Legislation must allow fast action in case of physical attacks, like an EMP pulse, or cyber attacks against the electric grid, experts say

Although some have considered an Electromagnetic Pulse (EMP) on the nation's electric grid unlikely, experts told a panel of the House Homeland Security Committee Tuesday that if the US completely ignores the possibility of such an attack, the possibility of an attack gets much higher.

"Some in government have taken the position that EMP attack and geomagnetic storm disruption  are low-probability events..." said William Graham, chairman for the Commission to Assess the Threat to the United States from Electromagnetic Pulse, a congressionally mandated commission to study the risk of EMP pulses. "By ignoring large scale, catastrophic EMP vulnerability, we invite such attack on our infrastructure by adversaries looking to attack us where we are weak, not where we are strong."

A high-altitude EMP is the result of the detonation of a nuclear warhead at altitudes between 40-400 km above the Earth's surface, Graham told the House Subcommittee on Emerging Threats, Cybersecurity, and Science and Technology.

"The immediate effects of EMP are disruption of, and damage to, electronic systems and electrical infrastructure," Graham said. "EMP is not reported in the scientific literature to have direct effects on people."

Subcommittee chairwoman Yvette Clarke (D-NY) said the risk of an EMP attack or cyber attack is a significant threat to homeland security.

"Many nation states, like Russia, China, North Korea, and Iran, have offensive cyber attack capabilities, while terrorist groups like Hezbollah and al Qaeda continue to work to develop capabilities to attack and destroy critical infrastructure like the electric grid through cyber means," Clarke said.

Clarke's panel heard from Graham and other experts on threats to the US electric grid to gain their perspectives on vulnerabilities of the electric sector prior to consideration of the Critical Electric Infrastructure Act (HR 2195). The bill would authorize the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to issue emergency rules to protect the electric grid after a determination by the secretary of Homeland Security that the grid faces an imminent threat.

"The committee has a bipartisan, bicameral legislative solution to secure the electric grid," Bennie Thompson (D-Miss.) of the House Homeland Security Committee stressed. "Our bill is comprehensive in its scope. Because the grid is only as strong as its weakest link, we believe that all elements of the grid- from generation to transmission to distribution to metering infrastructure-should all be included. Our bill covers physical attacks--like electromagnetic pulse--as well as cyber attacks."

Thompson said the bill would do four things:

• It requires FERC to establish interim measures deemed necessary to protect against physical and cyber threats to critical electric infrastructure. This would improve existing mandatory standards.
• It provides FERC with the authorities necessary to issue emergency orders to owners and operators of the electric grid after receiving a finding from DHS about a credible and imminent cyber attack.
• It requires the Department of Homeland Security (DHS) to perform ongoing cyber security vulnerability and threat assessments to the critical electric infrastructure, and provide mitigation recommendations to eliminate those vulnerabilities and threats.
• It requites DHS to conduct an investigation to determine if the security of federally owned critical electric infrastructure has been compromised by outsiders.

The most important thing about preventing either a cyber or EMP attack is clear communication from the private sector to the public sector when there is a perceived threat, testified Steve Naumann, vice president of Wholesale Markets, who at the hearing was representing Edison Electric Institute and Electric Power Supply Association. He also said that that communication shouldn't be in the form of directives issued by DHS.

"If we don't know about the threat, its very hard to mitigate," Naumann said. "If there's an emergency, to the extent, there is time. It's very important that rather than issuing a directive, there be as much consultation as possible under the circumstances."

The bill has the support of Republicans as well as Democrats on the Homeland Security Committee. Roscoe Bartlett (R-Md.) likened the bill to an insurance policy.

"EMP attack may be a low probability, a certainly high impact event, but when you have such a potential like your house burning, you buy an insurance policy," Bartlett said. "You do something that will make you whole in the event that that happens. I would submit that in our country we have done essentially nothing that would make us whole if this were to happen."

Joseph Lieberman (I-Conn.), chair of the Senate Homeland Security and Governmental Affairs Committee, has introduced a companion bill (S. 946) in the Senate.

Editor's note: For more on the threat of an EMP attack, click here for previous HSToday.us coverage.