HANSARDCommons02 Jul 20259 contributions

Space Weather

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3:59 pm
Dr Neil Shastri-Hurst (Solihull West and Shirley) (Con)
ConservativeSolihull West and Shirley
I beg to move,
That this House has considered the impact of space weather on the UK.
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairmanship, Mr Turner. There are debates in this House that deal with the visible challenges of our time, such as conflict, inflation and public services, and then every so often, there are those that deal with the dangers not yet on our doorstep, but hurtling towards us all the same. This is such a debate. The threat that I raise today does not wear a uniform, cross borders or sail across oceans. It travels from the heart of our solar system, faster than sound, silent and invisible. It is called space weather, and it poses one of the gravest risks to our modern way of life.
I will start with a simple truth: the sun, for all its warmth and majesty, can also be a menace. It gives us energy, light and life, but without warning it can unleash waves of electromagnetic fury so powerful and indiscriminate that they can bring nations to a standstill in a matter of minutes. This is not speculation or science fiction; it is based on history and science, and it is an urgent question of national resilience.
In 1859, a solar storm known as the Carrington event ignited telegraph wires, shocked operators and lit up the skies from Canada to the Caribbean. In the 21st century, such a storm would do more than send sparks down copper wires. It would knock out GPS, disable satellites, crash the grid, blind radar systems and paralyse entire regions. In 1989, Quebec’s power grid collapsed in under two minutes; schools shut, hospitals faltered and 6 million people were left in the dark. In 2012, a storm of Carrington magnitude missed Earth by just a matter of days. After that, NASA estimated that the global cost would have exceeded $2.6 trillion.
In short, we are not speculating about what might happen; we are merely observing what has already happened, just not to us—or at least not yet. In effect, we are living between bullets: one already fired, another having just missed, and a third, we must assume, now chambered.
We live in a nation defined by connection. Our power grid, transport system, banks, hospitals and military platforms are all linked, all digital and all dependent on space-borne technology. It is one of the great marvels of modern Britain. But it is also, if we are frank, one of our greatest vulnerabilities. A severe solar storm would not simply inconvenience us; it would disrupt the essential machinery of civilised life. High-frequency radios used by pilots and the armed forces fail. Satellites are disabled. Navigation systems go dark. Power lines are overloaded by geomagnetic surges, and cascading failures begin.
The Met Office, supported by the Royal Academy of Engineering, has warned that a major event could leave parts of the UK without electricity for days or even weeks. When the power goes, everything else follows: the supermarket tills, the mobile networks, the ventilators and the pumps that keep our water flowing. The digital backbone of our modern state is silenced. It is not just a problem for astronomers or scientists in their white coats, but a matter of national security, public health, financial stability and strategic foresight.
The United Kingdom does not enter this debate empty-handed. In 2021, the Cabinet Office and the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy produced the severe space weather preparedness strategy, which was a forward-looking and well-considered document. It identified three pillars: first, assessment to improve forecasting and monitoring; secondly, preparation to support resilience planning in key sectors; and thirdly, response and recovery to co-ordinate emergency action across Government, industry and services. Those are the right foundations, but as we all know, strategies do not defend countries; implementation does, and in that sense we are not yet where we need to be.
Let me identify four urgent areas for action. First, preparedness must become mandatory, not voluntary. We rightly legislate to ensure that our infrastructure can cope with floods, so why not do the same for solar storms? We have the regulators—Ofcom, Ofgem and the Civil Aviation Authority—and we need them to require, not merely recommend, that resilience plans are in place. When the warning comes, it will not arrive with some sort of grace period.
Secondly, we must harden our defence capability. Our armed forces are increasingly reliant on satellite-enabled systems, whether that is for communication, targeting or navigation. Every major platform, from Type 26 frigates to F-35 jets, integrates space-dependent systems. We must invest in hardened equipment and train to operate in degraded space conditions. We must fund research into back-up navigation systems and sovereign capabilities. The reality is that our adversaries are already preparing for such an environment and we must not be found lagging behind.
Thirdly, we must strengthen civil contingency planning. Local resilience forums are charged with keeping our communities safe. They plan for floods, pandemics and cyber-attacks, but in many areas, they do not yet plan for solar storms. They must be given the data, the scenarios and the authority to act.
Fourthly, we must lead international co-ordination. This threat does not respect borders; the response must be global. The United Kingdom should press for a framework through NATO, the G7, the UN or the European Space Agency to share data, align early-warning systems and co-ordinate national preparedness. We have led the world in tackling threats before. Let us now do the same in the case of space weather. This is not a matter of national pride; it is a matter of global necessity.
Let me bring the reality home to this House. Imagine that it is mid-January. The temperatures are freezing and the skies are dark. The sun erupts and a geomagnetic storm is en route. Local hospitals are now running on back-up power, ambulances are offline, phones are down and the grid is being rationed. Supermarkets are unable to take card payments, petrol pumps do not work, water pressure drops and air traffic is grounded. Our farmers cannot access the satellite data they need, small businesses grind to a halt, trains are suspended and mobile coverage is patchy or lost. The elderly, who are already vulnerable, are now cut off, isolated and invariably frightened. That is not fiction or dramatic exaggeration; it is foreseeable and preventable. All of that happens not because we lack the knowledge, but because we failed to act on it.
