Battery storage 30% cheaper than new gas peaker plants, Australian study finds

[turbguy + 1,537]

46 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

Large industrial and users get special low rates and should agree to being first to shut down heavy machinery when needed. Exceptions for some industries like food storage and medical. 

Yes.  That type of account is common throughout the industry, and is a means of shedding load, BEFORE an imbalance between generation and demand is reached.

Edited April 29, 2021 by turbguy

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

28 minutes ago, ronwagn said:

Large industrial and users get special low rates and should agree to being first to shut down heavy machinery when needed. Exceptions for some industries like food storage and medical. 

Load subject to contracted demand management does not count against the projected max peak: the system is designed to shed this load when required. This will include al the usual suspects as it has for decades. It will also include a whole bunch of new stuff at the level of individual smart appliances and other small but ubiquitous stuff, including home heat pumps and AC. the other big new smart demand is the EVs. All of this fancy stuff means that demand management will be much finer-grained than it is today.

Food storage and medical will not generally have contracted for demand management. If load shedding starts to affect them, the system is operating beyond its worst-case demand projections, and the grid must now struggle to save itself by blacking out some load on an involuntary basis: the classic "rolling blackout" scenario.

Given smart loads everywhere, it would be possible to apply much more precise load shedding, down to the level of individual loads. A customer would contract for certain max demand at each of several priorities, and at different costs for each priority level. For example, In my house I could contact for (say) 0.5 kW "essential", and run the refrigerator, two light bulbs, and the router, "high-pri" would include hot water and heat pump. "medium-pri" would be the rest of the house, and low pri would be the EV. Or whatever.

[turbguy + 1,537]

1 hour ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

Load subject to contracted demand management does not count against the projected max peak: the system is designed to shed this load when required. This will include al the usual suspects as it has for decades. It will also include a whole bunch of new stuff at the level of individual smart appliances and other small but ubiquitous stuff, including home heat pumps and AC. the other big new smart demand is the EVs. All of this fancy stuff means that demand management will be much finer-grained than it is today.

Food storage and medical will not generally have contracted for demand management. If load shedding starts to affect them, the system is operating beyond its worst-case demand projections, and the grid must now struggle to save itself by blacking out some load on an involuntary basis: the classic "rolling blackout" scenario.

Given smart loads everywhere, it would be possible to apply much more precise load shedding, down to the level of individual loads. A customer would contract for certain max demand at each of several priorities, and at different costs for each priority level. For example, In my house I could contact for (say) 0.5 kW "essential", and run the refrigerator, two light bulbs, and the router, "high-pri" would include hot water and heat pump. "medium-pri" would be the rest of the house, and low pri would be the EV. Or whatever.

Smart metering already exists in many areas, and is relatively inexpensive.  The "load shed granularity" at the residential level can be controlled to individual meters.  Those can be back-fitted right now, with no need to change appliances or alter your internal circuitry.

Edited April 29, 2021 by turbguy

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

1 hour ago, turbguy said:

Smart metering already exists in many areas, and is relatively inexpensive.  The "load shed granularity" at the residential level can be controlled to individual meters.  Those can be back-fitted right now, with no need to change appliances or alter your internal circuitry.

But I want to automatically selectively load shed within my home. I don't want an all-or-nothing loss of electricity. I think this means that my individual loads must be sensitive to a signal from the meter (or somewhere), and this does require some sort of per-circuit or per-appliance control. I know I can ask the electric company to install something on an electric hot water heater that responds to a signal. That is a crude baby step.

[nsdp + 449]

One thing about this is the authors should be shot at sunrise for cherry picking the data. I got my IBEW journeyman's card as a dispatcher and was certified by IEEE a a Power Generation and Transmission Protection specialist in 1975. The authors do not factor in any intelligent manner something called parallel path(linear programming-simplex mathematics developed by John von Neuman) nor do I see them calculating costs  for managing dynamic reactive power, (all inverters give you synthetic inertia)/grid inertia, phase angle/relaying, frequency and voltage control.  Voltage will control frequency  but not the other way around. I doubt any of the authors would recognize Maxwell's equations if they walked up, said.  "excuse me " and then bit them in the ass.

