UH OH: What if all the lights go out? The U.S. is at risk of a nationwide blackout — and policymakers and industry have known this for years. “Given that there are tens of thousands of substations on the national grid, PG&E’s experience may not seem so alarming. But according to the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission study disclosed by the Journal, a few dozen of the substations are so important to the flow of energy that knocking out just nine of them would cause a metastasizing blackout that stretched from coast to coast. And replacement transformers for these substations can take more than a year to build, deliver and install, in part because most are made overseas.”

So, a natural-gas backup generator that can also run off of a propane tank, I guess. . . .