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96–952 PDF 2015

THE EMP THREAT: THE STATE OF PREPAREDNESS 

AGAINST THE THREAT OF AN ELECTROMAGNETIC PULSE (EMP) EVENT 

JOINT HEARING 

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY 

AND THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE INTERIOR 

OF THE

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT 

AND GOVERNMENT REFORM 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES 

ONE HUNDRED FOURTEENTH CONGRESS 

FIRST SESSION 

MAY 13, 2015 

Serial No. 114–42 

Printed for the use of the Committee on Oversight and Government Reform 

( 

Available via the World Wide Web: http://www.fdsys.gov 

http://www.house.gov/reform 


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COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM 

JASON CHAFFETZ, Utah, Chairman 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

MICHAEL R. TURNER, Ohio 

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee 

JIM JORDAN, Ohio 

TIM WALBERG, Michigan 

JUSTIN AMASH, Michigan 

PAUL A. GOSAR, Arizona 

SCOTT DESJARLAIS, Tennessee 

TREY GOWDY, South Carolina 

BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas 

CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming 

THOMAS MASSIE, Kentucky 

MARK MEADOWS, North Carolina 

RON DESANTIS, Florida 

MICK MULVANEY, South Carolina 

KEN BUCK, Colorado 

MARK WALKER, North Carolina 

ROD BLUM, Iowa 

JODY B. HICE, Georgia 

STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma 

EARL L. ‘‘BUDDY’’ CARTER, Georgia 

GLENN GROTHMAN, Wisconsin 

WILL HURD, Texas 

GARY J. PALMER, Alabama 

ELIJAH E. CUMMINGS, Maryland, Ranking 

Minority Member 

CAROLYN B. MALONEY, New York 

ELEANOR HOLMES NORTON, District of 

Columbia 

WM. LACY CLAY, Missouri 

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts 

JIM COOPER, Tennessee 

GERALD E. CONNOLLY, Virginia 

MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania 

TAMMY DUCKWORTH, Illinois 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan 

TED LIEU, California 

BONNIE WATSON COLEMAN, New Jersey 

STACEY E. PLASKETT, Virgin Islands 

MARK DeSAULNIER, California 

BRENDAN F. BOYLE, Pennsylvania 

PETER WELCH, Vermont 

MICHELLE LUJAN GRISHAM, New Mexico 

SEAN MCLAUGHLIN, Staff Director 

DAVID RAPALLO, Minority Staff Director 

ANDREW R. ARTHUR, National Security Subcommittee Staff Director 

WILLIAM MCGRATH, Interior Subcommittee Staff Director 

SHARON CASEY, Deputy Chief Clerk 


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SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY

RON DESANTIS, Florida, Chairman 

JOHN L. MICA, Florida 

JOHN J. DUNCAN, JR., Tennessee 

JODY B. HICE, Georgia 

STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma, Vice Chair 

WILL HUR, Texas 

STEPHEN F. LYNCH, Massachusetts, 

Ranking Member 

ROBIN L. KELLY, Illinois 

BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan 

TED LIEU, California 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE INTERIOR

CYNTHIA M. LUMMIS, Wyoming, Chairman 

PAUL A. GOSAR, Arizona 

BLAKE FARENTHOLD, Texas 

KEN BUCK, Colorado, Vice chair 

STEVE RUSSELL, Oklahoma 

GARY J. PALMER, Alabama 

BRENDA L. LAWRENCE, Michigan, Ranking 

Member 

MATT CARTWRIGHT, Pennsylvania 

STACEY E. PLASKETT, Virgin Islands 

JIM COOPER, Tennessee 


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C O N T E N T S 

Page 

Hearing held on May 13, 2015 ............................................................................... 1 

WITNESSES 

Mr. George Baker, Professor Emeritus, James Madison University, CEO of 

Baycor 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 5 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 8 

Dr. Peter Vincent Pry, Executive Director, Task Force on National and Homeland Security 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 21 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 23 

Mr. Mike Caruso, Director of Government and Specialty Business Development ETS-Lindgren 

Oral Statement ................................................................................................. 49 

Written Statement ............................................................................................ 51 

APPENDIX 

Walpole Fire Department Research Paper 2012 ................................................... 70 

Submission of William Graham, Commission to Assess Threat to U.S. From 

EMP Attack .......................................................................................................... 71 

Submission of William Radasky, Metatech Corporation ...................................... 75 

Submission of Thomas Popik, Resilient Societies ................................................. 80 

Opening Statement from Interior Ranking Member Brenda Lawrence ............. 85 

Opening Statement from Congressman Trent Franks ......................................... 87 


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THE EMP THREAT: THE STATE OF PREPAREDNESS AGAINST THE THREAT OF AN 

ELECTROMAGNETIC PULSE (EMP) EVENT 

Wednesday, May 13, 2015 

HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, 

SUBCOMMITTEE ON NATIONAL SECURITY, JOINT WITH

SUBCOMMITTEE ON THE INTERIOR, 

COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM, 

Washington, D.C. 

The subcommittees met, pursuant to call, at 2:20 p.m., in Room 

2154, Rayburn House Office Building, Hon. Ron DeSantis [chairman of the subcommittee on National Security] presiding. 

Present for Subcommittee on National Security: Representatives 

DeSantis, Duncan, Hice, Russell, Lynch, Lieu, and Kelly. 

Present for Subcommittee on the Interior: Representatives Lummis, Gosar, Buck, Palmer, and Lawrence. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The Subcommittees on National Security and Interior will come to order. Without objection, the chair is authorized 

to declare a recess at any time. 

The state of preparedness against the threat of an electromagnetic pulse is the subject of today’s hearing. An electromagnetic 

pulse could be created through an attack from a missile, nuclear 

weapon, radio frequency weapon, or geomagnetic storm caused by 

the sun. Fallout from an EMP event, either man-made or natural, 

could be extremely significant ranging from the loss of electrical 

power for months, which would deplete energy sources of power 

such as emergency batteries and backup generators have cascading 

consequences for supplying basic necessities such as food and 

water, and result in loss of life. 

The electrical grid is necessary to support critical infrastructure, 

supply and distribution of food, water, and fuel, communications, 

transportation, financial transactions and emergency and government services. Significant damage to the electrical grid during an 

EMP event would quickly and significantly degrade the supply of 

these basic necessities. 

EMPs can also be caused by solar storms, also referred to as geomagnetic disturbances, which are basically an everyday occurrence, 

they just doesn’t always hit the Earth. Two significant storms that 

did enter the earth’s atmosphere occurred in 1859 and 1921, respectively. Given the limited use of electricity in the mid-19th and 

early 20th centuries, the impact on society was relatively minimal. 

Today however, society depends heavily on a variety of technologies that are vulnerable to the effects of intense solar storms. 


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Scientists predict that these storms impact the Earth once every 

100 to 150 years. So it’s not a question of if, but a question of 

when. 

The occurrence today on an event like the 1921 storm could result in large scale and prolonged blackouts affecting more than 100 

million people. The National Academy of Sciences estimates the 

cost of damage from the most extreme solar weather at $1 to $2 

trillion with a recovery time of 4 to 10 years. The cost from even 

short-term blackouts are significant. 

In July of 1977, a blackout in New York that lasted only one day 

resulted in widespread looting and the breakdown of law through 

many New York neighborhoods. The blackout cost approximately 

$346 million and nearly 3,000 people were arrested during a 26- 

hour period. In August of 2003, more than 200 power plants shut 

down as a result of the electricity cut off caused by cascading failure. The blackout affected Ohio, New York, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Michigan and parts of Canada. Although relatively short in 

duration, the blackout’s economic cost was between $7 billion and 

$10 billion due to food spoilage, lost production, overtime wages 

and other related costs. 

To look at this threat, Congress has created two EMP commissions which reported their findings in 2004 and 2008. Based in 

large part on their recommendations, a bill has been introduced in 

every Congress since 2009 to strengthen protection of the electrical 

grid by mitigating the effects of an EMP. Some bills have passed 

the House but no bills have yet become law. 

Congress is not alone in its assessment of the EMP threat. State 

governments, such as in New York and Massachusetts have taken 

action themselves to protect portions of the electrical grid located 

within their respective States. Even some individual utilities have 

correctly assessed their vulnerability to EMP and hardened a few 

of their critical electrical control centers. 