Inverters destabilize the grid when they reach a significant percentage of load. https://www.nrel.gov/docs/fy21osti/73476.pdf

"This report is intended to provide a comprehensive analysis of the challenges in integrating inverter-based resources and offer recommendations on potential technology pathways to inform the academic community, industry, and government research organizations. Although the focus of this roadmap is on grid-forming inverter controls, their impact on grid stability, and evaluating crucial system interactions (e.g., protection), we recognize that the large interconnections in North America will comprise both electromechanical and inverter-based resources (in this roadmap, sometimes called a hybrid power system). More importantly, we further recognize that inverter-based resources will comprise both grid-forming resources and other forms of control, such as grid-following resources. "

The February 15th was a rerun of the February 1-4, 2011 winter storm. EPE is an example of the problems when DYNAMIC support for the grid is missing. 

"Because of the significant loss of its local generation (six out of seven operational units) and the resulting loss of dynamic reactive support, EPE was limited in the amount of generation that could be imported on its transmission system.

On 2/2 "2:02 AM, EPE purchased power from SPS; the Eddy DC tie was opened and ramped to 100 MW. "

5:07 am t 5:07 AM, the HVDC terminal at the Eddy DC Tie experienced a runback169 from 100 MW to 48 MW. "  https://www.ferc.gov/sites/default/files/2020-04/08-16-11-report.pdf p105-6 this due to loss of DYNAMIC reactive power. incident

The EPE is a classic example of synthetic inertia failure  associated with inverters because they have no inertial mass. LBNL explanation of low inertia. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CZtzgWsWImsBlackout like ERCOT Feb. 15 2021.  EPE fixed their problems.

Correct solution https://www.powermag.com/aes-uses-synchronous-condensers-for-grid-balancing/

 

 

 

 

Edited April 29, 2021 by nsdp

[turbguy + 1,537]

9 hours ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

But I want to automatically selectively load shed within my home. I don't want an all-or-nothing loss of electricity. I think this means that my individual loads must be sensitive to a signal from the meter (or somewhere), and this does require some sort of per-circuit or per-appliance control. I know I can ask the electric company to install something on an electric hot water heater that responds to a signal. That is a crude baby step.

IF you have an electric hot water heater.  If nat gas, no deal.

I agree that selective load sheds are desirable, but reflect on all the devices that must be altered or installed to perform what you want to do.

I guess a host of "smart outlets/plugs" could be an option for some devices, but typically not large hard-wired residential loads.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

59 minutes ago, turbguy said:

IF you have an electric hot water heater.  If nat gas, no deal.

I agree that selective load sheds are desirable, but reflect on all the devices that must be altered or installed to perform what you want to do.

I guess a host of "smart outlets/plugs" could be an option for some devices, but typically not large hard-wired residential loads.

No, it does not work with your natural gas appliances, but the need for fine control of natural gas usage is a truly exceptional situation. The only occurrence of this that I can recall happened in Texas in February 2021.

For fine-grained demand management of electricity I anticipate a gradual transition. Basically all big appliances now have a microcontroller of some sort because they are cheaper than the electromechanical controllers they replaced.  The incremental cost of an over-the-wire receiver is probably less than one dollar, and the incremental per-unit cost of the controller software is basically zero. The only extra functionality would be defining the protocol that continuously (say, once per second) broadcasts the current load-shedding level from the meter to the house wiring.  So, if an industry standards body published a trivially-simple spec for the protocol, we would eventually get there. Higher-end appliances would integrate with smart home systems to allow for (fairly worthless) fancy monitoring and reconfiguration.

[turbguy + 1,537]

49 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

No, it does not work with your natural gas appliances, but the need for fine control of natural gas usage is a truly exceptional situation. The only occurrence of this that I can recall happened in Texas in February 2021.

For fine-grained demand management of electricity I anticipate a gradual transition. Basically all big appliances now have a microcontroller of some sort because they are cheaper than the electromechanical controllers they replaced.  The incremental cost of an over-the-wire receiver is probably less than one dollar, and the incremental per-unit cost of the controller software is basically zero. The only extra functionality would be defining the protocol that continuously (say, once per second) broadcasts the current load-shedding level from the meter to the house wiring.  So, if an industry standards body published a trivially-simple spec for the protocol, we would eventually get there. Higher-end appliances would integrate with smart home systems to allow for (fairly worthless) fancy monitoring and reconfiguration.

