Securing Electricity Supply in the Cyber Age

The electricity infrastructure is one of society s most critical infrastructures. The complexity of the electricity infrastructure system is increasing quickly, due to the increasing intensity of market-based power exchanges between electricity systems, the associated market restructuring and an increasing share of decentralized generation. As a consequence, the organizational complexity of power systems has exploded. At the same time, there is a shift in public and societal goals towards low-carbon and sustainable power generation. This will eventually require a drastic transformation of the industry. Increasingly, ICT is being depended upon for managing this infrastructure, for technical control and operation and for facilitating markets. A recent example is demand-side management, based on detailed metering of consumption and decentralized electricity generation.