EMP and Its Impact on Electrical Power System: Standards and Reports
- February 6, 2018
- Posted by: RSIS
- Categories: Electrical and Electronics Engineering, Engineering
International Journal of Research and Innovation in Applied Science (IJRIAS) | Volume I, Issue VI, September 2016 | ISSN 2454-6194
EMP and Its Impact on Electrical Power System: Standards and Reports
Dr. Vladimir Gurevich
Central Electric Laboratory, Israel Electric Corp., POB 10, Haifa 31000, Israel
Abstract: The purpose of the given publication is to give to civil specialists the information on accessible standards and reports in the field of EMP/HEMP which they can use at an estimation of danger of EMP for the power electrical and electronic equipment and development of means of protection.
Key words: high altitude electromagnetic pulse, HEMP, EMP, geomagneticaly induced currents, GIC, intentional destructive electromagnetic impacts.
The problem of intentional destructive electromagnetic impacts on electronic and electric equipment became apparent a few years after the USA conducted a series of nuclear test explosions coded “Operation Crossroads” on Bikini Atoll in the Marshall Islands (3800 km south-west of Hawaii) in 1946. During those test explosions a new physical phenomenon was discovered: the emergence of a powerful impulse of electromagnetic emission, encompassing an extensive area, which immediately caught the attention of military men. From 1958 until 1962 both the USA and the Soviet Union conducted a series of high burst tests (40 to 450 km) in order to investigate this phenomenon. It was revealed that the High Altitude Electromagnetic Pulse (HEMP) can destroy electronic equipment, communication systems, radiostations and radar from a distance of thousands kilometers from the center of the explosion. At that time information about this phenomenon was kept quiet. Recently, however, it has become known that since the 1980s several countries started to put their efforts into the development of a so-called “super-EMP” nuclear weapon, where the EMP (electromagnetic pulse) effect is significantly magnified compared to an ordinary nuclear weapon.
The problem of intentional destructive electromagnetic impacts on electrical power systems becomes recently more and more actual in connection with two modern trends: an extending application of microelectronics and microprocessor-based devices and systems in electric power industry – on the one hand, and intensive designs special equipment for distance destruction of electronic devices and systems – with another. The most powerful method for such destruction is the HEMP as a result of high-altitude nuclear explosion. The history of experimental high-altitude nuclear explosions includes already half a century.