The Department of Defense recently decided to move the North 

American Aerospace Defense Command, NORAD back inside Cheyenne Mountain in Colorado because the mountain is EMP hardened and would allow the military to sustain communications and 

homeland defense operations despite an EMP event. 

One of our witnesses here today, Dr. Peter Pry, wrote in The 

Wall Street Journal earlier this month about the military’s decision 

and rightly surmised, ‘‘The Pentagon was wise to move NORAD 

back into Cheyenne Mountain, but how are the American people to 

survive?’’ The Department of Homeland Security, the Federal agency responsible for protecting the American citizens, is not doing 

enough to lead an interagency effort to mitigate the impact of an 

EMP event, leaving vast populations of Americans vulnerable to 

the effects of an EMP. 

Lastly, the draft executive order by the National Space Weather 

Strategy was released for comment earlier this month by the White 

House Office of Science and Technology Council. This order is necessary and clearly within the constitutional mandate to provide for 

the common defense, but it is an outline of goals, not what is needed. A strategy with priorities and a blueprint for how to reliably 

mitigate adverse solar weather. 


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It is essential that state and national leaders have adequate 

plans at hand to determine how best to respond to EMP threats as 

they arrive. As such, it is critical that a scenario focused on the 

EMP threat be included in national planning scenarios by the Department of Homeland Security. This is precisely the directive included in the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act sponsored by 

my good friend, Congressman Trent Franks, who will be here with 

us today later to discuss the importance of the EMP issue. His bill 

would require DHS to take the lead for researching for how to best 

prepare and protect the American citizens from the threat of an 

EMP event. 

Trent is also the leading sponsor on legislation such as the Secure High-Voltage Infrastructure for Electricity from Lethal Damage Act, the SHIELD Act, which again, seeks to strengthen America’s hand against an EMP attack. 

I look forward to hearing Trent’s thoughts on this issue when 

he’s able to come as well as our other witnesses because this is an 

important issue and there are things our government can do to address it right now. And with that, I recognize the ranking member, 

the gentleman from Massachusetts for 5 minutes. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’d like to thank you and 

also Chairwoman Lummis for holding the hearing, this hearing to 

examine our state of preparedness against the threat of a Electromagnetic Pulse Event, also known as a EMP. 

As well, I would like to thank our colleague, Mr. Franks of Arizona, who will, as you say, join us shortly and also, our other witnesses on the panel today for helping us with our work. 

As set forth in President Obama’s 2015 national security strategy, a comprehensive national security agenda must prioritize efforts to address the top strategic risk to the U.S. interests, including the possibility of a catastrophic attack on U.S. critical infrastructure. 

Similarly, the strategic plan developed by the Department of 

Homeland Security provides that we must enhance security for our 

Nation’s critical infrastructure against the threat of a terrorist attack by identifying key vulnerabilities and addressing them 

through the implementation of appropriate technology. 

In support of our shared responsibility to protect America against 

attack, we must make every effort to examine the extent of potential threats such as an electromagnetic pulse event to our homeland security. Now, this oversight is even more critical, given that 

the current budgetary climate requires Congress to make very difficult choices in determining Federal agency spending. 

Not only is the Federal Government still operating under sequestration, but unfortunately, Congress recently passed a budget blueprint that contemplates cutting nondefense spending, including our 

Homeland Security budget that could be helpful on this issue by 

nearly $500 billion below sequestration level spending caps. 

While government officials, scientists and other experts may disagree on the imminence of Electromagnetic Pulse event, the EMP 

Commission established by Congress in 2001 to assess the threat 

of an EMP attack reported that our national electric grid and other 

U.S. Critical infrastructure could be significantly disrupted by a 

sudden and high-intensity energy field burst. Now as the chairman 


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noted, this could be large in scale and produced by nuclear explosion, it could also be created through the use of batteries, reactive 

chemicals and other nonnuclear devices, or be the product of a natural magnetic storm. 

According to the Commission’s 2008 report, ‘‘Because of the ubiquitous dependence of U.S. Society on electrical power systems, its 

vulnerability to an EMP attack, coupled with the EMP’s particular 

damage mechanisms creates the possibility of a long-term catastrophic consequence.’’ A 2012 research paper prepared by a Fire 

Department in my congressional district—and I’d like to ask unanimous consent to submit the report by Deputy Chief Michael K. 

Laracy, Sr., from the wonderful town of Walpole, Massachusetts, 

he’s the deputy fire chief there. The title is ‘‘Potential Impacts of 

Electromagnetic Pulse Attacks on Fire and EMS Delivery Services 

for the Walpole Fire Department.’’ 

Mr. DESANTIS. Without objection, so ordered. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. In response to such concerns, the House 

passed H.R. 3410, the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act, by a 

voice vote at the end of last year. This bill introduced by our friend, 

Mr. Franks from Arizona, sought to require the Department of 

Homeland Security to include the EMP threat in its national planning scenario. 

While the bill did not pass the Senate, DHS has indicated that 

the threat of an EMP attack is very much on its radar during recent congressional testimony. Ms. Suzanne Spaulding, the Under 

Secretary for the National Protection and Programs, indicated that 

the DHS is currently partnering with private sector entities in the 

electronic sector to determine how best to address the EMP threat. 

So I look forward to discussing the issue with our witnesses in 

order to examine what additional steps we might take in order to 

better safeguard our national electric grid and other critical infrastructure. Thank you, Mr. Chairman and I yield back the balance 

of my time. 

Mr. DESANTIS. I thank the gentleman from Massachusetts. I ask 

unanimous consent that enter into the record a letter from Dr. William Graham who is chairman of the 2008 EMP Commission, a letter from Dr. William Radasky, president of Metatech Corporation 

and leading EMP expert for more than 50 years and a letter, fax 

sheet and cost estimate model from Thomas Popik, chairman of the 

Foundation for Resilient Societies. Without objection so ordered. 

Mr. DESANTIS. I now recognize the chairwoman of the Natural 

Resources Subcommittee, Mrs. Lummis, for 5 minutes. 

Mrs. LUMMIS. Thank you, Chairman DeSantis for spearheading 

this hearing. And I also want to thank ranking member, Ranking 

Member Lynch, thanks for your participation and involvement in 

this hearing to examine the important issue of electrical grid preparedness in the event of an electromagnetic pulse caused by an attack or a solar storm hitting the Earth. 

The threat to the grid infrastructure is real and the potential for 

devastating impacts needs to be examined. Solar flares have resulted in numerous incidents; the Carrington event of 1859, which 

at the time, only affected telegraph systems. To be honest, I don’t 

remember the Carrington event personally, I was a mere child at 

the time. That was a little joke. But I do remember the 1989 geoVerDate Sep 11 2014 14:33 Dec 08, 2015 Jkt 000000 PO 00000 Frm 00010 Fmt 6633 Sfmt 6633 F:\96952.TXT APRIL

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magnetic storm that disrupted radio signals and satellite damage 

and knocked out the power grid in Quebec. The grid is a critical 

piece of national infrastructure that contributes to the most basic 

daily needs of Americans, as well as business and government. 

Given the threat presented to this critical infrastructure, I agree 

with Chairman DeSantis that the Federal Government needs to 

take the EMP threat seriously by including it in DHS national 

planning scenario. That’s why I support Congressman Trent 

Franks’ Critical Infrastructure Protection Act. This important bill 

takes a step forward towards protecting our grid against an EMP 

threat. I note that it passed the House last Congress, and I appreciate all the hard work that Congressman Trent Franks has done 

on this issue. 

The Federal Government needs to follow the lead of State-based 

utilities and harden the grid against an EMP threat. As we will 

hear today, the entirety of the Nation’s grid is not prepared to deal 

with a variety of threats. It is important that the Federal Government realize this and takes the necessary steps to protect the grid. 

I welcome the testimony of our witnesses today. I look forward to 

hearing more about what our country needs to do to protect against 

the threats of EMPs. Mr. Chairman, thank you, I yield back. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentlelady yields back. We will now recognize 

our panel of witnesses. I’m pleased to welcome Dr. George Baker, 

Professor Emeritus at James Madison University and CEO of 

BAYCOR; Dr. Peter Vincent Pry, executive director of the Task 

Force on National and Homeland Security; and Mr. Mike Caruso, 

Director of Government and Specialty Business Development at 

ETS–Lindgren. Welcome all. 

