Track: Future Electric Power Systems: Smart Grids, Engineering,
            Economics and Security
Minitrack: Reliability, Security and Trust

This mini-track focuses on topics related to advanced control concepts to enhance reliability, and security and trust issues associated with operating the future electric power infrastructure. The increasing reliance of the electric power industry on information technologies introduces a new class of cyber vulnerabilities and threats to the electric power infrastructure that are only beginning to be effectively addressed through common industry standards and best practices. This mini-track will explore the application of these technologies that are being considered to enhance the reliability of the modern electric power grid, and the associated cyber security issues associated with these and related technologies.

Session 1: Wide Area Monitoring and Control
Session Organizer and Chair: William Sanders, whs@illinois.edu

Networked computer systems are increasingly used to support the operation of wide-area electric power grids and energy service providers. Many types of Intelligent Electrical Devices (IEDs) have been introduced in substations and networked through Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems. These advances have exposed electric power systems to the numerous cyber security threats that plague other types of computers and networks. These threats can be addressed to some degree by sound application of existing cyber security techniques, but there are also new types of problems specific to control systems in general and electric power systems in particular. This session will consist of research advances in technologies that will provide the necessary cyber security for such wide-area power monitoring and control systems.

Session 2: Distribution/Customer Interface Issues
Session Organizer and Chair: Al Valdes, alfonso.valdes@sri.com

The electric power grid is experiencing rapid changes in the areas of the low voltage distribution system and the customer interconnections. These changes have the potential to dramatically affect the operation and control of the electric grid. But they also raise the potential for increased cyber security threats. This session will explore research advances that are being made to take advantage of this new monitoring and control potential, and to enhance the trustworthiness of the cyber infrastructure.
 

Minitrack Chair:

Jeffery E. Dagle
Pacific Northwest National Laboratory
P.O. Box 999, MS K1-85
Richland, WA 99352
Phone: 509-375-3629
Email: jeff.dagle@pnl.gov