New York Times: The Electric Power Grid Needs America’s Attention
A case can be made that the electric power grid is the nation’s most critical infrastructure, based on America’s dependence on electricity.
A siloed view of the power system must give way to an understanding of interdependencies among the power sector and other critical services.
Telecommunications, financial systems, transportation, fuel, national defense and emergency services all depend on continuous, quality, power supply. The digitization of society through mobile devices and social networking increases consumers’ reliance on electricity, and reduces their tolerance for even brief outages.
Extreme events such as Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, and the earthquake and tsunami in Japan, heighten society’s sense of dependence on the grid, and the need for it to be resilient.
Other trends and events have focused attention on the need for grid resilience. A 2013 act of vandalism damaged high-voltage transformers in a West Coast substation, bringing scrutiny to the need for enhanced physical security and resiliency. The wide deployment of “communication nodes” throughout the power system raises concerns of cyber and coordinated cyber/physical attacks.