Actually, if these "smart appliances" could simply monitor frequency, they might not even need any communication,

Heavy load, if frequency drops by say 0.2 %, off.

Lighter loads, if frequency drops .3%, off.

or something similar.

 

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

2 minutes ago, turbguy said:

Actually, if these "smart appliances" could simply monitor frequency, they might not even need any communication,

Heavy load, if frequency drops by say 0.2 %, off.

Lighter loads, if frequency drops .3%, off.

or something similar.

 

Here is where my ignorance shows up. I simply do not know the details of how the gird reacts to overload the way you do.

[turbguy + 1,537]

16 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

Here is where my ignorance shows up. I simply do not know the details of how the gird reacts to overload the way you do.

Seems that might take some deeper thought, but auto-load shedding based on granular underfrequency monitoring for household load should work.

It should be possible to even build that functionality into individual circuit-breakers in the home's panel.

Then you could just switch old breakers with upgraded breakers (like the way arc-detection breakers came into being) to install it. 

Easy-peasy??

Particularly with new construction!

Edited April 29, 2021 by turbguy

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

6 minutes ago, turbguy said:

Seems that might take some deeper thought, but auto-load shedding based on granular underfrequency monitoring for household load should work.

It should be possible to even build that functionality into individual circuit-breakers in the home's panel.

Then you could just switch old breakers with upgraded breakers (like the way arc-detection breakers came into being) to install it. 

Easy-peasy??

If frequency is a (usually) reliable signal, then adding frequency-monitoring inside each appliance that already has a microcontrooler (i.e., most of them) is a very inexpensive option. These can implement algorithms to sample and make appropriate decisions e.g. about how long to stay off or when to turn off. For example, a microwave that has less than a minute on its timer might stay on until the end of the time, whille a microwave that has just noticed that the frequency has recovered might delay starting a new job for at least a few seconds. the hot water heater would shut off instantly, but would stay off for longer after recovery if the heater temperature was still above the "load-shedding" temperature setting.

[RichieRich216 + 454]

Sure when Elon builds them for next to nothing! 90% of the County is waste land…

[Ecocharger + 1,447]

Here is an article which shows that renewable electricity is less reliable than gas generated electricity.

This pretty well decides the argument.

https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Renewable-Energy/The-Ugly-Truth-About-Renewable-Power.html

And from Forbes,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2021/04/20/why-renewables-cause-blackouts-and-increase-vulnerability-to-extreme-weather/?sh=7f0d46764e75

Edited April 30, 2021 by Ecocharger

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

On 4/29/2021 at 8:04 PM, Ecocharger said:

Here is an article which shows that renewable electricity is less reliable than gas generated electricity.

This pretty well decides the argument.

https://oilprice.com/Alternative-Energy/Renewable-Energy/The-Ugly-Truth-About-Renewable-Power.html

And from Forbes,

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2021/04/20/why-renewables-cause-blackouts-and-increase-vulnerability-to-extreme-weather/?sh=7f0d46764e75

I'm not aware of any expert that thinks wind or solar are more reliable than natural gas-powered generators, so this is a false argument. Both of these articles incorrectly generalize from wind and solar to "renewables".  (As an aside, this is a false generalization, since geothermal and hydro both count as renewable and are more reliable than NG. Nuclear is also more reliable than NG.)

Wind and solar are variable. Solar is reliably variable in some seasons and some places. If you want a system with more than about 20% wind and solar, you need reliable mid-term and long-term storage. The best candidate for mid-and long-term storage is pumped hydro. Pumped hydro is more reliable than natural gas. With pumped hydro, you can design and implement a system that goes all the way to 100% renewable.

The main problem with pumped hydro is a very long implementation time. This is driven almost entirely by environmental regulations and permitting, which do not distinguish closed-loop pumped hydro from traditional hydro-electric dams.

[-trance + 114]

1 hour ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

The main problem with pumped hydro is a very long implementation time. This is driven almost entirely by environmental regulations and permitting, which do not distinguish closed-loop pumped hydro from traditional hydro-electric dams.

There are other gravity potential storage techniques that require less regulatory approval.

Electric cranes that stack blocks or a heavy locomotive on a hill.  

Unlike with water there are no fish to disrupt, and you can't leak or evaporate away your energy.   Even "borrowing" water from an ecosystem can have serious detrimental effects, generally thermal pollution / deoxygenation.