Governments are judged not only on whether they see crises coming, but on how they respond to them. There are threats we cannot foresee, but there are others, like this one, where the science is established, the risk is understood and the warning is clear. This is precisely the kind of threat that distinguishes those Governments that react from those that prepare. The storm may come next year or not for a generation but, when it does, it will be too late to start preparing then. This is not the moment for drift or delay; it is the moment for decisive leadership.
With that in mind, I ask the Minister to address six critical questions; they are not intended to catch anyone out but to encourage action. First, will the Government publish a delivery plan with clear targets and funding to give force to the 2021 strategy? Secondly, will Ministers bring forward statutory requirements for critical infrastructure operators to mitigate this risk? Thirdly, are the Government satisfied that our armed forces are equipped and trained to operate in the event of a space weather blackout?
Fourthly, what investment is being made in forecasting capabilities, including support of the ESA Vigil mission and co-ordination with the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, NASA and others? Fifthly, will the Cabinet Office require local resilience forums to prepare for this threat, as they do for other category 1 emergencies? Finally, will Britain now lead efforts to build an international framework for preparedness, starting with NATO or the G7?
The case is clear, the risk is real and the time to act is now. Let us not be the generation that read the reports, saw the warnings, nodded thoughtfully and then did nothing. Let us instead be the generation that looked beyond the horizon, recognised the scale of the threat and acted with the seriousness it demands. The sun may well be 93 million miles away, but its reach is far closer than we think. When the next storm comes, let it not find us asleep at the wheel. Let it find us ready and prepared. Let it find a country that saw the storm and stood firm in the face of it.
4:10 pm
Lizzi Collinge (Morecambe and Lunesdale) (Lab)
LabourMorecambe and Lunesdale
It is a pleasure to serve under your chairship, Mr Turner, and I thank the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley (Dr Shastri-Hurst) for securing this important debate. Space weather has profound effects on our planet, particularly now that we rely so heavily on technology that can be affected by radiation or changes to the magnetosphere. What is space weather? Basically, it is the sun chucking out gas and particles into space. It varies over time, and has peaks and troughs. We are currently just past the highest peak, but we are still in a very active period.
Three main types of solar weather events affect us on Earth: solar flares, solar energetic particles and coronal mass ejections. Those travel at different speeds, have different make-ups and have different impacts. Essentially, they all sneak past our normal protections—the magnetosphere and our atmosphere—and cause problems for us on Earth. The extra radiation and geomagnetic storms from the events can cause high-frequency radio blackouts and affect all sorts of electronic systems, both in space and on the ground. I also wanted to discuss the Carrington event in 1859, but time is short, so those watching at home will have to google it.
What can we do about the risks of space weather? First, I support the calls of the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley. I asked my friend, astrophysicist Dr Alfredo Carpineti—I always keep a tame astrophysicist on hand—what he thought Parliament needed to know about space weather. He agreed with me that we must continue to invest in the Met Office space weather operations centre, which monitors and forecasts space weather, and promote its work. It has done a great job in reaching the public with its aurora forecasts, and I would love people to know more about the rest of its work.
I have very much enjoyed educating my colleagues about space weather this week. Dr Carpineti told me that we need more research on how the UK would cope with a Carrington-level event and work out how to mitigate the potential impact. Another key research topic is around the degradation of technologies from the continuous stream of particles from space. I am told that that is particularly relevant for British territories and facilities at higher latitudes.
4:12 pm
The Minister for Data Protection and Telecoms (Chris Bryant)
LabourRhondda and Ogmore
It is a delight to see you in your place, Mr Turner, and to take part in this debate.
Given the weather we have been having, it is somewhat ironic that we are worrying about space weather. People sometimes think the sun is a wonderful thing and a delight when it comes out in the UK. It also helps ice cream sales, with the best ice cream in Britain coming from Subzero, made in the Rhondda—I note no contest on that. But having suffered from stage 4 melanoma, I am also conscious that the sun can cause enormous damage through normal exposure. One of the fastest growing forms of cancer in the UK is skin cancer, as a direct result of people being over-exposed to the sun. My advice is that people should avoid the sun between 10 o’clock and 3 o’clock and, if they are out in the sun, that they should cover up or use high-quality sunscreen.
I am grateful to the hon. Member for Solihull West and Shirley (Dr Shastri-Hurst) for securing the debate, which relates to an important part of the resilience we need in this country. Of course, it is something we need to do not on our own but with our allies. As he said, we are intimately involved with the European Space Agency, and we will address some of these issues with allies in other countries.
The hon. Member is right to highlight the importance of space weather. He referred to the 1989 Quebec incident, and there are many others, although some have not been quite as severe. He did not mention what happened in May 2024 when, to the great delight of many people, the aurora borealis was visible all the way down to Kent, which antagonised my husband, who has on many occasions gone to Norway, Iceland and all sorts of other places, where he has sat in car parks to try to watch it without ever seeing it. At the same time, 5,000 Starlink satellites had to perform autocorrection manoeuvres to make sure they were safe. The system survived, but it shows that severe space weather can have a profound effect on our satellites.
4:26 pm
Sitting suspended.