An Overview of Cyber Security and Privacy on the Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure

Electric vehicles (EVs) are key to alleviate our dependency on fossil fuels. The future smart grid is expected to be populated by millions of EVs equipped with high-demand batteries. To avoid an overload of the (current) electricity grid, expensive upgrades are required. Some of the upgrades can be averted if users of EVs participate to energy balancing mechanisms, for example through bidirectional EV charging. As the proliferation of consumer Internet-connected devices increases, including EV smart charging stations, their security against cyber-attacks and the protection of private data become a growing concern. We need to properly adapt and develop our current technology that must tackle the security challenges in the EV charging infrastructure, which go beyond the traditional technical applications in the domain of energy and transport networks. Security must balance with other desirable qualities such as interoperability, crypto-agility and energy efficiency. Evidence suggests a gap in the current awareness of cyber security in EV charging infrastructures. This paper fills this gap by providing the most comprehensive to date overview of privacy and security challenges To do so, we review communication protocols used in its ecosystem and provide a suggestion of security tools that might be used for future research.Comment: 12 pages, 5 tables, 3 figure

Ten questions concerning integrating smart buildings into the smart grid

Recent advances in information and communications technology (ICT) have initiated development of a smart electrical grid and smart buildings. Buildings consume a large portion of the total electricity production worldwide, and to fully develop a smart grid they must be integrated with that grid. Buildings can now be ‘prosumers’ on the grid (both producers and consumers), and the continued growth of distributed renewable energy generation is raising new challenges in terms of grid stability over various time scales. Buildings can contribute to grid stability by managing their overall electrical demand in response to current conditions. Facility managers must balance demand response requests by grid operators with energy needed to maintain smooth building operations. For example, maintaining thermal comfort within an occupied building requires energy and, thus an optimized solution balancing energy use with indoor environmental quality (adequate thermal comfort, lighting, etc.) is needed. Successful integration of buildings and their systems with the grid also requires interoperable data exchange. However, the adoption and integration of newer control and communication technologies into buildings can be problematic with older legacy HVAC and building control systems. Public policy and economic structures have not kept up with the technical developments that have given rise to the budding smart grid, and further developments are needed in both technical and non-technical areas

A Survey of Protocol-Level Challenges and Solutions for Distributed Energy Resource Cyber-Physical Security

The increasing proliferation of distributed energy resources (DERs) on the smart grid has made distributed solar and wind two key contributors to the expanding attack surface of the network; however, there is a lack of proper understanding and enforcement of DER communications security requirements. With vendors employing proprietary methods to mitigate hosts of attacks, the literature currently lacks a clear organization of the protocol-level vulnerabilities, attacks, and solutions mapped to each layer of the logical model such as the OSI stack. To bridge this gap and pave the way for future research by the authors in determining key DER security requirements, this paper conducts a comprehensive review of the key vulnerabilities, attacks, and potential solutions for solar and wind DERs at the protocol level. In doing so, this paper serves as a starting point for utilities, vendors, aggregators, and other industry stakeholders to develop a clear understanding of the DER security challenges and solutions, which are key precursors to comprehending security requirements

Causative Cyberattacks on Online Learning-based Automated Demand Response Systems

Power utilities are adopting Automated Demand Response (ADR) to replace the costly fuel-fired generators and to preempt congestion during peak electricity demand. Similarly, third-party Demand Response (DR) aggregators are leveraging controllable small-scale electrical loads to provide on-demand grid support services to the utilities. Some aggregators and utilities have started employing Artificial Intelligence (AI) to learn the energy usage patterns of electricity consumers and use this knowledge to design optimal DR incentives. Such AI frameworks use open communication channels between the utility/aggregator and the DR customers, which are vulnerable to \textit{causative} data integrity cyberattacks. This paper explores vulnerabilities of AI-based DR learning and designs a data-driven attack strategy informed by DR data collected from the New York University (NYU) campus buildings. The case study demonstrates the feasibility and effects of maliciously tampering with (i) real-time DR incentives, (ii) DR event data sent to DR customers, and (iii) responses of DR customers to the DR incentives

