Off the Grid
What do you do when fascists start targeting power substations around the country?
Ten years ago this week an unknown group of people with rifles started firing at the Metcalf power transmission substation in Santa Clara County in California, just next to San Jose. An unknown party snuck in, cut phone lines and then fired more than 100 rounds of ammunition into the substation. They heavily damaged 17 transformers, with utilities operator PG&E only barely averting a blackout for the region. The attack resulted in $15 million in repair costs. It took less than an hour to carry out.
The case was never solved. No perpetrators were ever found.
San Jose and Silicon Valley got lucky. The attack did not result in mass power outages. No one was hurt by the gunfire. It could have been much worse. But it was terrifying enough as is. It took 10 months for details of the attack to come to light, with the public learning about the intricacy of the plot. An FBI agent told Foreign Policy the feds didn’t believe it was a terrorist attack, but a former PG&E executive called it a “dress rehearsal.”
In the decade since the sabotage at Metcalf, attacks on the power grid, particularly power grid substations, have become the new popular tactic of terrorists in the United States. More than a dozen plots have occurred or been planned since 2016. And that’s particularly been in the last year. On Dec. 3, someone attacked two substations in Moore County, North Carolina. The damage caused power outages that impacted 45,000 people for at least five days, and resulted in car crashes and other incidents. Only a few weeks later, gunmen shot up two substations in Randolph County, North Carolina. The Moore County one came amid threats over drag shows in North Carolina. It’s still unclear who attacked the power grid or why, but that connection has neither been ruled out or confirmed.
There were also attacks in the Pacific Northwest. Gunfire at a substation in November 2022 in Washington State knocked out power for more than 5,000 people and later in December another attack was done in Oregon by simply cutting into a chain link fence, sneaking in and opening fire.
As Marketplace noted, these attacks can be big, coordinated strikes with weapons like the 2013 Metcalf incident, or they can be quick acts of vandalism that can still sabotage the infrastructure. Either way they are a big problem. Forget about the companies themselves, that doesn’t matter. What matters is the people. These targets are easy to hit and their damage can impact and hurt thousands if not millions of people depending on the region, and there really isn’t much momentum to do anything about this. Fascists and insurrectionists who aren’t trying to outright assault minorities are waging terror campaigns by going after this infrastructure. It doesn’t help that so many law enforcement members have been linked to extremist groups.
In Washington, one wasn’t done as part of a political ideology, but apparently to create a distraction for a robbery. Two men were charged with carrying out a Christmas Day attack on four substations, allegedly as cover for a burglary that day. This is some Arthur Conan Doyle “The Case of the Red Headed League”-type scheming, but combined with a truly dangerous tactic. It does have a “dumb criminals” angle, in part because they tried a huge distraction and yet still kept their cell phones on them. But copycats beget copycats. The Pacific Northwest saw more than a dozen attacks on power infrastructure since June 2022. Even if a few are for theft, others are for intimidation or harm, and either way, people get hurt.
Neo-Nazi groups are pointing to these kinds of attacks as a winning strategy. And the United States doesn’t seem as concerned about it as it should.
The scary thing is that it’s an easy, ingenious move. A few rounds of ammunition from a distance and you can cripple a city. This isn’t an endorsement, just an acknowledgement. And it’s becoming a popular tactic, during a time where mass shootings and targeted attacks on minorities are spiking. The American power grid is an easy target. These substations are often exposed to the elements, with maybe a chain link fence to surround them but not much in terms of protection. A switch to green energy might help — and to be clear it is needed if we want to avoid mass unending suffering from climate change — but even then the infrastructure of moving that power is still a target. A target that fascists are exploiting.
This month the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission ordered a review of security measures after the attacks in December. It’s unclear what the overall recommendations and actions will be, but it’s at least a necessary step. But the growing frequency of attacks makes even the fastest timeline (the order calls for a report in 120 days) feel too slow.
So what can be done? Beyond funding better social services and community engagement to avert fascism — which we should do, but it won’t stop the fascists already here — the answer is security, but not in the way it’s usually envisioned. Hiring armed security for each location is a fool’s errand and heading down the wrong path. If nothing else, when these sites can be attacked at a distance and at elevation with high-powered weapons. Posting some rent-a-cops at the perimeter doesn’t solve that. Of course, at least three states — including North Carolina— still introduced bills to put around-the-clock security at these spots.
There are some obvious solutions. Higher walls could help, ones that are harder to get through than a fence. Not leaving these facilities and equipment exposed is a good step. Sure it can be costly, but repairs and blackouts are costlier. It’s not as if so many power companies on the Pacific Coast aren’t already paying high fees for the deadly wildfires their equipment causes. Taking some steps to prevent terrorists from sniping at substations feels like a decent investment.
These types of attacks don’t seem like they’re going to go away any time soon. And we need to take them seriously. Metcalf was an omen.