Pursuant to committee rules, witnesses will be sworn in before 

they testify. So if you guys can rise an raise your right-hand side. 

Do you solemnly swear or affirm that the testimony that you are 

about to give will be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but 

the truth, so help you God? 

Let the record reflect that all witnesses answered in the affirmative. Thank you and please be seated. 

In order to allow time for discussion, please limit your testimony 

to 5 minutes and you’ll see the blinking lights in front of you. 

When it hits red, that’s when you’ve hit 5 minutes. Your entire 

written statement will be made a part of the record. And with that, 

Dr. Baker, you are up for 5 minutes. 

WITNESS STATEMENTS 

STATEMENT OF GEORGE BAKER 

Mr. BAKER. My thanks to Chairman DeSantis and Chairman 

Lummis, ranking members and committees members for this opportunity to share my concerns about EMP. My name is George 

Baker, and I’ve spent most of my professional career protecting the 

U.S. military from EMP. At the Defense Threat Reduction Agency, 

I manage the development of the military standards used to protect 

the Department of Defense systems. As a retired professor, James 

Madison University and DOD consultant, I now perform EMP vulnerability assessments of key government facilities. 


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The congressional EMP Commission on which I served as principal staff made a compelling case for protecting critical infrastructure against nuclear EMP and solar storm geomagnetic disturbances, I will also refer to that as GMD. Among potential disasters, 

EMP and GMD are particularly challenging because the effects can 

be continental in scale. EMP and GMD disasters are preventable, 

that’s my main point today, they are preventable. We have the engineering, know-how and tools, what is missing is resolve. 

I see three reasons why we are not making progress at present 

on these threats and I’ll address these in the rest of my talk. The 

first is there are many misconceptions about EMP and GMD 

threats. I’ll look at four of those. The first misconception is that 

only major nuclear powers, such as Russia and China with highyield thermonuclear devices could effectively execute an EMP attack. In fact, low yield devices obtained by emerging nuclear powers such as North Korea and Iran can produce catastrophic EMP 

effects. 

Misconception two, that a nuclear EMP attack would burn out 

every exposed electronic system. In fact, based on government 

tests, we know that smaller self-contained, self-powered systems 

such as vehicles, handheld radios, disconnected portable generators 

are often not affected. 

Misconception three, EMP effects on critical infrastructure will 

be limited to nonsevere, nuisance-type affects. In fact, wide area 

failure of just a few systems, could cause cascading infrastructure 

collapse, in highly interconnected networks. One example is the 

2003 electric blackout of the northeast was precipitated by a single 

high-voltage line touching a tree, and then proceeded to cascade to 

the entire northeast. 

So, when you extend this concept to a wide area of failures and 

infrastructure networks, including the Internet, you can see that 

EMP is an existential threat that we must take very seriously. 

Fourth and final misconception I’ll address, that is, to protect all 

other infrastructure against EMP would cost a large fraction of the 

U.S. GNP. In fact, protecting the electric grid and communication 

networks alone would provide substantial benefit and be cost effective. 

A recent cost study by the Foundation for Resilient Society shows 

that significant EMP protection could be achieved for an investment in the range of $10 to $30 billion. The second reason we 

aren’t making progress is the stakeholders are in a state of denial. 

Concerned about cost makes stakeholders, the government and the 

private sector reluctant to admit EMP vulnerabilities. Actions to 

date have been limited and ineffective. An example is the joint effort of the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, that is, FERC, 

and the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, that is 

NERC, to set reliability standards for wide area electromagnetic 

impacts on the electric grid. 

The NERC-developed and FERC-approved standards that we 

have exclude nuclear EMP, despite the opportunity to protect 

against both GMD and EMP using the same equipment. NERC 

standards rely on operational procedures that require no physical 

protection of the electric grid. The largest measured storms are a 

factor of 10 higher than their benchmark for protection. A sceptic 


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might suspect that NERC’s main objective was to avert liability 

rather than to protect the American public. 

The third reason we aren’t making progress is there is no one in 

charge. There’s no single point of responsibility to develop an implement a national protection plan. When I ask NERC officials 

about EMP protection, they informed me we don’t do EMP, that’s 

DOD’s responsibility. The Department of Defense tells me, EMP 

protection for civilian infrastructure is DHS’s responsibility. And 

then when I talk to DHS, I get answers that the protection should 

be done by the Department of Energy, since they are the infrastructure’s sector-specific agency. So we have EMP and GMD protection as finger-pointing exercises at present. 

In closing, I have the following recommendation for future 

progress, the DOD experience with EMP protection has given us 

the necessary engineering tools, but what we need is the help of 

your committee to get government to act. First, we need a designated executive authority. The DHS and DOD both are likely 

candidates. The first order of business would be a national EMP, 

GMD protection plan and a set of planning scenarios. Second, let 

us budget for a national program to check the electric grid, including essential supporting infrastructures used for fuel supply and 

communication. And third, Congress should recognize that the regulatory apparatus conceived in the Energy Policy Act of 2005 is not 

working. Establishing a new independent commission, solely focused on electric grid reliability would be very helpful, a commission with the power to issue and enforce regulations on its own 

similar to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. 

The present FERC/NERC arrangement has proved ineffective. 

Thank you for this opportunity to present my concerns and recommendations, which are more fully explained in my written testimony and I look forward to your questions. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Baker follows:] 


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Mr. DESANTIS. Thank you, Dr. Baker. 

The chair now recognizes Dr. Pry for 5 minutes, you are up. 

STATEMENT OF PETER VINCENT PRY 

Mr. PRY. Thank you for the opportunity to address the subcommittees today. First, what I think we must understand about 

the threat is that it is not merely theoretical, it is a real threat. 

In the military doctrines of Russia, China, North Korea and Iran, 

they plan to make a nuclear EMP attack against the United States. 

We have seen North Korea and Iran exercise this, including by 

launching ballistic missiles off of a freighter at sea, which would 

enable the possibility of an anonymous EMP attack. During the nuclear crisis we had with North Korea in 2013, it was the worst nuclear crisis we ever had with Kim Jong Un was threatening to 

make nuclear missile strikes against the United States in the aftermath of their third illegal nuclear test. 

In the midst of that crisis North Korea orbited a satellite over 

the south pole that passed over the territory of the United States 

on the optimum trajectory and altitude to both evade our national 

missile defenses, and, had that been a nuclear warhead, to place 

an EMP field over all 48 contiguous United States that would have 

had catastrophic consequences. That was the KSM 3 satellite; that 

satellite stills passes over us, it’s sill in orbit and passes over us 

with regularity. 

Another thing that must be understood is that EMP is part of 

a—a larger part of their military doctrine that they consider a revolution in military affairs. That, basically, is a combined arms operation with cyber attacks, physical sabotage, nonnuclear EMP weapons, and nuclear EMP weapons is the most decisive instrument all 

used together and coordinated in a formula new Blitzkrieg, except 

one that’s waged in cyberspace to basically bring a civilization 

down to its knees so that a failed state like an Iran or North Korea 

could theoretically defeat and destroy a highly advanced society 

like our own. 

This would be unprecedented in history where you would have 

a situation where a state like Iran or North Korea or even a sub 

national actor like a terrorist group if they could get hold of that 

one nuclear bomb and do it in combination with cyber attacks and 

physical sabotage to crash our critical infrastructures, especially 

the electric grid and basically destroy our civilization. But they 

write about it; they exercise it; they are serious about it. And we 

actually see this being practiced in real life in some countries back 

in June of last year while ISIS was sweeping over northern Iraq, 

al Qaeda and the Arabian Peninsula blacked out the entire electric 

grid in the state of Yemen, put 18 cities and 24 million people into 

the dark. That is the first time in history that a terrorist group has 

blacked out a whole country. And it so destabilized Yemen that 

look what happened to them. They have gone from being a U.S. 

ally, so now we have lost one of our most important allies in the 

Middle East already to this kind of an attack. 

This year, in January 25 of this year, a terrorist group blacked 

out 80 percent of the grid in Turkey. We don’t know what they are 

up to in doing that—excuse me, in Pakistan, but Pakistan is a nuclear weapons State. So the idea that 80 percent of the grid could 


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be blocked out in Pakistan for purposes unknown is extremely disturbing. 