Edited May 2, 2021 by -trance

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

44 minutes ago, -trance said:

There are other gravity potential storage techniques that require less regulatory approval.

Electric cranes that stack blocks or a heavy locomotive on a hill.  

Unlike with water there are no fish to disrupt, and you can't leak or evaporate away your energy.   Even "borrowing" water from an ecosystem can have serious detrimental effects, generally thermal pollution / deoxygenation.

A closed pumped hydro system does not need to interact with the ecosystem at all. You need to "borrow" that water only once, just like you need to "borrow" whatever mass is used in those other gravity systems. There were no fish in the upper and lower reservoirs to begin with because those reservoirs did not exist before the system was built, and the water won't evaporate if you put covers on the reservoirs.

For any gravity system (see this), you get a theoretical 1.36 Wh/kg for a 500m lift. That's 1.36 kWh/tonne. For water, a tonne is a cubic meter, so a pair of reservoirs that are each 1 sq. km in area will provide 1.36 GWh for each meter of depth.

For comparison, one bbl (of oil or whatever) is 159 liters. The total oil storage capacity at Cushing is 75.8 million bbl. If you split that tankage and put half at the top of your 500-meter mountain and half at the bottom, you can store 6 GL = 8.2 GWh of electricity.

A square km is 247 acres. Assume a 10 meter depth: we can store 1 GWh in each 25 acres. The US has more than 735 ash ponds of more than 50 acres each with an average depth of 40 feet: this would store more than 1500 GWh if these ponds were magically relocated to suitable locations.

[Dan Clemmensen + 1,011]

On 5/2/2021 at 12:59 PM, -trance said:

There are other gravity potential storage techniques that require less regulatory approval.

Electric cranes that stack blocks or a heavy locomotive on a hill.  

Unlike with water there are no fish to disrupt, and you can't leak or evaporate away your energy.   Even "borrowing" water from an ecosystem can have serious detrimental effects, generally thermal pollution / deoxygenation.

Stacking blocks vs pumped hydro: let's assume your blocks are lead (density=11). Anything denser will cost too much. A water tank will need to have the same height and 11 times the area of your lead stack to store the same energy. The water tank would have a diameter 3.3 times the cylindrical lead stack.  I see no way the stack of lead is cost-competitive even before we look at the other system components.

The only place I can think of that may effectively store energy with weights is a skyscraper. Lift people up in the morning using solar energy, and recover the energy during the evening rush hour by lowering them back down.😀

[-trance + 114]

13 minutes ago, Dan Clemmensen said:

Stacking blocks vs pumped hydro: let's assume your blocks are lead (density=11). Anything denser will cost too much. A water tank will need to have the same height and 11 times the area of your lead stack to store the same energy. The water tank would have a diameter 3.3 times the cylindrical lead stack.  I see no way the stack of lead is cost-competitive even before we look at the other system components.

The only place I can think of that may effectively store energy with weights is a skyscraper. Lift people up in the morning using solar energy, and recover the energy during the evening rush hour by lowering them back down.😀

I only mentioned it because of the comment about regulatory hurdles related to water systems.

I agree pumped water is probably better, but water is essential for life and lead or rocks is not.

"Lifted human flesh" is awesome!

Edited May 4, 2021 by -trance

[Ecocharger + 1,447]

Brookings research,

"

"As Brookings, a nonprofit public policy organization, contributor Samantha Gross notes:

"The energy density of fossil fuels is particularly important in the transportation sector. A vehicle needs to carry its fuel around as it travels, so the weight and volume of that fuel are key. Electric vehicles are a much-touted solution for replacing oil, but they are not perfect for all uses. Pound for pound, gasoline or diesel fuel contain about 40 times as much energy as a state-of-the-art battery. On the other hand, electric motors are much more efficient than internal combustion engines and electric vehicles are simpler mechanically, with many fewer moving parts. These advantages make up for some of the battery's weight penalty, but an electric vehicle will still be heavier than a similar vehicle running on fossil fuel. For vehicles that carry light loads and can refuel often, like passenger cars, this penalty isn't a big deal. But for aviation, maritime shipping, or long-haul trucking, where the vehicle must carry heavy loads for long distances without refueling, the difference in energy density between fossil fuels and batteries is a huge challenge, and electric vehicles just don't meet the need."

