The U.S. electrical grid: How big of a cyber target is it?

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RE: The U.S. electrical grid: How big of a cyber target is it?

I am a retired engineer, formerly employed by 2 electric utilities - one of them a very large utility within the U. S; Department of Energy. In that job I was the project manager for a large SCADA/Energy Control System. So I (think) I know a little about SCADA systems an how they operate.

EVERY SCADA system that I have ever seen use it's own dedicated communication network to carry data between the Master Station (the "base"), and the substation Remote Terminal Units (RTU's) and with the powerplants. The Master Station is manned 24 hours per dasy, seven days per week, 52 weeks per year. In other words, ALL THE TIME. So if something happens, the knowledgeable, experienced operator can take immedaite steps to countyeract the event. One example: many years ago, a light airplane flew into a high voltage transmission line in Northern Arizona. The electric system "alarmed", and a dispatcher in a Phoenix control center shut down that line and rerouted power so as to minimize outages to customers until the cause of the alarm had been identified and corrective measures taken.

Another Western US utility's management decided to "economize" by combining the SCADA functions with the company's corporate functions in a single computer. And, of course, there was a "firewall" between the SCADA and corporate functions. And when the firewall failed, it took down the company's entire power grid. Needless to say, nobody in electric utility management today sees this as a way to economize.

Oh yes, did I mention that SCADA systems almost always use reduncant computers, so that in the event that one fails, an automatic "failover" to the backup computer occurs?

Remember the late 1990's, and the widespread fear that the rollover to year 2000 would cause widespread failures in the electric power grid, becuase microprocessors and computers had not been designed to recognize dates beyond 1999? And that once the grid crashed, taking out all electric power in North ASmerica, it would be impossible to restart, because electric power was needed just to start up a generator, etc. As the person who designed the data communications protocol for use between our Master Station and the several (hydro and steam) powerplants we had under control, I knew that the prognosticians of doom were wrong. And, remember what happened on New Year's Day, 2000: NOTHING. The electric system continued to function, just as before. The doom-sayers were WRONG.

So, considering that utilities use dedicated, private (usually microwave) communications for their SCADA systems, and that the data communcations use various codings and security methods, I, for one, will not lose any sleep worrying that the Chinese or Russians are going to tap into our country's SCADA systems and crash the power grid.

Posted by: harlan-b@...   Posted on: 04/08/09 You are currently: a Guest | Members login | Terms of Use

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