Is this a precursor to try to get their hands on nuclear weapons 

in Pakistan? About a week before the Washington blackout happened, Turkey was put—80 percent of Turkey was put into blackout by a cyber attack by Iran. These were not EMP attacks, but 

they are experiments with parts of this doctrine that they have 

that would combine all these things and we have seen in the case 

of North Korea and Iran experiments with the nuclear EMP option 

as well. 

Now, so the threat is real. As George Baker has testified, however, there is really no excuse for us to be vulnerable to this. We 

know how to fix the problem, and one of the things the EMP Commission recommended was, if you can protect against the worst 

threat, which is the nuclear EMP attack, if you can protect against 

that, it will mitigate all the others: Cyber attacks, physical sabotage, nonnuclear EMP weapons and GMD as well. So we know how 

to fix the problem. 

What to do? I endorse everything that Dr. Baker said. We need 

to pass the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act. The importance 

of having a national planning scenario focused on EMP cannot be 

understated. 

Right now, despite what DHS may be telling you, if it is not in 

the national planning scenarios, the threat doesn’t exist for State 

and local emergency planners, or for Federal emergency planners, 

too. People who want do something about this threat at the State 

level when they apply for funding, for example, from DHS, can’t get 

it because EMP is not among the national planning scenarios. So 

that would put it on the radar screen for Federal, State and local 

emergency planners and would be an enormous step forward toward solving the problem. 

Next, we need to bring back the congressional EMP Commission, 

which is actually under consideration right now in the Defense Authorization bill being negotiated with the Senate. The greatest 

progress we made in this country was when the EMP Commission 

was around and, you know, with the absence of the Commission, 

well we have seen that no progress has been made. If we can bring 

back the EMP Commission, I expect that that would reintroduce, 

we would have a voice in the governmental level part of Congress 

that could aggressively promote EMP preparedness, and that is 

what we need to do. 

And last, the NERC/FERC relationship, I completely agree with 

Dr. Baker. It’s extremely dysfunctional, it doesn’t work. It needs to 

be reformed. I’m not sure that you can actually reform those institutions. I would actually advocate abolishing both FERC and 

NERC and starting with something else, a different kind of institution, something similar to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission that 

has real regulatory power, and that understands that its stakeholder, its customer is not the electric power industry first, but it’s 

the American people first. And the responsibility is first not to the 

profits of the utilities, but it’s to America’s national security. Thank 

you for hearing me out. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Pry follows:] 


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Mr. DESANTIS. Thank you. Mr. Caruso, thank you for coming 

you’re recognized for 5 minutes. 

STATEMENT OF MICHAEL CARUSO 

Mr. CARUSO. Thank you. I’d like to thank Chairman DeSantis, 

Chairman Lummis, ranking members and committee members for 

this opportunity to testify. I consider it an honor and a privilege 

to be here today to share my 32 years of experience in the practical 

side of protecting against EMP events. 

EMP hardening has long been considered very expensive and an 

illusive art known to few. The current guidance on EMP protection 

is found in the MIL Standard 188–125 that is not necessarily appropriate for every application when considering the critical infrastructure. 

EMP hardening of the critical infrastructure would require a less 

stringent application of the MIL Standard 188–125. Government, 

public, and private critical infrastructure facilities and services are 

becoming increasingly interdependent, as we’ve seen with many of 

the companies that I’ve talked to over the past 3 years. 

In addition to the interdependency of those services, we see an 

increasingly dependence on the very vulnerable electric grid and 

electric power system. To date, little has been done to harden the 

electric power system and the 16 segments of critical infrastructure 

as designated by the Department of Homeland Security. 

Currently, 18 States have ongoing initiatives to require the electric utilities to at least address the protection of the electrical grid 

from the dangers of a EMP or solar storm. Electromagnetic energy 

from an EMP can disrupt a supervisory and control data acquisition systems, or SCADA systems, which the electric grid heavily relies. 

I recently testified in the Texas State House in support of bills 

introduced for EMP protection of the critical infrastructure. Texas 

is one of the States aggressively pursuing passage of EMP legislation, including an appropriation to get critical infrastructure segments started in the overall evaluation of their vulnerability. 

In 2014, ETS–Lindgren, the company for which I work, was part 

of a multidisciplinary team that successfully completed construction of the very first large private sector SCADA facility in the 

United States that includes EMP protection. The building was a 2- 

story, 105 square-foot building, of which 44,000 square feet were 

EMP-protected, that included generators and cooling systems. The 

total project cost was about $100 million and the approximate EMP 

protection part of that was about $8 million. So if we’re looking at 

it, about 8 percent of the overall budget. If we looked at that cost 

spread over the 2 million customers that that building serves, we’re 

looking at less than a dollar per year, per customer spread out over 

5 years. 

While the optimum scenario is to protect a brand new control 

building, retrofitting is possible. I’ve spoken with quite a few electric utilities about retrofitting their control buildings. If we’re looking at the existing facilities, they are tremendously vulnerable because the equipment was never intended to be EMP-protected, nor 

were the support systems ever laid out properly to be protected. An 


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estimated rough order of magnitude for protecting a similar facility 

as the 44,000 square feet that we talked about in the new building 

would be approximately $16 million. And there again, when you 

take a look at that and spread that out over 5 years, it’s less than 

$2 per customer, based on the 2 million customer service area. 

In my opinion, EMP protection of the electric utilities is the primary concern due to the survival and dependency we have on electrical power. Some proactive, forward-thinking utilities have either 

instituted EMP protection programs, or have at least begun to consider implementing them. However, the balance of the critical infrastructure segment, such as financial, wastewater, drinking 

water, transportation, food distribution, health care emergency 

services, have really not ever been addressed at all. It is my sincere 

belief that we as a Nation will some day face an EMP attack. I respectfully urge you to consider and pass legislation to address the 

EMP threat that I belive has been overlooked for far too long. 

Chairman DeSantis, Chairman Lummis, ranking members, committee members, I thank you again for this opportunity to present 

my thoughts, and I would be very happy to answer any questions 

that you have of me. Thank you to your time. 

[The prepared statement of Mr. Caruso follows:] 


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Mr. DESANTIS. I thank the witnesses for your testimony. The 

chair now recognizes himself for questions for 5 minutes. 

Dr. Baker you talked in your written testimony about the critical 

importance of the electric grid. So an EMP attack that would fry 

the electric grid, can you just explain the consequences to somebody who maybe has never heard of an EMP before today’s hearing, what practical effect would that have on American society? 

Mr. BAKER. The electric grid is the foundation for all other infrastructures. DHS has listed 16 critical infrastructure sectors, and 

the one sector that every—depends, you know, that drives everything else is the electric power. The other thing about the electric 

power, it not only is the most critical, arguably the most critical infrastructure, it is arguably the most vulnerable to EMP because 

you measure EMP in volts per meter, so the longer the line, the 

larger the voltage it will be induced on the line. 

So it’s ironic that our most critical infrastructure is also the most 

vulnerable, and that’s why we have to be so serious about protecting the grid. But without the electric grid, basic life services: 

The ability to pump drinking water, the ability to heat and cool our 

homes—— 

Mr. DESANTIS. Take our money from an ATM, would you be able 

to do that? 

Mr. BAKER. Yeah, that’s right. You would—you would—our financial sector is also way up there on in terms of EMP vulnerability and risk factor mainly because it depends upon the electric 

grid and the on call communications as well. So essentially it would 

be—we’ve seen sort of a microcosm of what could happen in the 

northeast blackout and the anarchy that resulted there, but that— 

in Britain, I’ve been to some EMP meetings in Britain, where they 

actually are protecting their grid—but their rule of thumb is it’s 3 

days to total anarchy, I heard this member of Parliament say— 

once you lose the electricity. 

Mr. DESANTIS. And in terms of the some of the casualties, because people have surmised men, terrorists, if they can get their 

hands on a nuclear device, detonate an American city, obviously 

that would be very devastating. And someone said, yeah, that 

would be, but their best bet to do the most damage would be to try 

to launch it over the country and explode it and create an EMP. 

And the casualty estimates I’ve seen are really, really high if they 

were able to cripple our entire electrical grid. Is that your understanding that you are talking about potentially millions of people? 

