Lack of emergency plans, massive shortages in supply: The Federal office for civil protection warns of the consequences of a nationwide power failure. To think right, Blackout-expert Thomas Leitert in the DW-Interview.
Bent electricity poles in the Winter of 2005, parts of Germany shut down
And suddenly, nothing: was no heating, no traffic lights, no public transport. As at the end of November 2005, about 80 electricity pylons under the weight of Snow collapsed, sparked off in Parts of North Rhine-Westphalia and lower Saxony a mess. More than 250,000 people were cut off from the power supply – in some cases up to five days. The economic damage amounted, according to estimates of the affected länder a minimum of 100 million euros.
The largest blackout in the history of the Federal Republic of Germany exposed the vulnerability of the German power supply and infrastructure. Since you can’t feel very much safer. The Federal office for population protection and disaster relief, calls him an internal position paper that has been through media reports, known, better emergency planning. Because: A large-scale power failure leads to the final calculations are still to be defects of substantial Supply. The impact would be “catastrophic”.
Thomas Leitert, dealing for years with the issue of power failure, it is not surprising the. The entrepreneur who works with the Berlin fire brigade, operators of critical infrastructures such as water plants, as well as various universities and the Federal Ministry of education and research together, we have been requesting for years that Germany must prepare for the future. Leitert is Chairman of the Board of the Berlin civil protection company KomRe AG.
DW: In the position paper of the Federal office for population protection, it means that the power supply in Germany is generally safe, however, the impact would be in the case of a power failure, catastrophic. Do you share this assessment?
Berlin in the dark. A burned down power line caused a power outage in several districts of
Leitert: Yes, absolutely. The effects would be in principle a national disaster. The Bundestag has recognized in 2010, he has commissioned the office of technology assessment to investigate exactly this scenario. And came to the conclusion that We would not be able to manage this scenario in Germany.
There is still no adequate emergency plans in Germany?
In fact, not. This has something to do with the federalism in Germany. Civil protection in Germany, the municipality is actually responsible, i.e., the lowest local authority. The district administrator or the district Council is actually the first disaster to conservationists. And would be unable to cope with a nationwide Blackout completely. In this respect, he is struggling to hit for this scenario, Prevention. Ultimately, the responsibility lies with him, and he would have to actually care about, to remain capable of action.
According to the Federal network Agency by October, the number of supply interruptions has been in the last year of decline. However, downtime in the distribution network due to storms, high water, or snow, had doubled over the previous year. Are we prepared for the increase in extreme weather events as a result of climate change sufficient?
No, of course not. Why? Because of these weather are not the dominate phenomena and to predict. We see it in the high water cases. Almost every year, it is said, is now the flood of the century, and then a flood, what gets the same title is coming two, three years later.
How do you assess the risks posed by cyber-attacks or terrorist attacks on the power supply?
There are such incidents here in Germany. But these are not communicated to the General Public. The best example, there were two or three years ago in the Ukraine and in the conflict with Russia. There was tried – by whom -to separate the Crimea from the power supply by has just blown up a transmission line. Thus, the Crimea, and 1.2 million people for two weeks, normally. The other side were the Russians, have taken revenge, then, just before Christmas, and with a cyber attack to ensure that in the Ukraine across the Board, the power went out. A few hundred thousand people were separated for several days from the power supply. So there are incidents in Europe, but which are not communicated openly, in order to prevent copycat.
Test of patience for travelers: at the beginning of June, the power went out at Hamburg airport
Germany is not sufficiently established to such cyber attacks?
The answer is a clear no. We strive, of course, by the Federal office for security in information technology, to make appropriate Provisions, follow but from my perspective of development. Other countries such as the USA, China or Russia are much more. We have a high need to catch up. However, critical infrastructure is to protect very difficult. With a very low level of violence, exposure to an extremely large damage can be achieved, and the infrastructures in Germany are simply not designed to provide protection, but functionality and development.
It would be a longer area, the current to the ceiling failure, as in 2005, what would have to be observed in the population with urgently? How should you respond?
Thomas Leitert calls for area-wide emergency plans
The population must follow what the Federal office for population protection and disaster relief, is proposing today to make yourself care. The population should hold up for at least 14 days of food and water supplies, to suffer, at least at the beginning, no Need. And then disaster protection-organizations should invest much more in prevention and Preparedness. Comprehensive emergency plans have to be created. You have to prepare for such a scenario in a targeted manner. Up to now, the make the least.
What would need to specifically done, what will be invested?
We need to strengthen in every case, the non-police danger prevention in terms of civil protection, and we need to harden the critical infrastructures that they are able to, the delivery of basic services. It starts with the water. This is more about food and medicines, and of course, nowadays, very important, the Information. The Federal office requires that the communication in case of a power break failure only after several hours. From my experience, the but it’s faster. As soon as the power is away, we also have no landline, no Internet and no mobile more. As a result, we are no longer able to communicate, get information, and that would, nowadays, be the biggest Problem.
In the event of a massive power outage in Germany, it would have that impact on our European neighbours?
Definitely! We speak of a European Electricity grid, and it is not very likely that such a power failure stops at the borders of Germany. It can also be Vice versa, that, for example, a power failure in France, Austria or Italy means that we also get a Blackout. As I said, we speak of a European Energy network. And the result is that we are affected by them, at a time when elsewhere the power goes out.
New York is frequently struck by power outages home. In 2012, hurricane Sandy put the power switch in Manhattan
In the centre of the South Korean capital of Seoul, has caused on Saturday a fire in an underground cable channel to massive failures in the telecommunications and many users are largely from the Internet cut off. Were affected more than 210,000 households. Now the incident in South Korean Newspapers is also referred to as a Prime example of the risks in a digital society. This is the price one has to pay for the Expansion of the technologies of the future?
I’m afraid, Yes. The more complex a society is – and South Korea is one of the highly developed, complex societies – the more vulnerable she is in this area. We had experienced similar a few months ago in Berlin. Radical forces were under a bridge a power line on fire, what parts in the several city to blanket an area, the current to led failure with an impact on the communication infrastructure such as mobile, landline and Internet. Yes, the price can be very high, and if we don’t start thinking about prevention, we must pay the price at the end as a society.
The Interview was conducted by Ralf Bosen.