You can see the whole thing
here.
It's obviously a worst-case scenario and highly unlikely...but still fun to hypothesize about! The portion of the transcript that covers this is below...also addresses the vulnerability of the U.S. military as a result of its complete reliance on the commercial grid...interesting...
TESTIMONY TRANSCRIPT (~53:00 - 58:00)
BARTLETT: Thank you very much.
I have three quick concerns. Let me express them.
Mr. Daggett, you mentioned the asymmetric warfare that we are involved in, and the -- that we will be attacked where we are weak. And perhaps here in the homeland, I would suggest that one of our greatest vulnerabilities, not just in the homeland, but in our military, is our susceptibility to -- our vulnerability to EMP.
We may avoid that, sir, but what we will not avoid is a major solar storm of the Carrington magnitude. A high official in FERC told me that if that happened our grid would come down, cascading effects would bring down some of the major transformers. It would be perhaps several years before the grid was back up.
I asked him the consequences of that. He said probably 80 percent of our population would die. I see no activity on the part of either the military or the Homeland Security that addresses this enormous threat to life as we know it.
Secondly, Mr. Berteau, you mentioned unaddressed risks. I read just recently that China has developed and is now fielding an anti- ship missile. If that is a cruise missile, supersonic, we probably have defense against that.
We'd have to stand off 1,200 miles from any land where an enemy had that kind of a -- of a weapon. I see no indication that we're addressing that and re-ordering our military for the future to that reality, which is here and will increase.
And thirdly, Mr. Donnelly, you mentioned that our military expenditure today is less in terms of GDP than it has ever been. I would suggest there is no shortage of money. What there is a shortage of is our ability to convince the American people that we need more money. The American people will support any level of funding of the military which is necessary to address our national security interests.
Am I wrong in having these concerns?
DAGGETT: On EMP, I know that you've been engaged -- involved in the commission that has been studying EMP issues. I have to say I haven't looked at it as thoroughly as I think I probably should.
I have taken a look at some -- lots of different studies of potential future asymmetric threats. I discussed one in ...
BARTLETT: Would you get just a little closer to the mike?
DAGGETT: Yes. I discussed one set of those challenges in the -- in the testimony, which is access denial of -- access denial kinds of challenges, which I am convinced is an increasing problem for U.S. naval forces.
But the United States is beginning to address that. The decision to terminate DDG 1000 and use instead DDG 51 as a basis for blue water forces reflects, I think in part, a decision that it's more difficult to maintain a ship of the size of the DDG 1000 in close-in littoral waters, given area denial strategies by the Chinese and by others, than in the past.
And that could include not just the anti-ship cruise missiles, as you mentioned, but also smart mines, even precision guided ballistic missile capabilities and things of that sort, let alone small boats with suicide, you know, bombers on board.
So there are a lot of -- there are a lot of those kinds of challenges. And, you know, EMP is one of them, but there are a number of other asymmetric challenges which we're going to have to cope with in the future. And, as I said, I think they could in the future become a pretty significant budget driver.
BERTEAU: Mr. Bartlett, let me respond both -- to both your first two points there. On the vulnerability on the grid, I would urge you, as you're looking at defense next year, also to notice that it used to be, 15 years ago, that much of the defense infrastructure in the U.S. had its own independent power sources.
Today that's no longer true. We've now privatized, and DOD is largely dependent on the commercial grid. And so, ...
BARLETT: We've gone in the wrong direction, haven't we? The military ought to be able to island itself. We have a bunch of our electric production which cannot do a black start. It has got to have electricity to start if it goes down. We will now be incapable of that. And wouldn't it be a good idea if our military could island itself, so that it could be a starter for this?
BERTEAU: And I suspect there's a third option there from a technology point of view that ought to be looked at.
From the unaddressed risk things, particularly the one you raised -- and we can't talk about it much here in an open session -- but I actually think the QDR has done a better job on these sets of risks than in many other areas. And I suspect that you'll be -- you'll be able to see some of the results of that when the QDR is released.
The bottom line is this. A catastophic solar flare is highly unlikely, but it's not unprecedented. Whatever we do to prepare for a worst-case scenario will lessen the inevitable impacts that come along with the minor irritations associated with EVERY solar max. Leaders have to find the balance of resources to throw at such a high impact low frequency (HILF) event. 
Check out this image from the national Infrastructure Protection Plan. It highlights what COULD happen in the "perfect space weather storm" if the grid fails. It's not just electricity that goes away...it's water, refrigeration, medical stockpiles, etc. 