Mr. BAKER. That’s my understanding. Even though you don’t get 

direct effects on biological, humans—the long-term term effects 

without the electric power grid, we’re talking about certainly within a year, you would lose at least half the American population. I 

have seen estimates as high as 90 percent of the American population would be at risk over a projected 1-year period. 

Mr. DESANTIS. So given that the consequences are potentially 

very dire, but also given that, I think, as all the witnesses have 

said, there are certainly things we could do very easily, why 

haven’t we done enough, in your opinion? 

Mr. BAKER. One of the problems is that the liabilities, the public 

companies are reluctant to admit vulnerabilities, because if something bad were to happen, they would be liable, and I think that’s 


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a big problem. And just the cost, the wide-area effects, we get into 

these hand-wringing stances where people—they don’t know where 

to begin so they haven’t. And what we’re trying to do is lay out, 

you know, a well-ordered, incremental approach where to get us beyond the hand-wringing. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Mr. Caruso, you’ve been involved in this field and 

have done work hardening critical infrastructure against an EMP 

attack. So help us understand what is involved when you actually 

try to harden a facility or a line? 

Mr. CARUSO. Certainly. In addition to the critical infrastructure, 

I’ve been involved in hardening military and government facilities 

for the 32 years in this business. And essentially, what’s required 

to harden a facility is to create an electromagnetic shield, a 6-sided 

electromagnetic shield around the equipment that’s intended to be 

protected. 

Mr. DESANTIS. As of right now, in your judgment, and based on 

your experience, what percentage of the electrical grid is prepared 

for an EMP threat? 

Mr. CARUSO. Currently, there’s only one control center in the entire country that I’m aware of that is protected. 

Mr. DESANTIS. And which one is that? 

Mr. CARUSO. I’m not allowed to say, because of non-disclosure 

agreements that I’m under. 

Mr. DESANTIS. Understood. My time has expired. Thanks for answering the questions, and I now recognize the ranking member of 

the full committee—the subcommittee on National Security, Mr. 

Lynch, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. So what we’re saying 

here is that because of the interconnectivity of our society today, 

the great reliance and connectivity to the Internet, so much of 

every aspect of our lives is wired now, that that fact will actually 

amplify the impact of a EMP event. Is that basically what you’re 

saying, Mr. Baker—Dr. Baker? Excuse me. 

Mr. BAKER. That’s right. 

Mr. LYNCH. All right. Now, for countermeasures, I understand, 

and I don’t question the level of disruption that would occur. And 

I guess the imminence of this is debatable, but there is no debate 

above the disruption that would result if one of these EMPs occurred. The countermeasures that have been talked about, the folks 

at CRS that serve Congress, the Congressional Research Service, 

mentioned a couple of countermeasures. One was this Faraday 

Cage protection, which I guess is some kind of a cladding. Can you 

talk about that for a bit? 

Mr. BAKER. I can. Mike Caruso just mentioned the idea of a 6- 

sided shield. You have a six-sided metal enclosure, that’s referred 

to in electrical engineering as a Faraday Cage. 

Mr. LYNCH. Okay. Mr. Caruso, do you want to go into that a little bit more? 

Mr. CARUSO. Certainly. The six-sided metal shield has to be constructed so it basically has no openings in it except those that are 

absolutely necessary to have. And all of those openings are technically considered to be points of entry. So you start out by building a six-sided metal box with no openings, and then you start adding openings for things like the electrical power, communications 


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and air exchanges and cooling systems. And all of those points of 

entries are handled in a very, very special and particular way in 

order to ensure that you are attenuating any EMP signal that 

might be broadcast in the atmosphere, but also any signals that 

are being brought in, conducted on the electrical lines or communication lines. 

Mr. LYNCH. Sort of like a surge protector? That type of—— 

Mr. CARUSO. Exactly. A surge protector on steroids, if you would. 

Mr. LYNCH. Yeah. Now, what about the other countermeasure 

that I’m not sure if it incorporates the Faraday Cage protection, 

these portable, or mobile units that, I guess, some of the contractors for Microsoft and, I guess, some of the other computer outfits 

have come up with, sort of an off-the-rack type of system where 

they can house all of these servers in the event that you have an 

event. Is that one and the same or are these two different strategies? 

Mr. CARUSO. It’s one and the same. In terms of technology, the 

portable data centers, if you will, the EMP-protected data centers 

are essentially six-sided Faraday cages with all the points of entry 

addressed, and sometimes they get actually interfaced with the 

fixed asset that might be inside of a building. So they become a 

supplement to what’s going on in the building. These same shelters 

sometimes hold backup generator systems or backup cooling systems to act as protection against the EMP for those systems as 

well. 

Mr. LYNCH. Okay. So the last time we had a talk about this, the 

study was done in 2008, I think, then there were 16 recommendations. Is there anything different that we’re doing now than what 

was going on at that point, talking about Congress? 

Mr. BAKER. The only substantive response to the EMP recommendations has been within the Department of Defense, where 

they are actually providing an annual report to Congress on the 

steps they are taking to meet the EMP Commission recommendations. But as far as the civilian infrastructure, I’m not aware of any 

progress. 

Mr. LYNCH. Dr. Pry, I don’t want you to get off the hook without 

a question. The general recommendation then would be to adopt 

some of these countermeasures for infrastructure that we identify 

as being critical, whether it’s civilian critical infrastructure, or military infrastructure; is that right? 

Mr. PRY. Yeah, that’s right. You know, for example, there are 

2,000 extra high voltage transformers that are basically the technological foundation of our electronic civilization, you know, most people don’t even know that. These things are vulnerable to EMP. 

They should be protected. You know, they are very hard—we don’t 

even make them in this country anymore. But that’s an example 

of—the Commission had a rather long list of recommendations, basically a plan that could be implemented to protect the civilian critical infrastructure at affordable cost. It’s not hard to do, the technology isn’t the problem, the money isn’t the problem, it doesn’t 

cost that much to do it, it’s the politics that has been the problem. 

As George has said, nobody has responsibility for doing this, 

those who would think would have responsibility, the Department 

of Defense, for example. You know, when you talk about it, they 


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have no jurisdiction over the civilian critical infrastructure. And 

they will say, well, this could be caused by a geomagnetic storm 

and that’s not our department. We are dealing with foreign threats, 

so it is the Department of Homeland Security’s job. DHS will say, 

well, a nuclear weapon, that’s the DOD’s job, so nobody has been 

in charge. 

And then where it counts the most is we have this very dysfunctional relationship between the NERC, the North American Electric Liability Corporation that represents the 3,000 utilities that is 

supposed to be—partner with U.S. FERC in providing for grid security. But the political reality is that that relationship is dysfunctional and it has not resulted in not only in increasing our security 

where EMP is concerned, but even against tree branch problems, 

for instance. It took NERC a decade to come up with a vegetation 

management plan to better manage tree branches so that we won’t 

have a repeat of the great Northeast Blackout of 2003. They are 

falling down on job on very pedestrians threats, let alone cyber 

threats and EMP attacks and the like. It’s just the system isn’t 

working, and that needs to be fixed by somebody. 

Mr. LYNCH. Thank you. I assume my time has expired. I yield 

back. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentleman yields back. The chair now recognizes the gentlewoman from Wyoming, the chairman of Natural 

Resources Subcommittee for 5 minutes. 

Mrs. LUMMIS. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. I’m a bit of a novice to 

this subject, so I’m going to ask you some general questions, feel 

free to take them wherever you choose. You know, over the weekend I got a little taste of this. I woke up Sunday morning in my 

country home, in Wyoming, without electricity. I had no water because in a rural area I’m on an electric pump to pump my well 

water. So the inconveniences associated to being without electricity 

were apparent from the minute my eyes opened. 

As it turned out, it was just something, I think they called it a 

bayonet which is a very large fuse that they just came and replaced. And believe it or not, they came on Sunday morning and 

I was back up and running, and happily so. But when you think 

about that on the scale that we’re talking about, it really does create immediate global problems, especially in this country. 

So my first question, Mr. Caruso, what do these things cost, 

these shields that protect our infrastructure? 

Mr. CARUSO. The shield that I gave an example of in my testimony was approximately $182 per square foot to put into place. So 

if you look at a floor plan of a building and look at the square footage, again, about $182 a square foot on top of the building cost 

itself. 

Mrs. LUMMIS. So it’s not chump change. 

Mr. CARUSO. It’s not chump change, but it’s not insurmountable 

either. 

