I-Corps: Development of a Power Substation Blackbox

Michigan Technological University, Houghton MI

Investigators

Abstract

The broader impact/commercial potential of this I-Corps project is the development of power substation blackbox that will foster enhanced collaboration between insurance and utility businesses. The energy control center framework has evolved from a monolithic to a networked environment, allowing substation systems to reliably and efficiently communicate with a control center for coordination of grid-related disturbances. The computing platform for these systems has gradually adopted standardized communication protocols and information technology practice, which inherently introduces existing software vulnerabilities into the critical network. Cybersecurity issues are a known challenging issue that has been studied by university researchers to investigate the fundamental issues between the cyberphysical relations and the associated potential risks. The proposed technology aims to allow a seamless exchange of aggregated risk profiles of substations in the insurance market. This I-Corps project is based on the development of information retrieval, anomaly detection frameworks, and cyber-based contingency analyses for power grids. The proposed technology is a trustworthy mechanism that will allow exchange of information between a substation network and insurance markets, as well as federal entities for compliance purposes. Algorithms may allow identification of a programming platform and software integration. The commercialization potential includes the hardware/software integration to extract anomalies across a substation network, which allows the attributes of the cybersystems to be correlated within a substation as well as between neighborhood substations. The understanding of how supply chain security is deployed for substation solutions is crucial in developing working relationships with stakeholder communities where the existing networks with industry partners will be strengthened. This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.