POWER January 2020 - 23

2020 INDUSTRY FORECAST
'Future of Electric Power' Inquiry Looks
at Cybersecurity
One of the key issues facing electric
power in the U.S. is how the electric
system can face challenges involving
the cybersecurity implications of computing,
communications, and the resilience
of the grid. That topic got a full
day's airing at a National Academies of
Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine
(NASEM) workshop in November.
The challenge, said William H. Sanders,
the new dean (effective Jan. 1,
2020) of Carnegie Mellon University's
College of Engineering, is " providing
trustworthy grid operation in hostile
environments. " The goal, he added, is
" a system that does what it is supposed
to do, and nothing else. "
The hostile environment Sanders
described involves
" accidental failures,
design flaws, and malicious attacks. "
The task is to " make the whole
system trustworthy, including both
physical and cyber components, and
their interactions. "
The workshop at the NASEM's
Washington, D.C., headquarters was
part of a two-year inquiry into " The
Future of Electric Power in the U.S., "
established by Congress in the 2018
Department of Energy appropriation.
Congress called on the academies to
" conduct an evaluation of the expected
medium- and long-term evolution of
the grid. This evaluation shall focus on
developments that include the emergence
of new technologies, planning
and operating techniques, grid architecture,
and business models. " The
NASEM expects the result of the inquiry
this year.
The cyber workshop was the first
the project committee has held, and a
second workshop is planned to address
energy modeling. Carnegie Mellon Professor
M. Granger Morgan, chairman of
the prestigious committee, noted that
one feature well-understood about energy
models is that " every model turns
out to be wrong. " The full electric future
committee has held four working meetings
to date-all in 2019. The first was
March 4-5, the second May 13-14, the
third August 14-15, and the fourth November
2.
Sanders said grid resilience is " intimately
tied to the cyber infrastructure. "
Adverse events, he said, are " not just
attacks, but from hardware/software
malfunctions, or through error in conJanuary
2020 | POWER
figuration or operation. " He also noted
the crucial interdependence of connections
between the power grid and
other critical infrastructure, such as oil
and gas operations, water distribution
systems, transportation
scheduling
and routing, and the like.
Looking at cybersecurity from a different
perspective, Mike Hyland of the
American Public Power Association
(APPA) highlighted the difficulties facing
the majority of municipally owned
power systems. While large munis,
such as the Los Angeles Department
of Water and Power, closely resemble
investor-owned utilities in terms of resources
and scale, the vast majority of
APPA's 2,000 members are tiny.
For these small municipal systems,
many with fewer than 1,200 customers,
cybersecurity is not at the top
of their operational agenda. He suggested
you can still go into offices and
find passwords on Post-it notes. In the
1970s, Hyland noted, " We developed
a culture of safety. " That was followed
by a culture of reliability, and now by
a culture of resilience. " Some small
systems are still having trouble coping
with the culture of safety. "
The small municipal systems have
largely ignored the rise of automated
meter
reading
and
smart
meters.
" When you have a meter reader who
reads the electric meter, the gas meter,
and the water meter at the same
time, " smart electric meters don't
make much sense, Hyland said.
Most municipal systems with fewer
than 5,000 meters " just don't have
SCADA [supervisory control and data
acquisition systems]. " Many don't
have a web page and some don't even
have email.
Big municipal systems have all the
accoutrements of a modern electric
utility. Many of the smallest systems
have none. There is a middle group
of some 400 mid-sized municipal
systems, which Hyland calls " tweeners. "
These are " large enough to have
some SCADA " but not large enough
to have information technology (IT)
staff. Many rely on the city government
to provide IT.
-Kennedy Maize is a long-time
energy journalist and a frequent
contributor to POWER.
www.powermag.com
2030. BNEF believes energy density at
the cell and pack level will play a growing
role, as it allows for more-efficient use
of materials and manufacturing capacity.
It said new technologies like silicon or
lithium anodes, solid state cells, and new
cathode materials will be key to helping
cost reductions play out.
" The most interesting piece I think
we'll see with lithium-ion [batteries] coming
forward in the next year to two years
is how they are used, " Mashek said.
" Does the utility follow the, I'll call it,
'rules' of a warranty or do they use them
as they need them? And, how does that
really affect the replacement and duty
life of the batteries? "
Mashek noted that the CEO of a large
U.S. utility said her company was installing
batteries but was unconcerned
about warranties, suggesting the utility
would use the batteries as needed
regardless of whether the battery
manufacturer approved of the practice.
Mashek said that could reduce battery
life by 50% to 66%, adding significantly
to the true cost of installations.
The Future Revolves Around
Technology
New and evolving technology (see sidebar)
could help fit all the power pieces
together. In a paper released by Burns
and McDonnell's renewable energy
team leading up to a large power event
in November, the writers said, " Now, as
public policy shifts toward development
of renewable energy as a strategy to
address concerns over climate change,
hydropower is being targeted as an excellent
source to assume a larger share
of the generating portfolio. Digital control
technology is a key element of upgrading
and expanding hydro capacity. "
Bryan Friehauf, executive vice president
and general manager-Enterprise
Software with ABB, seemed to agree
that technology could be vital to success.
" Digital technology-the integration of
information technology/operational technology,
artificial intelligence and machine
learning, and big data analytics into traditional
operational processes and strategy-is
emerging as a path forward for
asset-intensive firms to drive efficiencies,
capture more rapid time-to-value
and time-to-change, unlock new sources
of business value, and strengthen their
operational agility in response to growing
secular challenges in the global business
landscape, " he told POWER. ■
-Aaron Larson is POWER's
executive editor.
23
http://www.powermag.com
POWER January 2020

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of POWER January 2020