Mrs. LUMMIS. My next question is for all of you. I am going to 

direct to Dr. Pry first, but then I’d like to ask our other two witnesses to weigh in. This is about your concern that the relationship 

between NERC and FERC is dysfunctional. You mention the possibility of doing away with both. So if you were dictator for a day, 

and you could do exactly that, either combine NERC and FERC or 


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do away with them and replace them with something else that 

would solve the dysfunction you’ve identified, as well as address 

this electromagnetic pulse issue responsibly, what would that look 

like? 

Mr. PRY. That would look like the kind of relationship that the 

Federal Aviation Administration has with the air line industry. 

What I think that isn’t understood is that the electric power industry is the only critical infrastructure that still operates basically in 

something that’s close to a 19th century regulatory environment. 

The Federal Aviation Administration has the power and has independent inspectors. If they find metal fatigue in the wings of an 

airline, they can ground that whole fleet and order the air line industry, you are not going to fly those planes until they are fixed. 

When there is a disaster and an airplane crashes, the industry 

doesn’t get to investigate and figure out what went wrong, not by 

themselves. It’s the Federal Aviation Administration that drags 

those things into a hangar. And why do we do that? Because we 

want an objective actor whose first priority is public safety, because 

hundreds of lives are at stake when airplanes fly and so we don’t— 

you know, we don’t take lightly, you know, the lives of the American people when it comes to that. If we go to the Food and Drug 

Administration or any other industry, I would like that same kind 

of regulatory relationship with the electric power industry. 

Let me describe to you a little bit about what the current regulatory environment is like, because it’s not really what we would 

consider a regulatory environment. The U.S. FERC, for example, 

does not have the power to tell NERC, that is, the industry, what 

they shall do to protect the grid. It can order them to come up with 

a plan and then NERC can take as much time as it likes to come 

up with a plan or a proposed plan. And then if the U.S. FERC has 

objections that plan, the whole plan has to be scrapped, and the 

process starts all over again. 

That’s how it took 10 years to get a plan for vegetation management, you know, so we wouldn’t have a repeat of the great Northeast Blackout of 2003. Industry takes its time dragging its feet and 

can use the process, you know, to basically escape doing what it’s 

supposed to do. The NERC is supposed to partner with the U.S. 

FERC in providing for the security of the American people, but it 

doesn’t. And I don’t think combining these or keeping the same— 

I mean, there are some good people in these institutions, but 

George and I have served, for example, on the NERC’s Geomagnetic Disturbance Task Force, and we have actually seen them 

engage in junk science, dishonest practices, you know, in terms of 

the science to try to mislead people. 

In my written testimony, I describe a very disturbing example of 

where the NERC came up with a hollow standard for the natural 

EMP created by the sun saying, okay—they were dragged, kicking 

and streaming by the way and resisted for years saying that oh, 

the threat from the sun doesn’t really affect the electric grid, which 

was completely untrue. Eventually they were forced to come up 

with a standard, the standard is so low, that it doesn’t provide any 

real protection. 


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Mrs. LUMMIS. Dr. Pry, my time has expired, but I’m hoping to 

follow up with all three of you on this issue in a second round of 

questioning. Thank you all very much. 

Mr. Chairman, I yield back. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentlelady yields back. I ask unanimous consent to enter into the record a statement of Ms. Lawrence, who is 

the ranking member on the Subcommittee on Interior. Without objection, that will be so ordered. 

Mr. DESANTIS. At this point, I would like to recognize Mrs. Lawrence for 5 minutes for her questions. 

Mrs. LAWRENCE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. We—this issue is 

one of great importance to me and to our country. The congressional EMP Commission issued a report in 2008 identifying 16 segments of our infrastructure that could suffer severe damage if not 

protected. Today, 7 years later, the testimony continues to echo 

those concerns. I’m curious today, Mr. Caruso, has anything 

changed since this last report regarding the protection of the grid? 

Mr. CARUSO. I don’t believe anything significant has changed. 

What we have seen is that many private industries that make up 

the critical infrastructure have taken it upon themselves just as 

doing good business to do EMP protection. I have worked with several financial institutions, including insurance companies. I’ve 

worked with electric utilities and have done some work counseling, 

the gas and electric industry as well, but other than that, nothing 

real significant has happened. 

Mrs. LAWRENCE. To follow up on your statement, there has been 

some independent efforts being made in this direction. Are we monitoring that as a Federal Government if we start implementing 

the—taking the steps that we should, would we have a different 

system that is being used now, or are we just going to provide oversight to these individual companies? What is the plan that you’re 

recommending here? 

Mr. CARUSO. My recommendation really falls in line with those 

of Dr. Pry and Dr. Baker in that someone needs to be in charge, 

and especially as it’s related to the 16 critical infrastructure segments in terms of providing real protection, and at least addressing 

the issue to ask the question what if, what happens if we lose the 

electrical power? What happens if we lose the ability to do it? I 

use—I like to use the example of the waste treatment systems. You 

would not only lose the electrical power, but the control systems 

that control the wastewater filtration and pumping stations 

throughout an area. If that goes down in a major city, you have 2 

or 3 days before the city is just on its knees. 

Mrs. LAWRENCE. My question is to Dr. Baker. As we look at the 

need, we heard your recommendations, 2008 was the last report. 

Will we have to initiate a new commission and a new report so it 

would be relevant, or do you feel strongly that the information we 

have now is enough to move forward with starting our plan? 

Mr. BAKER. I believe that the EMP Commission reports that 

were issued in 2004, 2008 are still operative, and so I would say 

yeah, they are a very good place to start. I don’t know whether 

there is anything I can add to those reports. The thing that helps 

us is that—I understand that there’s going to be a lot of new construction on the electric grid, and that if we are able to project and 


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develop some plans that we can actually include EMP protection 

with the new build-out. So there might be some maybe augmentation of the EMP Commission recommendations. 

Mrs. LAWRENCE. I do want to say as my time runs out that as 

a mayor, I lived through the power outages that affected the Midwest. And when you talk about the threat of lives, hospitals that 

were in my city, individuals stranded on elevators, life support systems and oxygen, getting the pumps backed up with batteries so 

that we could continue to ensure that our water was properly processed through cleaning water filtration, this is a very serious issue. 

And I appreciate your testimonies today, and I know for a fact if 

we receive such an attack, the threat is one that would be significantly dangerous for our country and a lot of dangerous people on 

simple mere traffic navigation, everything came to a complete halt. 

To be able to sit in a room in our emergency command center with 

no power, we could not pull up documents of employee records, because it was on a computer. So it taught me a lot of how we were 

dependent just from being a mayor and trying to manage through 

that power outage. So I thank you today for your testimony. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentlelady’s time has expired. 

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Georgia for 5 minutes for his questions. 

Mr. HICE. Thank you. 

Dr. Pry, what Federal agency do you believe is best suited to lead 

a preparedness effort for this? Is it Homeland Security? Is it Energy? Which one is it? 

Mr. PRY. I think the Department of Homeland Security, that it 

naturally falls under their jurisdiction, you know, because they’re 

responsible—they’re supposed to be responsible for critical infrastructure protection in the first place. So I think that they’re the 

ones. 

However, DHS and the Department of Defense are also supposed 

to have a cooperative relationship, you know, when it comes to providing for homeland security. There’s a lot of expertise—now, DHS 

should have the lead, but there’s a lot of expertise in the Department of Defense. And the Department of Defense is also dependent 

on the civilian critical infrastructure. 

Mr. HICE. All right. But, at the end of the day, DHS, you believe. 

Mr. PRY. I would say DHS. I’d like—— 

Mr. HICE. All right. 

Does DHS currently have anything to deal with the scenario— 

they’ve got the 15 national planning contingency scenarios. Is anything dealing with EMPs a part of those 15 plans? 

Mr. PRY. No, they’re not. And that’s part of the problem and why 

we need to pass the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act. 

And I would add that there are people—there are people within 

DHS that are standing by, waiting for us to do exactly that. 

The—— 

Mr. HICE. All right. So there needs to be—if DHS is responsible, 

DHS then needs some sort of plan. Is there a reason there is not 

a plan, if DHS is responsible? 

