With cybersecurity so much in the news, I found myself in a heated discussion the other day about whether IT should take over SCADA, and in particular SCADA security, or whether it should not. SCADA
(System Control And Data Acquisition) refers to the technologies that run large
processes. In common use, it refers primarily to the large distribution systems,
such as those for electricity, water, and gas. SCADA systems were usually
designed to operate with the extreme resource constraints of last generation
technology. SCADA systems have traditionally been secured primarily through
isolation. Any signal that breached the outer shell was considered trusted.
Read MoreSmart Grid
What is the smart grid
in Smart Grid
There is a lot of confusion about the smart grid today. I hear all kinds of claims, along with the frequently heard “There are a lot of opinions about what the smart grid is.” Other have written that they have learned of a lot of clever little devices, but nothing that would qualify as over all smarts. The smart grid builds upon interoperability derived from the standardized telemetry and real time operations of Intelligrid. It meets the definitions of the Modern Grid Initiative. It is based upon transacted energy as described in the 2005 GridWise constitutional convention. These ideas were coded into law by...
Read MoreIP Everywhere, or Just About
In February, a new administration official stated that the smart grid requires "IP everywhere", stirring considerable concern among the dumbest (in terms of grid smarts) of the smart grid players. Earlier this month, as I wrote of in The Impulse to Run Around Naked, a maker of building systems asked why we don’t just build systems with their own native languages and their own "most optimal" media. The operators of the big distribution systems (SCADA) for electricity, water, sewage, and natural gas are all a-twitter over the proposed national cyber-security directorate. This agitation in those that manage the actions of the built world is based upon misunderstandings based upon poor definitions as much as anything else.
A Caffeinated view of Aging Energy Infrastructure
The local coffee shop, The OpenEye Cafe, has an outsized role in thinking about smart buildings and the smart grid. Each day when I leave the gym, I go to the OpenEye to caffeinate myself out of my post exercise torpor and to write.
The OpenEye is a great college town coffee shop, even if it is in Carrboro, the town next door to the college town. Its main room is huge for a coffee shop, fitted out with as many old couches and comfy chairs as it has little tables surrounded by mismatched chairs. It has numerous small side rooms, a patio in the back, more sidewalk seating in the front.
This size gives it a wonderful variety of subcultures, as there is the construction contractor corner, klatches of endurance runners, and every college town’s PWDIBs (people who dress in black). On weekends, the Men Who Run in Kilts...