the 21st century India’s <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2012/jul/31/india-blackout-electricity-power-cuts">two blackouts of 2012</a> are remembered as the the biggest blackouts of the decade. On power blackouts, which occurred on 30 and 31 July 2012, left over 600 million people — 9% of the world’s population — in the dark. Some parts of country faced outages that lasted as long as 10 hours, the other half was left with no electricity at all. <div type="image" title="power3" msid="74981518" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Massive rush of commuters at Rajiv Chowk Metro station in New Delhi following an overnight region-wide power outage in July 2012&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> It started when one of the circuit breakers on the Bina-Gwalior line tripped on 29 July 2012. This line was linked to Agra-Bareilly transmission section — where the circults also tripped. From there on, it cascaded into power failures across the country’s power grids. In the affected states, all major power stations had to be shut down. It took nearly 15 hours to restore 80% of the service. <div type="image" title="power5" msid="74981520" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Streets are packed in heavy traffics following power outage and rains in the central part of New Delhi in July 2012&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> The system failed again on 31 July due to a relay problem near the Taj Mahal. For a second consecutive day, power stations across the <a href="https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2012_India_blackouts#cite_note-DH-5">22 affected stated</a> were pulled offline to resolve the issue. The blackout of 2001 While the blackouts of 2012 were two of the biggest that India has had to face, they’re not the only notable examples. In January 2001, another blackouts — primarily affecting north Indian states — left 230 million people without power. <div type="image" title="power1" msid="74981527" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Sunset behind a street light during in Delhi &amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> The blackout was triggered when a substation in Uttar Pradesh failed. Power failures were subsequently reported in Punjab, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chandigarh, Delhi — all the way to Jammu and Kashmir. It took the authorities over 16 hours to restore power. Meanwhile, more than 80 trains were stranded midway and businesses came to a standstill. The blackout reportedly resulted in a loss of <a href="https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2001/01/ind-j09.html">$5 billion</a>, according to the Confederation of Indian Industry (CII). Considering that the the upcoming blackout will a voluntary choice, it’s unlikely that it will trigger any power grid failures. Nonetheless, in some states — like <a href="https://www.ndtv.com/india-news/coronavirus-maharashtra-energy-minister-nitin-raut-concern-after-pm-modi-appeal-to-turn-off-all-ligh-2205916">Maharashtra</a> — the energy minister has urged citizens to reconsider Modi’s call to switch all the lights off. See also: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/indias-power-grids-gear-up-for-1-3-billion-people-switching-of-their-lights-on-april-5/articleshow/74980245.cms">India's power grids gear up for 1.3 billion people switching of their lights on April 5</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/india/news/india-puts-curbs-on-exports-of-testing-kits-with-immediate-effect/articleshow/74979665.cms">India puts curbs on exports of testing kits with immediate effect</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/international/news/coronavirus-impact-global-food-supply-chain-could-sky-rocket-with-anxiety-driven-panic-say-experts/articleshow/74977714.cms">Coronavirus' impact on the global food supply chain could sky-rocket with anxiety-driven panic, say experts</a>

PM Modi's bid for a blackout could trip power grids — Here's what happened the last two times India had a massive power outage