Mr. PRY. The—I think the—I don’t know what the motive has 

been within the leadership of DHS, because it’s been a bipartisan 

failure, you know—— 


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Mr. HICE. But a failure it is. We don’t need to elaborate. If DHS 

is responsible, that is one thing. If DHS is responsible and not prepared, that is another issue that certainly needs to be addressed. 

Mr. PRY. I’d say they are responsible and not prepared. 

Mr. HICE. Okay. Well, then we have to—that definitely needs to 

be addressed. 

Let me go, Mr. Caruso, to you. Hardening a facility, can you 

elaborate a little bit more on just what that means and what it involves? 

Mr. CARUSO. Certainly. 

As was mentioned before, we’re talking—the scientific term is 

‘‘Faraday cage.’’ And it essentially—we use steel to do that. So it 

encloses the area that’s intended to be protected in a six-sided steel 

enclosure. And all of the points of entry coming in and, most importantly, the electrical power are fitted with filter devices and suppression devices that would suppress an EMP coming down the 

line being conducted in from the external power lines. 

In addition to that, the facility shield protects all of the equipment inside from the radiated effects of an EMP coming down out 

of the atmosphere. And it needs to also protect the backup generators, the cooling systems, and all of the other support systems that 

would support a facility. 

Mr. HICE. Okay. I just have a couple minutes, so that—just a 

general understanding, I appreciate what you just shared. 

Do State governments—and I will just keep this with you, Mr. 

Caruso—do State governments have anything right now to protect 

against EMPs? 

Mr. CARUSO. Absolutely nothing. 

Mr. HICE. Nothing. All right. So we are totally vulnerable. That 

includes all 50 States; there is nothing out there? 

Mr. CARUSO. Nothing that I’m aware of. 

Mr. HICE. All right. All right. So we have got to address this 

problem because it is totally not addressed anywhere. 

Mr. CARUSO. That’s correct, except for a handful of private industry actors that have taken it upon themselves to protect it. The 

control center that I was speaking of before is an electric utility. 

They took it upon themselves to invest their own money to protect 

their control center. 

Mr. HICE. Okay. Then, real quickly, across the board, and I 

would appreciate an answer real quickly from all three of you. This 

being the case, what steps do Federal entities need to take to protect this? 

And, Dr. Baker, I will start with you, just real quickly because 

I know my name is about up. 

Mr. BAKER. First, we need a single authority that is in charge 

with the power to develop and enforce requirements. 

Mr. HICE. Okay. 

Mr. BAKER. And then I think, you know, of the 16 critical infrastructures, if we focused only on the electric power grid, that would 

be well worth it. We should have a program to—— 

Mr. HICE. All right. 

Mr. BAKER. —protect the grid. 

Mr. HICE. Real quickly, Dr. Pry and Mr. Caruso? 


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Mr. PRY. Pass the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act, which 

will require the Department of Homeland Security to add a new 

national planning scenario focused on the EMP threat. All State, 

local, and Federal emergency planning, training, and resource allocation is based on those scenarios. That’s why it’s not on the radar 

screen right now. Bring back the congressional EMP commission so 

you can have an aggressive watchdog to make sure that this work 

gets done. 

And reform the dysfunctional relationship between NERC and 

FERC. I say abolish them and start all over again. Give the job to 

DHS, somebody that’s willing to do the job. 

Mr. HICE. Unfortunately, my time has expired, but could Mr. Caruso—— 

Mr. DESANTIS. If you can submit your response—— 

Mr. HICE. Thank you. 

Mr. DESANTIS. —for the record written, it would be great. 

Mr. HICE. Thank you, Mr. Chairman. 

Mr. DESANTIS. And the chair now recognizes the gentleman from 

California, Mr. Lieu, for 5 minutes. 

Mr. LIEU. Thank you. Thank you, Mr. Chair, for holding this 

hearing to inform the public and policymakers about the threat of 

an EMP device. 

I have just some preliminary questions. Let’s say an EMP device 

was exploded over the U.S. What is the geographic area that it 

would affect? Is it the size of D.C.? Of Maryland? Of Virginia? 

Smaller? Larger? 

Mr. BAKER. An entry-level, you know, low-yield weapon, if it’s 

detonated at the optimum altitude, the diameter of the effect would 

be 1,200 miles. So it would be a circle with a 1,200-mile diameter. 

Mr. LIEU. Okay. 

And then, within that circle—so let’s say it fries the electrical 

generators. Does it also destroy the lines themselves, or are they 

still fine? 

Mr. BAKER. The—— 

Mr. LIEU. The lines that connect houses and businesses to the 

electric grid. 

Mr. BAKER. The lines will remain intact. There was some Russian experience where some of their lines, they actually had damage to the support insulators, where some of their lines fell to the 

ground. But the evidence is that, in most cases, the lines would remain intact. It’s just what’s on the end of the line would be affected. 

Mr. LIEU. And then, based on the way our electrical power grid 

is constructed in the U.S., could you take power from another part 

of the country and route it through the affected area? 

Mr. BAKER. That would depend upon the size of the circular diameter. It would be difficult to do that because you’re looking at 

areas that are crossing, you know, State boundaries and the boundaries of the different power companies. So it could be difficult. 

And we don’t—the grid control centers—we don’t have grid control centers in most cases that span that large of an area. 

Mr. LIEU. Okay. 

And I think, Mr. Caruso, you had mentioned a cost to harden our critical infrastructure. You said $182 per—per what? 


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Mr. CARUSO. Per square foot of floor space. 

Mr. LIEU. Okay. 

Mr. CARUSO. And that’s for doing a facility, not looking at the 

transformers. 

Mr. LIEU. So it’s hard for me to understand what that means. 

Can you sort of give me a number? To harden the United States 

to a place you think is sufficient, are we talking about $50 million, 

$50 billion, $500 billion? What is the range here so I can understand that? 

Mr. CARUSO. I’m sorry, I really don’t have that number available 

in my head. I can submit something. 

Mr. LIEU. Sure. 

Or anyone on the panel? 

Mr. PRY. It depends on how much protection you want to buy 

and what your judgment is, okay? It’s sort of like asking, well, how 

much will it cost to buy fire protection for my house? You know, 

some plans can be very inexpensive. It can be as simple as buying 

a smoke alarm—okay?—you know, which would cost you very little. 

Others might want to put a fire extinguisher in every room and put 

a sprinkler system in, which is going to cost a lot. 

There are—here are some legitimate plans and legitimate prices 

for you to keep in mind—okay?—that can range—John 

Kappenman, who was on our commission, had an idea, a plan, that 

would cost $200 million. And the idea here would be to protect the 

200 most important extra-high-voltage transformers, the ones that 

service the major metropolitan areas. So John wouldn’t say that 

this is adequate, but it will at least give you a fighting chance to 

save millions of people from starving to death, you know, because 

the transformers, at least, would be saved. 

The EMP Commission had a plan. It’s, you know, right in the 

plan, it’s about $2 billion—okay?—that protects all of the transformers and generators and is much more ambitious. And, you 

know, that’s a much better plan and would give you much greater 

resiliency and confidence in being able to recover the society quickly from an EMP. 

George Baker described an even better—a more ambitious and, 

I would say, a better plan that goes beyond that. It sort of depends 

on how much do you want to put into prevention. Just like in protecting your house, you know, you can spend more money to protect 

your house and be safer, or you can decide to spend less money and 

be less safe. 

But there are a wide variety of plans, which—— 

Mr. LIEU. And—— 

Mr. PRY. —industry sometimes misrepresents as being contradictory. They’re not. You know, it could range from $200 million up 

to $20 billion, $30 billion. 

Mr. LIEU. And so, given those options—as you know, a lot of electrical utilities are regulated by States or cities. What is your view 

of the Federal Government’s role? Why is it we don’t leave it up, 

for example, to the Public Utilities Commission of California to decide if they want to increase fees on ratepayers in order to harden 

the facilities there? 


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In other words—or is it your view we should give DHS authority 

to simply start imposing additional costs on ratepayers so we can 

harden all these facilities? 

Mr. PRY. May I respond? 

Mr. LIEU. Yeah, of course. 

Mr. PRY. Yeah. Well, you know, because this is—ultimately, this 

is a national security—especially if you’re talking about a nuclear 

EMP attack or a great geomagnetic storm that could cover not just 

the United States, but if it’s a Carrington event, you’re talking 

about the entire world being affected by this kind of a phenomenon. 

