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Today's Security Update ... [click here]

East Coast Heat Wave Tests Grid Resilience
Jennings Carney | 07.08.2010 | 08:26:54295 |

July 2010: As NPR has reported, a high-pressure system which settled over the East Coast over the week has brought triple-digit temperatures to the Northeast and Mid-Atlantic states testing the region's electrical grid resiliency. The heat wave has prompted local government officials to take responsive measures to help keep power and water usage down while making sure sensitive groups like the very young and very old, stay cool.

CBS News reported, "power outages affected some areas of Northern New Jersey with about 17,000 people left without air conditioning or lights for a period of time," on Monday. "On Tuesday, for many New Yorkers," CBS continued, "the power system stress rekindled fears of what happened in 2003, when a massive failure left 45 million people in eight states without power."

National Geographic wrote that a single falling tree, which sparked the massive blackout on August 14, 2003, was a small event which pushed an already-stressed-out-grid over capacity. "In the case of the grid," NG wrote, "small events not under the control of the operators can quickly knock down the whole system."

"The day was hot; the air conditioners were humming," NG continued. "Shortly after 1 p.m. EDT, grid operators at First Energy, the regional utility, called power plants to plead for more volts. At 1:36 p.m. on the shore of Lake Erie, a power station whose operator had just promised 'to push it to my max' responded by crashing. Electricity surged into northern Ohio from elsewhere to take up the slack."

"At 3:05 a 345-kilovolt transmission line near the town of Walton Hills picked that moment to short out on a tree that hadn't been trimmed. That failure diverted electricity to other lines, overloading and overheating them. One by one, like firecrackers, those lines sagged, touched trees, and short-circuted."

Not lost on the grid's antiquated design and infrastructure, the Department of Homeland Security and the Naval Postgraduate School Center for Homeland Defense and Security hosted a Workshop focusing on the power grid's resiliency and future design. Built and installed in the 1940s, the grid's role in America's infrastructure has fundamentally changed "With the advent of ubiquitous computing and the Internet, and soon the rise of electric-powered automobiles," the workshop's overview read. "The interconnected grid is losing its resiliency and as a result is highly vulnerable to small fluctuations that cascade into large system-wide failures."

The workshop's topics included smart-grid technologies like sensors, computer control and superconductor corridors, as well as distributed generation, cyber security, and social/economic issues. Richard Reed, Special Assistant to President Obama on Resilience Policy gave the Keynote address.

DHS' Science and Technology Directorate hosted a National Power Grid Simulator Workshop in 2008 and here is the Report.

 

 

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NCORP Update

NCORP and the Kennedy School of Government Collaborate on the National Blueprint for Secure Communities
Working in partnership with the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University, the ReadyCommunities Partnership is reaching out to first responders, local officials, the private sector and citizens throughout the nation to develop the National Blueprint for Secure Communities. The Blueprint will be the focus of the first National Congress for Secure Communities in November and serve as a roadmap for any community striving for resiliency during the first hours of a national or large-scale crisis.  Click Here to read more...

National Press Club Briefing on National Blueprint June 20th
In partnership with the Kennedy School of Government at Harvard University and it's non-profit, government and corporate partners, NCORP is reaching out to first responders, local officials, the private sector and citizens throughout the nation to develop a National Blueprint for Secure Communities. The Blueprint is a project under the ReadyAmerica Initiative, and was the focus of the National Press Club briefing at 11:30 a.m. on June 20, 2006.  The Blueprint will serve as a roadmap for any community working to reach a level of excellence in their preparedness.

Preliminary Report from Midwest Summit

The Midwest Summit Police Chiefs Association met May 3rd and 4th in LaCrosse, Wisconsin to develop public/private partnerships that augment and multiply community preparedness, response and recovery capabilities. NCORP joined the Summit to incorporate the output of the May 3rd Summit sessions into the National Blueprint for Secure Communities. Click Here to download the draft draft preliminary report of the Summit.



More Press Items:

Homeland Security Journal coverage

Speech at the Harvard Forum

The First 72 Hours Meeting Agenda

ReadyAmerica: The First 72 Hours

Photographs of the November 16th Meeting

Draft Transcript of Preparedness Congress

Richmond Times-Dispatch

December 17-18, 2007...
National Congress for Secure Communities  at the Capitol Hill Hyatt, Washington, D.C.

May 31, 2007...
Initial meeting in Hamilton County, IN with county/city stakeholders on the 5-community pilot project.

May 7, 2007 ...
Planning meeting in Charleston, SC with community stakeholders on the 5-community pilot.

April 25, 2007...
Meeting in Pontiac, Oakland County, Michigan for the 5-community Pilot.

January 18, 2007...
Southwestern Regional Meeting  of the NCORP Advisory Committee in Galveston, Texas

August 10, 2006...
Code Red for international flights to the U.S. originating in the UK: Code Orange for commerical U.S. domestic flights; Code Yellow for the U.S.

July 7, 2005...
Code Orange for metropolitan transportation and rail systems

January 18, 2005...
Code Yellow is in effect

Why Your Membership in ReadyCorps Will Help Strengthen Homeland Security

September 11, 2001 has not only changed the way communities view their preparation and response to crisis, but also redefined the role that citizens and corporations have in helping their communities prepare for and respond to threat and crisis. Though local, state and federal governments are responsible at one level or another, there just are not enough resources to protect all communities and property at all times, nor to respond equally or quickly. The threat and the country are too open and large.

ReadyCorps' Role

The National Council on Readiness and Preparedness has formed ReadyCorps to bring corporations together with communities, responders and governments to increase community surge capacity during incidents of mass casualty or destruction. ReadyCorps members will establish a corporate Crisis Response Officer (CRO) for each corporate facility, to serve as a contact point between responders and corporations to share information and assets, create preparedness response strategies and generally develop simple but effective ways to train and prepare employees for threat or crisis as resources to the responder sector during community response.


Click here to read more...

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