<ul><li>Solar flares contain <keyword id="1300605" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="solar-particles">solar particles</keyword>, which pose a threat to <keyword id="73998" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="astronauts">astronauts</keyword>, satellites, power grids and aeroplanes.</li><li>Moreover, they’re very hard to predict ahead of time.</li><li>Scientists believe they know where these particles originate, which may help astronomers better forecast solar flares that pose a threat to Earth and its technology.</li></ul>Every now and then, the Sun spits out a <keyword id="429902" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="solar-flare">solar flare</keyword> that leaves the Earth’s critical infrastructure on edge. One example is the ‘Carrington Event’ of 1859 in which a large solar storm caused telegraphic systems across Europe and America to fail. Another is the 1989 massive power blackout in Quebec. Knowing when a solar flare is going to occur could help Earth better prepare against solar storms and reduce the risk to human lives. In what may be a milestone in this research, a new study by astronomers at University College London (UCL) and George Mason University could at least tell others where to look. <div type="image" title="coronal mass ejections_edited" msid="81331400" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;A medium-sized (M2) solar flare and a coronal mass ejection (CME) erupted from the same, large active region of the sun on 14 July 2017. The flare lasted almost two hours, quite a long duration, according to NASA.&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> So what are we talking about? Even though the Sun is 149.6 million kilometers away, potentially hazardous solar particles within these flares have been known to knock out satellites and cause city-wide blackouts. They also pose a radiation risk to astronauts and threaten the <keyword id="48724" type="PERSON" weightage="20" keywordseo="Navigation">navigation</keyword> capabilities of aeroplanes and ships. Tracking down or predicting when these solar flares will occur has proven to be an elusive endeavour so far. According to the new study, the source is not slow solar wind but plasma located low in the Sun’s outermost layer, the corona. However, the solar particles are closer to the middle region of the Sun’s atmosphere — the chromosphere — than the outer edges of the Sun. <div type="image" title="layers of the sun_edited" msid="81331330" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;Layers of the Sun (innermost to outermost going left to right)&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> “Our evidence supports theories that these highly charged particles originate from plasma that has been held down low in the Sun's atmosphere by strong magnetic fields,” said co-author of the study published in <a href="https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/7/10/eabf0068">Science Advances</a>, Stephanie Yardley in a <a href="https://phys.org/news/2021-03-source-hazardous-high-energy-particles-sun.html">statement</a>. “These energetic particles, once released, are then accelerated by eruptions that travel at a speed of a few thousand kilometers a second.” The threat of solar flares A solar cycle is the amount of time it takes for the Sun’s magnetic poles to flip. During the process, the star transitions between an active to a quiet phase. Even though we know the length of one cycle is around 11 years, it’s still impossible to see when solar is going to occur until it's after the fact. The potentially hazardous solar particles within these solar flares can reach Earth within a matter of minutes. And, in all likelihood, the event will last a couple of days. The comparable data at the disposal of scientists is limited since records only go as far back as five cycles. An analysis led by the <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/science/space/news/great-super-solar-storms-strong-enough-to-cause-blackouts-flare-up-every-25-years/articleshow/73894093.cms">University of Warwick</a> was one of the first to study the past fourteen cycles for the first time and found that ‘severe’ magnetic storms have occurred 42 times — that’s one every 25 years. According to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (<a href="https://visibleearth.nasa.gov/images/55580/biggest-solar-flare-on-record/55582l" id="docs-internal-guid-e4d955ca-7fff-1010-31e7-02d86cdabdc4">NASA</a>), the biggest solar flare on record is from 2 April 2001. The explosion from the Sun hurled a coronal mass ejection into space at a whopping speed of roughly 7.2 million kilometres per hour. Luckily, the flare was not directed at Earth. <div type="image" title="superflarecombo_lrg_edited" msid="81331509" hostid="261" caption="&amp;lt;p&amp;gt;On Monday, 2 April 2001, the sun unleashed the biggest solar flare ever recorded, as observed by the Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) satellite.&amp;lt;/p&amp;gt;"></div> The new solar cycle will be their testing ground The scientists were able to track down these energised particles because they had the same ‘fingerprint’ as plasma from deep within the Sun’s corona. In order to determine whether their observations held true, these astronomers used events from the last solar cycle. However, in September last year, the star at the centre of our universe embarked on a fresh 11-year solar cycle. Now, these scientists will use their observations to try and predict when the next solar flare may occur in the new solar cycle. “We are now starting a new solar cycle, and once it gets going we will use the same techniques to see if our results are generally true, or if these events are somehow unusual,” said lead author David Brooks in a statement. SEE ALSO: <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/apps/news/this-spam-blocker-may-add-a-layer-of-anonymity-to-your-social-media-presence-while-twitter-and-facebook-are-under-pressure-to-verify-their-users/articleshow/81327239.cms">This spam blocker may add a layer of anonymity to your social media presence while Twitter and Facebook are under pressure to verify their users</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/tech/enterprise/news/mozilla-is-not-happy-with-indias-new-it-rules-claiming-there-arent-enough-checks-and-balances-in-place/articleshow/81308608.cms">Mozilla is not happy with India's new IT rules claiming there aren't enough checks and balances in place</a> <a href="https://www.businessinsider.in/business/news/indian-companies-stand-to-lose-7-14-lakh-crore-to-climate-change-but-they-could-end-up-making-2-9-lakh-crore-too/articleshow/81306789.cms">Indian companies stand to lose ₹7.14 lakh crore to climate change — but they could end up making ₹2.9 lakh crore too</a>

Earth's satellites, power grids and planes may have more time to prepare against the threat of solar flares

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PM Modi's bid for a blackout could trip power grids — Here's what happened the last two times India had a massive power outage

Prabhjote Gill

Earth's satellites, power grids and planes may have more time to prepare against the threat of solar flares

Prabhjote Gill

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