The federal government is scrambling to boost the capacity of America’s power grid, and that will continue to be one of this nation’s most important pursuits for many years to come, due to demands associated with electric vehicles and artificial-intelligence capabilities.

However, what must not become lost within that capacity-building endeavor is the companion necessity of beefing up power-grid protections.

Unfortunately, there so far has been little, if any, substantive discussion emanating from Washington about the protection issue, and that is troubling. Such discussion could be an especially worthy topic this summer and fall for the presidential campaign trail.

Nevertheless, an appropriate question even now is whether most voters have enough basic knowledge about the capacity issue and associated concerns to want to pay attention to what the candidates might want to say about them.

But the fact is, something needs to be said, even if voter interest is focused more intensely on other issues, which clearly seems to be the case at this time.

According to a June 7 Wall Street Journal report, to boost the capacity of this country’s power grid, the Biden administration is focused on stepping up efficiency of existing power lines by way of new technologies.

“The upgrades are far cheaper and faster than big transmission projects, which are often plagued by red tape and can take years to build,” the Journal said.

A project in Illinois is geared toward installing devices that redeploy power automatically when lines are overloaded, and a project in Virginia includes devices that will allow power distribution to be adjusted in response to changing conditions on the grid.

The Journal reported another relatively cheap and quick way to boost capacity is by replacing existing power lines with high-performance wires. A report by the University of California, Berkeley, and an energy consulting firm, GridLab, says the wide-scale replacement in question could help quadruple U.S. transmission capacity by 2035.

But again, in this dangerous world, strong emphasis must be placed on protecting the capacity investments currently being made, and which will be made, going forward. That challenge is reminiscent of what was discussed in a July 2014 Forbes magazine report dealing with the necessity of the U.S. protecting against electromagnetic pulses triggered by the explosion of nuclear weapons.

The Forbes report noted the conclusion that a single missile with a warhead not necessarily very large has the potential to take out the U.S. power grid, destroy America’s electronics networks and, quoting from the Journal article, “create an existential crisis like nothing the world has ever witnessed.”

Increased capacity will be necessary to handle growing amounts of wind, solar and other renewable energy, the Journal said.

Grid Strategies, a power-sector consultant, has reported grid planners have doubled their forecasts for overall demand growth in the next five years, signaling the need for new transmission lines as well as upgrades to the existing grid.

There always will be people willing to question government priorities, and power grid intentions are no exception.

However, the expected surges in demand and the protections those surges make inescapable offer virtually no window for ignoring or delaying now what should, in fact, have been initiated long ago.