A presidential panel on Thursday called for immediate attention to the imminent threat of a national blackout, lasting possibly six months, from a terrorist or solar attack on the nation’s electric grid.

The President’s National Infrastructure Advisory Council approved a 94-page report detailing the potential challenges to the government and human life and recommendations for a new focus on the threat made more likely by the development of electromagnetic pulse weapons by terrorist nations including Iran.

Its report was the latest to warn that a blackout would be both deadly and a threat to the nation.

It said that the grid is a “prime target” of terrorists and that [b]Americans are not ready for living without electricity, transportation, fuel, money, and healthcare.

“People no longer keep enough essentials within their homes, reducing their ability to sustain themselves during an extended, prolonged outage. We need to improve individual preparedness,” said the report.

“There needs to be more individual accountability for preparedness,” adds the report, Surviving a Catastrophic Power Outage.

Secrets earlier this week pointed out some of the issues raised in the report:

1. Given the growing frequency and severity of disasters and other risks, there needs to be an increase in individual accountability, enterprise, and community investment in resilient infrastructure.

2. There is a misconception that events occur infrequently.

3. There needs to be more individual accountability for preparedness.

4. Resilience at the state and local level will be critical to enable people to shelter in place and facilitate faster recovery. Any event that requires a mass evacuation will use up critical resources, clog transportation pathways, and reduce the workforce necessary for infrastructure recovery.

5. Electricity, fuel, clean drinking water, wastewater services, food/refrigeration, emergency medical services, communications capabilities, and some access to financial services have been identified as critical lifeline services that would be needed to sustain local communities and prevent mass migration.