Space weather poses trillion-dollar risk; UK teams race to improve forecasts

Inside the Met Office control centre, a bank of screens displays the Sun in constant, unblinking detail. This is where a handful of scientists on Earth—part of one of only a few teams worldwide—keep watch around the clock, every day of the year, on the weather happening 93 million miles away. What they see there matters urgently to everyone below.

The Sun's activity threatens the infrastructure that modern life depends on. GPS systems that guide ships and planes, power grids that light cities, the satellites that carry communications and data—all of them sit exposed to the magnetic storms the Sun can unleash. When solar flares erupt, they send waves of radiation and charged particles racing toward Earth. A severe space weather event, according to a 2025 estimate by Lloyds, could cost the global economy $2.4 trillion over five years. The UK government has formally listed severe space weather as a national risk.

The Met Office has been building defenses since 2014, working with the operators of critical infrastructure to predict what's coming and give them time to prepare. Richard Stone, who leads the space forecasting team, describes the work as diagnosis and warning: they read the Sun's surface, issue a forecast, and alert the people who run the systems that matter. But the challenge is brutal. Scientists can spot a dangerous event on the Sun roughly three days before it reaches Earth. Then nothing. There are no observations, no data, no warning at all until the disturbance hits satellites positioned about a million miles away. At that point, they have perhaps one hour to refine their prediction and tell infrastructure operators what to do. "It's like seeing a storm on the east coast of America and then not having any observations until it gets to Ireland," Stone said.

The technology available is impressive but still young. Stone acknowledges that since 2014, the field has made real progress, yet observations remain limited by the gaps in coverage. To close those gaps, the Met Office has partnered with researchers at Aberystwyth University, working alongside teams from Northumbria, Durham, and Reading. The project is led by Huw Morgan, Head of Space Physics at Aberystwyth, and the goal is straightforward: improve the forecasts before the next major event arrives.

The timing is significant. The Sun follows an 11-year cycle of activity, and it reached its peak—called the Solar Maximum—in 2024. During these peak years, space weather events can strike several times a day. The increased solar activity is why more people saw the Northern Lights recently. Yet despite the Sun's heightened activity, most people on Earth have felt almost no disruption, a testament to the warnings and precautions the forecasting teams have enabled. The system, imperfect as it is, has worked.

But the risk extends beyond Earth's surface. Astronauts in orbit face a different kind of exposure. Helen Sharman, the first British person in space, flew to the Mir Space Station in 1991 on an eight-day mission. She was trained on where to shelter if space weather struck the station. During her time in orbit, she experienced radiation from beyond the solar system—galactic cosmic rays that pass through spacecraft materials and through human skin. Astronauts often see bright flashes of light on their retinas as these particles penetrate their eyes. The higher an astronaut travels, the farther from Earth's protective magnetic field, the greater the danger. In low Earth orbit, the field offers reasonable protection. But as space agencies plan missions to the Moon and Mars, the radiation problem becomes critical. Sharman notes plainly that future deep-space explorers will need much better shielding than current technology provides. The work of forecasting space weather, then, is not just about keeping power on and GPS working. It is about making it possible for humans to venture beyond the one shield that has always protected us.