A threat of this scale should be a Federal national security responsibility. The States don’t normally think of themselves as protecting themselves against nuclear terrorist attacks, but because of 

the—— 

Mr. LIEU. But they do think about—right?—natural disasters. I 

mean, a massive naturally caused EMP thing would be a natural 

disaster. So, in California, it’s not so much the Federal Government 

saying, ‘‘Hey, harden yourself against earthquakes.’’ It’s actually 

California building codes that do that. 

So I’m just sort of curious as to, do you want this massive, overreaching Federal plan, or should we leave it to States and cities 

and local control? 

Mr. PRY. I personally don’t think it should be left to States and 

cities. But, however, you’re getting your wish. Because of the vacuum that’s been created by the lack of Federal leadership on this 

issue, the States are taking the initiative because they have to. 

Next week, I’m going up to Maine because Maine has passed a 

bill to protect its electric grid because the Feds haven’t done anything. Virginia has passed a bill. Arizona has passed a bill to protect its people. Florida has established a cyber and EMP legislative 

working group because there is no leadership, no help coming from 

Washington. 

And so the States are being made aware. They don’t even know 

about this threat, most of them, but as they become aware of this 

threat and they realize that the Federal Government isn’t doing 

anything, they are stepping up to the plate to protect their people. 

I don’t think that that’s—I was originally trained as a historian, 

and I find that rather disturbing, the fact that the States have to 

do this. You know, in the—one of the signs of the decline and fall 

of the Roman Empire was the rise of walled cities, because Rome 

would no longer—could no longer defend its cities against the Barbarians. So the states had to start providing for their own—I mean, 

the cities had to start providing for their own security. 

I don’t think that’s the way our system is supposed to work. You 

know, when it comes to national security, the Feds aren’t supposed 

to just say, ‘‘Well, the States, go ahead and do the best you can to 

take care of yourselves. We’ve got other things to do here.’’ You 

know, the fundamental constitutional obligation, the reason we 

have a Federal Government, is to provide for the common defense. 

Mr. LIEU. Thank you. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentleman’s time has expired. 

The chair now recognizes the gentleman from Tennessee for 5 

minutes for his questions. 


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Mr. DUNCAN. Well, thank you very much, Mr. Chairman. And 

thank you for calling this very important hearing. 

This is just one of thousands of things that we deal with, so none 

of us are the experts that you all are, but I can tell you this, it’s 

something I’ve been concerned about for a long time. 

In fact, just a few days after the 2003 blackout, I gave a speech 

on the floor, and I quoted from the Associated Press story at the 

time. And it said the proposed improvements that they were talking about to keep this from happening a second time, it says, ‘‘are 

making the electricity supply vulnerable to a different kind of 

peril—computer viruses and hackers that could blackout substations, cities, or entire States.’’ 

And the story went on to say, it said, ‘‘In the past, the grid’s old 

electromechanical switches and analog technology made it more or 

less impervious to computer maladies, but now switches and monitoring gear can be upgraded and programmed remotely with software, and that requires a vulnerable connection to a computer network. If that network runs on Microsoft Corporation operating systems, which virus writers favor, or it connects to the Internet, the 

vulnerabilities are increased.’’ 

That’s what came out in 2003. And I’m sorry that I’ve had to run 

in and out of here and not hear everything you’ve said because I’ve 

had some meetings with constituents. But when I hear you talking 

about knocking out the power to 80 percent of Turkey—somebody 

mentioned that—and all of Yemen, in some ways it seems like 

we’re almost more vulnerable today than we were then. Are we? 

Mr. BAKER. The quick answer is ‘‘yes.’’ 

Mr. DUNCAN. Well, you know, my wife has told me for years I 

still live in Andy of Mayberry days. And then, a few years later, 

I saw that I had the same birthday as Don Knotts. And when I saw 

that, I thought, well, she’s been right all these years. So I’m about 

as low-tech as they come. 

But it seems ridiculous to me that we’re so interconnected with 

each other that, when a crew cuts a tree limb in Cleveland, Ohio, 

and it cuts off the power to the entire Northeast and part of Canada for several hours, I mean, it seems like, to me, that that’s just 

ridiculous that we would allow that to happen. 

And it also seems to me that we need to get more people interested in this. Because surely we have people that can figure out— 

is it possible, you know, that bigger may not always be better? 

That maybe we shouldn’t have these power companies that are so 

big that, if we broke up some of these power companies, that we 

wouldn’t be so interconnected, where what happened to one would 

affect people all over the country? 

Mr. PRY. Well, actually, that was one of the recommendations of 

the EMP Commission. It’s called ‘‘islanding.’’ 

And, in effect, it’s kind of what’s happening at the level of the 

States. Even though it isn’t happening by a plan coming out of 

Washington, by this natural process of the States deciding to protect themselves, you’re creating islands, you know, where, if the big 

grid goes down, at least that State will have its lights stay on. And 

so—— 


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Mr. DUNCAN. Well, that is encouraging. I’ve been glad to hear 

that, that some of these States are taking individual initiatives. I 

hope that keeps growing. 

Mr. PRY. It makes it harder to do when the NERC claims that 

they’ve adopted a GMD standard and don’t worry about it, they’re 

on top of the problem, which they also say about cyber and things 

like that, which tends—is not true, you know, because it ends up 

taking away the incentive for the States to protect themselves 

when NERC convinces them that they are. 

And one—I’d like to also make one last statement, because you 

talked about, are we getting more vulnerable? Another thing that 

needs to be kept in mind is that we are getting more vulnerable 

all the time because of the advance of technology. You know, as our 

semiconductor technology gets better and better and faster and 

faster and runs on lower and lower voltages, it becomes more and 

more vulnerable to the EMP effect, which is why we’re so vulnerable now. 

Back in 1962, Starfish Prime test, when that happened, the vacuum tube technology of the day, you know, was 1 million times less 

vulnerable to EMP. Still, the lights went out in Hawaii—1 million 

times less vulnerable. 

And every time—I think it’s every 10 years we have, like, a tenfold increase in the capabilities of our semiconductor technology. It 

also becomes tenfold more vulnerable to EMP. So this problem is 

getting worse and worse. It’s not just standing still while we do 

nothing. 

Mr. DUNCAN. Well, what do you think about this bill by Congressman Franks? Is that a good first step? 

Mr. PRY. Oh, the Critical Infrastructure Protection Act? Absolutely. It’s, you know—it would go in a huge way toward helping 

solve the problem. 

Mr. DUNCAN. I remember several years ago I read on the front 

page of The Washington Post one day that a 12-year-old boy 

opened up the floodgates at the Hoover Dam 700 miles from his 

home because he was able to hack in. And it seems to me that, you 

know, we have a lot of brilliant people out here that should be able 

to—that should be working on this. 

We oversensationalize a lot of these threats because of a 24-hour 

news cycle and because so many people in companies make money 

off of threats that are exaggerated. But, in my opinion, this is one 

that’s not being exaggerated and that we need to do a little bit 

more. And I appreciate what you all are trying to do. 

I’ve run out of time. I’m sorry, Mr. Chairman. Thank you. 

Mr. DESANTIS. The gentleman yields back. 

I want to thank the witnesses for their testimony, for answering 

our questions. 

We wanted to have Congressman Franks testify and present both 

his critical infrastructure bill and the SHIELD Act, but he has a 

bill on the House floor right now, and he’s not able to attend. So 

we’re sorry that that couldn’t be arranged. 

But, clearly, I think, from what the witnesses have said, you 

know, those are the types of pieces of legislation, you know, that 

I think we need to be moving ahead in Congress. And so, if this 


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hearing has helped raise more awareness—and hopefully we can 

get some bipartisan support for this stuff and move forward. 

I will hold the record open for 5 legislative days for any members 

who would like to submit a written statement. 

Mr. DESANTIS. And, with that, this hearing is now adjourned. 

[Whereupon, at 3:40 p.m., the subcommittees were adjourned.] 


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APPENDIX 

MATERIAL SUBMITTED FOR THE HEARING RECORD


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‘‘Identify Potential Impacts of an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) 

Attack on Fire and EMS Delivery Services for the Walpole Fire Department’’ by Deputy Chief Michael K. Lararacy, Sr., Walpole Fire 

Department, Walpole, Massachusetts, can be found here: 

http://www.usfa.fema.gov/pdf/efop/efo46308.pdf 


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