By far the biggest problem will be the huge transient currents generated by the radiation pulse and by the electromagnetic pulse (EMP). The system can be protected by shielding to keep all induced currents on the outside of the structure (impractical for the power satellite and the COTVs) or using hardening techniques within the system to reduce the possibilities of upset or burnout. Some of these techniques include current-limiting resistors, clamping circuits, and use of devices designed for far greater power than the system would normally experience. Any of these techniques would require wholesale redesign of the Reference Design power satelites and COTVs, and may impose significant penalties in system mass.* It is important that the radiation pulse can induce no catastropic phenomena, such as firing of squibs, or power supply burnouts, or arcing across high voltage terminals, etc. The system should be screened for these types of failure modes. Then, if the system can recover and function after transient upset at levels of 10^8 - 10^9 rad(Si)/sec, and if lost information can be reinserted, considerably less detailed circuit design will be necessary. Such design consists of (1) a worst-case analysis to show that the circuit will meet its specifications (with transistors degraded by neutrons, etc.) and will not burn out due to transient currents, or (2) addition of clamping circuits to preclude some catastrophic event during the burst. Since SGEMP effects could be lethal to power satellites or COTVs at distances of several hundred kilometers from a one megatron warhead (or thousands of kilometers from a 50 megaton detonation), some consideration should be given to spreading out power satellites over as wide a range of GEO arc as possible and to keeping the COTVs as far apart as possible to reduce the chances of losing multiple system elements at once. Short of nuclear holocaust scenarios, large exoatmospheric nuclear tests by hostile nations constitute the major threat. Protection of SPS personnel in space would depend primarily on sufficient warning time for the crew to reach the solar flare shelter.. That much warning time would also be adequate for successful active defense measures to destroy attacking warheads at large ranges, especially using directed energy weapons. The LEO base is not expected to require a solar flare shelter, so a "bomb shelter" would have to be added if the crew is to be protected from nuclear weapon effects. *See Section 2.5 for a description of the power satellites.
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