Is there a limitation to the stored beam energy for 2011 and beyond?

The machine protection systems have been designed to ultimately operate with beams of a stored energy of 360MJ. This presentation will address if there is an intermediate limit and what upgrades are required to permit operation with 360MJ. A failure in one of the protection systems (BLM, BIC, LBDS, ...) could have catastrophic consequences for LHC. Considering the operational experience, the most critical failure modes are reviewed, their probability is estimated and methods for mitigation are discussed. Ideas for reducing the risk include additional interlocks (DIDT interlock, abort gap cleaning/monitoring, fast BLMs, additional BPMs as HW interlock, aperture measurements,...), operational procedures and upgrades of hardware systems. There are also examples when the beams should NOT be dumped immediately.