Towards ‘Smarter’ Systems: Key Cyber-Physical Performance-Cost Tradeoffs in Smart Electric Vehicle Charging with Distributed Generation

The growing penetration of electric vehicles (EV) into the market is driving sharper spikes in consumer power demand. Meanwhile, growing renewable distributed generation (DG) is driving sharper spikes in localised power supply. This leads to growing temporally unsynchronised spikes in generation and consumption, which manifest as localised over- or undervoltage and disrupt grid service quality. Smart Grid solutions can respond to voltage conditions by curtailing charging EVs or available DG through a network of cyber-enabled sensors and actuators. How to optimise efficiency, ensure stable operation, deliver required performance outputs and minimally overhaul existing hardware remains an open research topic. This thesis models key performance-cost tradeoffs relating to Smart EV Charging with DG, including architectural design challenges in the underpinning Information and Communications Technology (ICT). Crucial deployment optimisation balancing various Key Performance Indicators (KPI) is achieved. The contributions are as follows: • Two Smart EV Charging schemes are designed for secondary voltage control in the distribution network. One is optimised for the network operator, the other for consumers/generators. This is used to evaluate resulting performance implications via targeted case study. • To support these schemes, a multi-tier hierarchical distributed ICT architecture is designed that alleviates computation and traffic load from the central controller and achieves user fairness in the network. In this way it is scalable and adaptable to a wide range of network sizes. • Both schemes are modelled under practical latency constraints to derive interlocking effects on various KPIs. Multiple latency-mitigation strategies are designed in each case. • KPIs, including voltage control, peak shaving, user inconvenience, renewable energy input, CO2 emissions and EV & DG capacity are evaluated statistically under 172 days of power readings. This is used to establish key performancecost tradeoffs relevant to multiple invested bodies in the power grid. • Finally, the ICT architecture is modelled for growing network sizes. Quality-of- Service (QoS) provision is studied for various multi-tier hierarchical topologies under increasing number of end devices to gauge performance-cost tradeoffs related to demand-response latency and network deployment

Investigación sobre la flexibilidad de la demanda en redes eléctricas inteligentes: control directo de cargas

