The 'Carrington Event' of 1859 and the CME of 1989 in Quebec provide excellent direct observations of so called Solar Flare events and their effects. The Carrington occurred at a time of Telegraph systems and gas lights. The telegraph wiring actually sagged in places while sparks were thrown at insulators and operators were even shocked. The 89 Quebec event knocked out significant portions of the power systems and grid of Quebec.

Nuclear bombs can produce enough ionization, particularly at altitude to produce an EMP. It's thought by many that at least the US during the 50's and 60's did some testing of this during the heavy testing blasts of that period .

There does exist devices from large to hand held (you can even find plans and circuits for such devices on the web) that can be built by the home hobbiest that can be fairly destructive within several feet. We'll stay away from some of the work done on high power radio and microwave devices or some of the more exotic projection devices development.

Congress set up an EMP Commission and study groups that have released a number of reports (available from the web--not to be passing you off, but you are an author and would probably appreciate a more thorough detail than what you can get here) addressing the issue since 2001 and held public hearings in 2015.

Faraday cages work if constructed properly of the right materials and properly and sufficiently grounded (think lightning rod wiring to the ground). A metal storage shed or garage sitting on a wood or concrete base isn't going to help a lot. A typical automobile of today doesn't have enough metal in it's body and is insulated from ground on it's tires. Typical large industrial buildings with numerous motors and power distribution will have a grid of large(2/0 up to 250MCM and larger--the size of your thumb up to your wrist), bare copper conductors installed beneath any foundation work, connected (many welded with thermite) to all the metal and motor frames throughout the facility. Additional grounding rods of 5/8" to 1" driven 20 or so feet into the earth or even grounding wells (3 or more grouped (3 or 4ft separation) rods with copper sulfate poured into the 'well' to soak out into the surrounding soil) are often used to obtain or ensure sufficient ground conductivity. One is looking for 5-ohms or less resistance throughout the grounding grid for a large distance of separation.

As others have stated, the primary danger is to transformers in the power grid tertiary distribution system (the pole mount and local community types you see flashing during a tornado--(there are hundreds of thousands throughout the US system) primarily from internal overcurrent as well as capacitance and induction in the power lines and wiring, and end user control and communication devices that are not shielded. Even devices in a Faraday cage, if connected to an external circuit or device (antenna, solar panel, etc) would be effected. The damage is to the circuit board circuits, and any IC (chips, etc) and batteries dependent on type, from overcurrent/overvoltage. they would melt or even blow apart. Overcurrent produces enough heat to melt and overvoltage breaks down insulation or jumps (sparks) to adjacent devices/circuits--both can occur almost instantaneously. A typical circuit breaker in a power distribution system reacts (opens and interrupts the plasma arc) in less than 1/3 of 1 cycle in a 60 hz AC system. Lead/Acid are probably safe, particularly if unconnected but I wouldn't count on a Li or even a standard AAA type.

As you can see, this can be a very lengthy discussion. Most of the fiction I've seen written about these types of events are just that, fiction without much real world connection. Passenger planes aren't likely to fall from the sky, for example--they are struck by lightening (St. Elmos fire, lightening balls, and bolts) all the time as well as build up and discharge large static charges from movement through the air. Those electronics are insulated from the metal skin of the plane as well as hardened to the dangers they already face. It's the ground based systems they communicate with that are more in danger.

Hope that helps a little or at least points you in the right direction.

Thanks CG! As always a solid source of info.

EMP is outside my area, but I have worked on EMC immunity testing. In my work, the concern is that an electromagnetic field from something like a motor turning on will cause a signal in a wire to be interpreted wrong, causing the device to operate wrong or need to be reset.

There is a specific part of the EN 55000 tests that I think applies to effects of EMP: "Conducted Disturbances" http://www.dlsemc.com/emc-testing/eu/...

You might get somewhere by calling test houses (like DLS EMC or Intertek) and asking their business development people if they test to "standards related to EMP-hardening."