Also "Over the 20th century, the energy system transformed from one in which fossil energy was used directly into one in which an important portion of fossil fuels are used to generate electricity. The proportion used in electricity generation varies by fuel. Because oil — an energy-dense liquid — is so fit-for-purpose in transport, little of it goes to electricity; in contrast, roughly 63% of coal produced worldwide is used to generate electricity. Methods of generating electricity that don’t rely on fossil fuels, like nuclear and hydroelectric generation, are also important parts of the system in many areas. However, fossil fuels are still the backbone of the electricity system, generating 64% of today’s global supply."

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 4/26/2021 at 11:58 AM, Dan Clemmensen said:

Yep. This is the fundamental problem and I think it it why we keep arguing on this forum. We need to invest whole lot of capital to meet a rare situation. As the energy system and its fiscal structures have evolved over the last century, consumers pay for electricity and utilities invest capital and sell the electricity, so the fundamental mindset has been that a peaker must pay for itself based on the electricity it produces. But this is not the way to look at it, so we need to change the financial model and its mindset.  Our society pays for lots of stuff we hope we never need, for example the military and the fire department.

I am personally more in favor of local storage than I am of  long-distance transfer to meet peaks, but both probably have their place. We need energy storage in two timeframes. Batteries handle the short inter-day timeframe. They are preferred because the round-trip power==>storage==>power efficiency is very high. For longer-term storage (days, weeks, months)  storage efficiency ($/kWh) predominates, even when the round-trip efficiency is much lower. Basically, the lost energy is part of the cost of the long-term storage, and it is economical when you are using "free" excess renewable energy. In practice, the renewables are used every day with the electricity first going to instantaneous demand, then to battery until the battery is full, and finally to long-term, so renewables are not curtailed until long-term storage is completely full.  In California, if we stored as much hydrogen (or equivalent) as we currently store natural gas, we would have several months worth.

The two major contenders for long-term storage are Hydrogen and pumped hydro. The advantage of hydrogen is that it is also an efficient way to transport energy from areas with an annual surplus to areas without an annual surplus. Unfortunately, we are not there yet. A likely candidate for hydrogen transport and storage is ammonia.

You mention that we spend a lot of money on things that we might never need yet here we are spending trillions on wind, solar, and hydrogen etc. That is all money that could be spent on more important things such as hardening our grid against enemy EMP attacks, solar flares, distributed redundant energy sources and related issues. The plan for distributed and redundant energy sources would include gradually increasing wind, solar, pumped hydr and other technologies. We need a plan that the people will all get behind, not fed to us by the green lobby that will have us buying more products from China. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 4/28/2021 at 10:11 PM, Dan Clemmensen said:

Load subject to contracted demand management does not count against the projected max peak: the system is designed to shed this load when required. This will include al the usual suspects as it has for decades. It will also include a whole bunch of new stuff at the level of individual smart appliances and other small but ubiquitous stuff, including home heat pumps and AC. the other big new smart demand is the EVs. All of this fancy stuff means that demand management will be much finer-grained than it is today.

Food storage and medical will not generally have contracted for demand management. If load shedding starts to affect them, the system is operating beyond its worst-case demand projections, and the grid must now struggle to save itself by blacking out some load on an involuntary basis: the classic "rolling blackout" scenario.

Given smart loads everywhere, it would be possible to apply much more precise load shedding, down to the level of individual loads. A customer would contract for certain max demand at each of several priorities, and at different costs for each priority level. For example, In my house I could contact for (say) 0.5 kW "essential", and run the refrigerator, two light bulbs, and the router, "high-pri" would include hot water and heat pump. "medium-pri" would be the rest of the house, and low pri would be the EV. Or whatever.

Nice ideas but how does that supply grid protection against EMP's solar flares, and local redundancy? Another question is how would wind turbines, individual off grid solar, connected solar do with EMP and sola flares? How could they be protected? Yet again, do we have ANY real protection in our system? Do we just wait for China to destroy our entire energy system  and then hope to destroy theirs? They will still be backed up by coal. Thoughts on real important issues? 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 4/29/2021 at 12:25 AM, Dan Clemmensen said:

But I want to automatically selectively load shed within my home. I don't want an all-or-nothing loss of electricity. I think this means that my individual loads must be sensitive to a signal from the meter (or somewhere), and this does require some sort of per-circuit or per-appliance control. I know I can ask the electric company to install something on an electric hot water heater that responds to a signal. That is a crude baby step.

