A bill to address solar storm threats to the grid is under consideration by the Energy, Utilities and Technology Committee and will soon go to the full Maine legislature.

On March 9, 1989, the sun boiled over, sending a cloud of charged particles speeding toward the earth. When the cloud hit the earth’s magnetic field three days later, alarms went off at power grid operators across North America. The cloud’s impact had distorted the Earth’s magnetic field, causing powerful currents to surge through long-distance transmission lines. Substation transformers overheated and failed. Circuit breakers tripped off.

In New England, grid operators reported dozens of malfunctions. A gigawatt of electricity generation was temporarily lost ”“ nearly equivalent to the capacity of the Seabrook nuclear plant. A blackout for Maine was narrowly averted. Maine Yankee’s main transformer needed replacement, at a cost of several million dollars.

In Quebec, the fast-moving solar storm overwhelmed grid operators. At 2:45 a.m. on March 13, the entire province plunged into darkness. Homes went cold. People in stalled elevators were trapped. When daylight came, businesses couldn’t open; they had no power. In the nine hours it took to restore Quebec’s electric grid, an estimated $10 billion of economic activity was lost.

A quarter century later, Maine’s electric utilities still haven’t protected homes and businesses against blackouts from solar storms. Why? Because an obsolete “regulatory bargain” between the State of Maine and privately-owned utilities eliminates nearly all of their liability for grid outages. If power goes out for a day, month, year, or more, consumers have little recourse. Moreover, if utilities fail to prudently protect their equipment from solar storm damage, repair costs fall not upon the utilities, but on the ratepayers.

Maine’s electric utilities lack accountability for grid outages, except to government bureaucrats at the Public Utilities Commission.

Scientists working for the U.S. government warn that a catastrophic solar storm could strike Maine at any time. In 2008, a National Academy of Sciences report estimated that an extreme solar storm could cause a blackout with a recovery time of four to 10 years. Because of its high latitude, ocean coastline and granite geology, Maine is perhaps the most vulnerable of all 50 states.

In July 2012, an extreme solar storm missed the Earth’s position in orbit by only one week. NASA scientists estimate that the chance each decade of a catastrophic solar storm hitting the earth is 12 percent. Within the lives of today’s children, that’s a chance of well over 50 percent.

In 2010, the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, in a study sponsored by the U.S. Departments of Energy and Homeland Security, estimated the cost to protect American electricity consumers from solar storms would be 20 cents per year per ratepayer. Multiple studies have shown that the cost to protect Maine ratepayers would be slightly more ”“ $7 million, or about 50 cents per ratepayer per year over 20 years. That’s less than 1 percent of the capital invested in the Maine Power Reliability Program.

The sun cooks up solar storms while Maine’s utilities cook up excuses. Utilities expect that a reliability standard pending approval in Washington, D.C. might give them “justification” to install storm surge blockers ”“ or, more likely, an excuse not to. Under federal law, the regulatory system for electric grid reliability is painfully slow and even allows utilities to set their own easy-to-meet standards.

According to a grid model developed by Central Maine Power, the industry’s weak standard for solar storm protection would require only one out of 16 high voltage transformers in Maine to be protected against surges. According to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory report sponsored by the U.S government, 82 percent of Maine’s transformers are at risk.

Without surge blockers for solar storms, Maine’s utilities pretend that just 20 minutes of final warning will allow them to reduce power to minimize the storm’s impact. Did weather forecasts save New Orleans from Hurricane Katrina?

For the citizens of Maine, and citizens in all 50 states, it’s time to reexamine the “regulatory bargain” that saves utilities, but not the public, from blackout costs. Electric utilities and their lobbyists may have convinced some that no immediate action is needed to protect Maine’s grid, but their liability shield is no bargain for people and businesses in Maine. Utility executives can sleep, but the sun doesn’t.

 — Thomas Popik is Chairman of the Foundation for Resilient Societies, a New Hampshire nonprofit group that recently testified before the Energy, Utilities, and Technology Committee of the Maine State Legislature on solar storm protection. Andrea Boland is a former state representative for the Sanford district and an advocate for electric grid reliability.

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