"I understand that an EMP would essentially overload electrical systems and render those systems and anything attached to them useless. I also understand that devices reliant on battery power that is not attached to a power source that is connected to an electrical grid, those batteries would still function until they ran out of power. True?"
I think so because the wires of the electrical system would act as huge antennas. A battery would fine, certainly if it were in a small device and probably even if it were connected to long wires.

"If a car is moving when an EMP occurred, would it continue to drive until the battery ran out or would the alternator be fried and the car would slow to a stop?"
I think the weakest link would be its electronics. I suspect its alternator and battery would be robust against EMP. I suspect the metal cage around the engine would offer some protection, so a car might be fine after a moderately strong EMP event that destroys everything electronic that was plugged into an outlet at the time. A very strong EMP event would break something in the car's electronics, causing it to stop running cold.

"Are the power storage batteries in solar systems instantly effected?"
My guess is it would fry the charging electronics but not damage the battery, even if it were connected and being charged at the time.

"Would a fully functional large scale Tesla coil be impacted by an EMP burst?"
I think the Tesla coil would be fine. I'm really out of my area with this one, but I suspect it would be unaffected.

I agree with most of what Technocracy and some of what XenokRoy said. XenokRoy talks about wires being fried and things being safer if not being used. I think his friend is wrong on that point. My understanding is the wires act as antennas. The wires themselves won't be damaged at all. The device (e.g. solar collector) being off may not protect it b/c it's the wires that pick up the EMP. The key is not to have long wires in any form connected to the equipment. If somehow enough current flows to blow a fuse or fry a wire, something else is broken in the system. The wires won't fry. Even if you took long stretches of 30 gauge wire going off in opposite directions and connected together with a 300 ohm resistor in an EMP event, just trying to pick up EMP on purpose, it would not damage the wire or resistor. I don't know much about EMP, but I'm fairly confident on this point.

All my answers are based on my imagining normal EMC immunity testing but a few orders of magnitude worse. I don't really know if this is a good model for EMP.

Assuming a strong enough EMP of course :)

Virtually all modern vehicles, be they cars, planes, trains, busses etc are computer controlled and those computer controls will fry and disable the vehicle.

A sufficient spike or induced current can fry energy storage systems, especially low current ones. High current ones would not be as vulnerable. A cell phone battery may short for instance, but an Edison battery would not even notice.

Tesla coil....induced current could give you a powerful spike from it but unlikely to damage it.

Bottom line, the lower the normal current use, the more vulnerable an item is. ICs would be especially so, making computers very vulnerable.

As XenokRoy said, a Faraday Cage can offer protection, but not always.

Excellent, it makes sense to me that any production of electricity or delivery conduit of that electricity would be what suffer the overload. A battery on the other hand is a repository and would likely be safe, unless its actively charging at the time?

Thanks. Web searches, while helpful, can be counter-productive.

From my understanding, an EMP would fry any electrical system that is operating at the time the emp hits, unless it's in a Faraday Cage or some type.

So a car moving would loose all power, this would mean that power steering would no longer function and some people would be unable to respond to the extra force needed to turn, and likely crash as the car would continue to move as per Neuton's laws of motion.

Solar power, if generating power at the time would fry the solar panel and battery system. If on the other hand it was shut down and in storage for use after an EMP hit, there would be no problem.

Tesla Coil, I am not certain on, but I would suspect the same.

EMP basically causes any electrical current that is present to spike, frying the electrical system. If no electricity is present at the time of the EMP spike or it is protected its OK.

Another example that may be helpful is a pre-computer timeline car would still have its wires fried, but if you had an extra set of electric wires for the car, you could replace them. the car battery would be fine, and with no computer to get fried the rest of the car, truck or tractor would work if the wiring were replaced. A buddy of mine has an old 72 diesel truck as a bug out vehicle and he has two extra sets of wiring for it, just in case of EMP. Ya, he is a crazy prepper, but sometimes I wonder if he is right.

Edit: Actually the battery on the solar system would be fine, just the panel and any wiring would be shot.