Solar Storm Could Leave Britain Without Power 'For Months'

The risk of a catastrophic solar storm that would leave countries including the United Kingdom and United States without electricity for days or even months will peak in 2015, a new report claims.

The study, a joint venture from researchers at Lloyd's of London and Atmospheric and Environmental Research (AER) in the United States, details a dystopian scenario where a shortage of electrical transformers would leave Western nations without electricity for months because of the time needed to build replacements.

A solar storm occurs when magnetic fields "loop" out of sunspots, releasing huge amounts of energy. These bursts of "plasma", a superheated, electrically-charged gas, could enter the Earth's own magnetic field and eventually disrupt networks dependent on electricity on the ground.