wouldn't take much for a major "lights out"

Report: U.S. Could Be Plunged Into Blackout By Minimal Attacks

http://time.com/23281/report-u-s-could-be-plunged-into-blackout-by-minimal-attacks/

"A major federal study on the vulnerability of the U.S. electric grid reportedly finds that taking out just nine of the country's 55,000 electric-transmission substations—on a hot day when they're stressed—could provoke a national blackout"

just a little more recently released research on the bullet we dodged in 2012

Fierce solar magnetic storm barely missed Earth in 2012

http://newscenter.berkeley.edu/2014/03/18/fierce-solar-magnetic-storm-barely-missed-earth-in-2012/

"“Had it hit Earth, it probably would have been like the big one in 1859, but the effect today, with our modern technologies, would have been tremendous,” said Luhmann, who is part of the STEREO (Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory) team and based at UC Berkeley’s Space Sciences Laboratory.

A study last year estimated that the cost of a solar storm like the Carrington Event could reach $2.6 trillion worldwide. A considerably smaller event on March 13, 1989, led to the collapse of Canada’s Hydro-Quebec power grid and a resulting loss of electricity to six million people for up to nine hours.

“An extreme space weather storm — a solar superstorm — is a low-probability, high-consequence event that poses severe threats to critical infrastructures of the modern society,” warned Liu, who is with the National Space Science Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences in Beijing. “The cost of an extreme space weather event, if it hits Earth, could reach trillions of dollars with a potential recovery time of 4-10 years. Therefore, it is paramount to the security and economic interest of the modern society to understand solar superstorms.”

let me repeat just a few of those words  "a potential recovery time of 4-10 years"

that's one hell of a game changer

Hearing: Electric Grid Vulnerable to EMP

http://freebeacon.com/national-security/hearing-electric-grid-vulnerable-to-emp/

“It strikes at my very core when I think of the men, women, and children in cities and rural towns across America with a possibility of no access to food, water, or transportation,” he said. “In a matter of weeks or months at most, a worst-case scenario could bring devastation beyond imagination.”

lots of good info on the grid going down and the consequences

Super Solar Storm To Hit Earth - 'Carrington Effect'; 400 Nuke Plants Will Melt Down/Explode

http://agreenroad.blogspot.com/2012/03/super-solar-storm-predicted-to-hit-2013.html

and I have read One Second After

it's one of my favorite doomer porn books !

Five Reasons The U.S. Power Grid Is Overdue For A Cyber Catastrophe

http://www.forbes.com/sites/lorenthompson/2015/08/19/five-reasons-the-u-s-power-grid-is-overdue-for-a-cyber-catastrophe/

we're seeing more and MORE warnings about potential attacks against the grid

Satori wrote: I have it on good authority that those squirrels were associated with ISIS

BERLIN — In the early years of the Obama administration, the United States developed an elaborate plan for a cyberattack on Iran in case the diplomatic effort to limit its nuclear program failed and led to a military conflict, according to a coming documentary film and interviews with military and intelligence officials involved in the effort.

The plan, code-named Nitro Zeus, was devised to disable Iran’s air defenses, communications systems and crucial parts of its power grid, and was shelved, at least for the foreseeable future, after the nuclear deal struck between Iran and six other nations last summer was fulfilled.

Nitro Zeus was part of an effort to assure President Obama that he had alternatives, short of a full-scale war, if Iran lashed out at the United States or its allies in the region. At its height, officials say, the planning for Nitro Zeus involved thousands of American military and intelligence personnel, spending tens of millions of dollars and placing electronic implants in Iranian computer networks to “prepare the battlefield,” in the parlance of the Pentagon.

comment: So much for developing state-of-the-art cyber weapons to fight Isis and Iran

Puerto Rico Blackout Enters Second Day - Entire Island Of 3.5 Million People Without Power

http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2016-09-22/puerto-rico-blackout-enters-second-day-leaving-entire-island-and-its-35mm-people-wit