The SHIELD Act*
(Secure High-voltage Infrastructure for Electricity from Lethal
Damage Act)
The summary below was written by
Congressman Trent Franks.
Why We Need it:
In 2008, the bipartisan Electromagnetic Pulse Commission testified
before Congress that: Contemporary U.S. society is not structured, nor
does it have the means, to provide for the needs of nearly 300 million
Americans without electricity;
- The current strategy for recovery from a failure of the electric
grid leaves us ill-prepared to respond effectively to a manmade or
naturally occurring EMP event that would potentially result in
damage to vast numbers of components nearly simultaneously over an
unprecedented geographic scale;
- Should the electrical power system be lost for any substantial
period of time the consequences are likely to be catastrophic to
society, including potential casualties in excess of 60% of the
population, according to the Chairman of the EMP Commission;
- Negative impacts on the electric infrastructure are potentially
catastrophic in an EMP event unless practical steps are taken to
provide protection for critical elements of the electric
system; Finally, most experts predict the occurrence of severe
geomagnetic storms is inevitable, it is only a matter of when.
What it Does:
- The SHIELD Act, which amends section 215 of the Federal Power
Act, encourages cooperation between industry and government in the
development, promulgation, and implementation of standards and
processes that are necessary to address the current shortcomings and
vulnerabilities of the electric grid from a major EMP event;
- The SHIELD Act incorporates most of the EMP-related language of
HR 5026 from the 111th Congress, which passed overwhelmingly through
the House, but was stalled in the Senate during the Lame Duck due
mostly to additional language regarding cyber-security threats.
- However, the SHIELD Act omits language regarding cyber-security
threats, (which can be better addressed in a separate bill), and
then goes beyond HR 5026 by further requiring an automated
protection plan and hardware-based solutions, without which the
legislation would be toothless to truly address EMP threats.
- The SHIELD Act also requires that standards be developed within
6 months, as opposed to 1 year, of enactment, ensuring a faster
timeline of protection.
Click here to download a PDF version of the text above in a
ready-to-print format.
Click here to read the entire SHIELD Act in full.
Click here to check the status of the SHIELD Act.
© 2013 EMPact America
http://www.shieldact.com/about-the-shield-act/
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