Silicon Valley has an earthquake problem and building codes are not going to save anyone or anything in the case of a catastrophic earthquake.
If you weren’t aware, California sits on the ring of fire and is at permanent risk of having a catastrophic earthquake. The ring of fire is a name given to a kind of ring shaped, tectonic belt, of earthquakes and volcanoes. The belt stretches around the Pacific ocean and has a meaningful impact across its entire range.
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — An earthquake registering a magnitude of 3.7 shook part of the San Francisco Bay Area and people reported feeling a quick jolt. There were no immediate reports of injuries or major property damage.
The United States Geological Survey said the earthquake was detected at 7:02 a.m. Friday about 3 miles (4.8 kilometers) northwest of San Francisco with a depth of 12 miles (19 kilometers).
A magnitude 2.5 aftershock centered in the same area on the San Andreas fault occurred at 9:39 a.m. and a magnitude of 3.0 at 10:48 a.m. Friday, according to the USGS.
https://apnews.com/article/california-earthquake-san-francisco-de5b30a5108e131efa2f90a744f9363f?
Some 39 million people live in the state of California and every last one of them is at risk of having their entire world collapse on them thanks to that pesky ring of fire. Something like 10,000 earthquakes per year are recorded in California. And to top everything off California has a GDP of approximately $4.1 trillion. At some point one of those earthquakes is going to be off the charts and cause extreme damage in the state. It’s a question of when and not if.
You cannot just ignore probability and magically make it so bad things don’t happen.
The ring of fire and its earthquakes aren’t just a danger to life and property but also to the American tech industry as a whole. The American tech industry has an extreme concentration in the state of California. An endless number of companies call California home. One fifth of California’s GDP comes from the tech sector.
We cannot have all of our technology companies concentrated in a dangerous and relatively small area. California represents something like 5% of the United States total land mass yet California represents 15% of American GDP.
The reality is tech companies should be geographically dispersed. It’s easier for a fab to survive a tornado than it is to survive a massive earthquake. You can sink that fab foundation into solid bedrock and it simply will not matter in the event of a catastrophic earthquake. You have to recognize the sheer power, the energy, of earthquakes. We’re talking about huge areas being torn apart and or smashed against each other. We’re talking about an earthquake that will rip bedrock apart. We’re talking catastrophe.
It doesn’t matter that tech companies have data geographically dispersed. Yes in theory you could get a backup of your data, your data is safe across the globe, regardless of what happens to California… It doesn’t matter that manufacturing facilities are mostly in Asia. It doesn’t matter that there are engineers in Japan and Taiwan, that there are software developers in China, that Samsung has manufaturing capacity.
What we’re talking about is the engineers and software teams that call California home being dead. “Designed in California” would not be a thing anymore. We’re talking about fabs being destroyed. We’re talking about a catastrophe that would leave the global tech industry paralyzed, that would leave America paralyzed. It’s not a joke. The tech industry is simply too concentrated to be safe. Too many tech executives, too many engineers, too many workers, too many research and fabrication facilities call California home. The synergies of being close together do not outweigh the risks. And just because there are tech industries elsewhere does not negate the threat to losing the tech industry in California.
All of that talent and knowledge, all of those facilities that make the global economy run, would be lost in an earthquake. Again in theory the tech industry could absorb the loss of California in time, but how long can societies across the globe run without say just half of the 28,000 electrical engineers that call California home? What happens when smartphone, AI chips, and CPU development are all stalled? While China has no such issue? What happens when TSMC in essence takes over the entire CPU market for itself as American firms are temporarily crippled? American firms can’t just magically get the knowledge lost and time lost back. They’d be at a significant disadvantage in the global economy. American technology would most likely not be head of the pack anymore. We’d be ridiculously dependent on Asia for a good bit of time. All of which is unacceptable.
A catastrophic earthquake would damage American society to the point of being debilitating. We would lose much more than we’re willing to admit to ourselves. I haven’t even mentioned half of what would happen to our world.
And the thought that the Silicon Valley earthquake risk has been addressed through building codes, the dispersal of data across the globe, and the use of manufacturing facilities in other countries is silly. The concentration of the American tech sector in California remains, no building code will save a building from a catastrophic earthquake, and research and manufacturing facilities still exist and are still of vital importance to American society. In the face of nature, nothing will stop San Francisco and Silicon Valley from crumbling into the sea.
The reality is catastrophe planning should be done at a national level. Action should be taken. Assets vital to the nation’s health should be dispersed and located in relatively safe areas. Nations across the globe should be preparing for the worst scenario, not looking towards the best scenario.