I want to rely on a personal natural gas generator with the assurance that the natural gas infrastructure is protected from EMP and solar flares. I would also like to be able to switch to propane. 

[ronwagn + 6,290]

On 5/2/2021 at 1:19 PM, Dan Clemmensen said:

I'm not aware of any expert that thinks wind or solar are more reliable than natural gas-powered generators, so this is a false argument. Both of these articles incorrectly generalize from wind and solar to "renewables".  (As an aside, this is a false generalization, since geothermal and hydro both count as renewable and are more reliable than NG. Nuclear is also more reliable than NG.)

Wind and solar are variable. Solar is reliably variable in some seasons and some places. If you want a system with more than about 20% wind and solar, you need reliable mid-term and long-term storage. The best candidate for mid-and long-term storage is pumped hydro. Pumped hydro is more reliable than natural gas. With pumped hydro, you can design and implement a system that goes all the way to 100% renewable.

The main problem with pumped hydro is a very long implementation time. This is driven almost entirely by environmental regulations and permitting, which do not distinguish closed-loop pumped hydro from traditional hydro-electric dams.

Pumped hydro is not to be equated with dam hydro which is a far larger source of energy but can easily fail without enough rainfall. Likewise pumped hydro relies on whatever pumps the water. 

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,187]

3 hours ago, ronwagn said:

Nice ideas but how does that supply grid protection against EMP's solar flares, and local redundancy? Another question is how would wind turbines, individual off grid solar, connected solar do with EMP and sola flares? How could they be protected? Yet again, do we have ANY real protection in our system? Do we just wait for China to destroy our entire energy system  and then hope to destroy theirs? They will still be backed up by coal. Thoughts on real important issues? 

No no no... no one will EVER go to war! 

No one will EVER use EMP! 

Only the entire modern world runs on electricity/computers, such infrastructure will NEVER be attacked... surely not...

We live in Utopia didn' ch' know!

[footeab@yahoo.com + 2,187]

3 hours ago, ronwagn said:

I want to rely on a personal natural gas generator with the assurance that the natural gas infrastructure is protected from EMP and solar flares. I would also like to be able to switch to propane. 

Uh, frankly that is impossible.  AS EVERY single powerline is an antenna.  Even end point systems are near impossible to EMP shield without horrendous expenditures as this means the distribution centers logistics hubs must all Be EMP shielded --> That means humans bangin away on computers... 

EMP Engineering is HORRIFICALLY expensive and then if you have to have stupid lazy humans involved in said system?  Not realistic unless everything inside the buildings said stupid lazy humans are banging away on are EMP shielded itself.

Not even the Military is shielded from EMP my friend.  Military has SOME, uh hem, SOME systems which are EMP shielded like Fighter aircraft.  Every single tanker for said fighter aircraft is bare ass naked.  Every Logistics center is bare ass naked to EMP for instance as it is 100% computer/internet based and no one has built an EMP shielded computer in ~4 decades(Ok maybe when they were recently doing some upgrades to the Minuteman III computers they may have made one, I do not know).  Anything with a transistor (includes solar panels by the way) and Poof... EMP = gonzo.  Anyways, not a single computer/monitor in the Pentagon is shielded or any military base, and yet you want CIVILIAN infrastructure to be shielded?  Time to buy 1980's tractors and 1970's cars. Not even the Logistics of the military is shielded... No logistics, no military.  Even warships are horrifically exposed to EMP.  1 open door/hatch, improper maintenance on a seal because someone wants some fresh air or is looking at the ships wake or is power washing the deck, and poof... all internal systems on ship die.  And you want civilian infrastructure shielded?  🙄

Now is it possible to help shield things?  Of course, but overall?  Sorry, no real solutions anywhere, other than literally turning everything to DC instead of AC... It is actually possible now, but all the systems which CAN change the system from AC to DC are horrifically exposed to EMP so....

EDIT: SHould be noted fiber optic instead of telephone helps against EMP, but the end connections are horror shows for shielding as we are talking VERY expensive end points that have to have HUMAN access consistently which means sealing shielding such a building is next to impossible.

Edited May 24, 2021 by footeab@yahoo.com