In recent decades, the European Union has made decisive efforts to maintain its global leadership in renewable energies to meet climate change targets resulting from international agreements. There is a deliberate intention to reduce the usage of non-renewable energy sources and promote the exploitation of renewable generation at all levels as shown by energy production data within the Eurozone. The electricity sector illustrates a successful implementation of these energy policies: The electricity coming from combustible fuels was at historical lows in 2018, accounting for 83.6 % of the electricity generated from this source in 2008. By contrast, the pool of renewables reached almost 170 % of the 2008 production. Against this background, power systems worldwide are undergoing deep-seated changes due to the increasing penetration of these variable renewable energy sources and distributed energy resources that are intermittent and stochastic in nature. Under these conditions, achieving a continuous balance between generation and consumption becomes a challenge and may jeopardize the system stability, which points out the need of making the power system flexible enough as a response measure to this trend. This Ph.D. thesis researches one of the principal mechanisms providing flexibility to the power system: The demand-side management, seen from both the demand response and the energy efficiency perspectives. Power quality issues as a non-negligible part of energy efficiency are also addressed. To do so, several strategies have been deployed at a double level. In the residential sector, a direct load control strategy for smart appliances has been developed under a real-time pricing demand response scheme. This strategy seeks to minimize the daily cost of energy in presence of diverse energy resources and appliances. Furthermore, a spread spectrum technique has also been applied to mitigate the highfrequency distortion derived from the usage of LED technology lighting systems instead of traditional ones when energy efficiency needs to be improved. In the industrial sector, a load scheduling strategy to control the AC-AC power electronic converter in charge of supporting the electric-boosted glass melting furnaces has been developed. The benefit is two-fold: While it contributes to demand flexibility by shaving the peaks found under conventional control schemes, the power quality issues related to the emission of subharmonics are also kept to a minimum. Concerning the technologies, this Ph.D. thesis provides smart solutions, platforms, and devices to carry out these strategies: From the application of the internet of things paradigm to the development of the required electronics and the implementation of international standards within the energy industry.En las últimas décadas, la Unión Europea ha realizado esfuerzos decisivos para mantener su liderazgo mundial en energías renovables con el fin de cumplir los objetivos de cambio climático resultantes de los acuerdos internacionales. Muestra una intención deliberada de reducir el uso de fuentes de energía no renovable y promover la explotación de la generación renovable a todos los niveles, como demuestran los datos de producción de energía en la eurozona. El sector de la electricidad ilustra un caso de éxito de estas políticas energéticas: la electricidad procedente de combustibles fósiles estaba en mínimos históricos en 2018, representando el 83,6 % de la electricidad generada a partir de esta fuente en 2008; en cambio, el grupo de renovables alcanzó casi el 170 % de la producción de 2008. En este contexto, los sistemas eléctricos de todo el mundo están experimentando profundos cambios debido a la creciente penetración de estas fuentes de energía renovable y de recursos energéticos distribuidos que son de naturaleza variable, intermitente y estocástica. En estas condiciones, lograr un equilibrio continuo entre generación y consumo se convierte en un reto y puede poner en peligro la estabilidad del sistema, lo que señala la necesidad de flexibilizar el sistema eléctrico como medida de respuesta a esta tendencia. Esta tesis doctoral investiga uno de los principales mecanismos que proporcionan flexibilidad al sistema eléctrico: la gestión de la demanda vista tanto desde la perspectiva de la respuesta a la demanda como de la eficiencia energética. También se abordan los problemas de calidad de suministro entendidos como parte no despreciable de la eficiencia energética. Para ello, se han desplegado varias estrategias a un doble nivel. En el sector residencial, se ha desarrollado una estrategia basada en el control directo de cargas para los electrodomésticos inteligentes siguiendo un esquema de respuesta a la demanda con precios en tiempo real. Esta estrategia busca minimizar el coste diario de la energía en presencia de diversos recursos energéticos y electrodomésticos. Además, también se ha aplicado una técnica de espectro ensanchado para mitigar la distorsión de alta frecuencia derivada del uso de sistemas de iluminación con tecnología LED, empleados para la mejora de la eficiencia energética frente a las tecnologías convencionales. En el sector industrial, se ha desarrollado una estrategia de planificación de cargas para controlar el convertidor AC-AC de los hornos de fundición de vidrio con soporte eléctrico. El beneficio es doble: mientras que se contribuye a la flexibilidad de la demanda al eliminar los picos encontrados en los esquemas de control convencionales, también se reducen al mínimo los problemas de calidad de suministro relacionados con la emisión de subarmónicos. En cuanto a las tecnologías, esta tesis doctoral aporta soluciones, plataformas y dispositivos inteligentes para llevar a cabo estas estrategias: desde la aplicación del paradigma del internet de las cosas hasta el desarrollo de la electrónica necesaria y la implementación de estándares internacionales dentro de la industria energética

A Communications Testbed for Testing Power Electronic Agent Systems

As power electronic system (PES) continue to incorporate complex intra-system communication, understanding and characterizing this communication has become a complex task. Knowing how a system’s communication will behave is vital to ensuring proper operation of these systems. This thesis proposes and outlines a communication testbed that streamlines the development and testing of the communications between the components of PES, and further presents the characterization of communication protocol utilized in these multi-agent PESs. These communication protocols include MQTT, Modbus, or User Datagram Protocol (UDP). Understanding the different behavior of these protocols presents is paramount for the design of PESs

Securing the Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure

Electric Vehicles (EVs) can help alleviate our reliance on fossil fuels for transport and electricity systems. However, charging millions of EV batteries requires management to prevent overloading the electricity grid and minimise costly upgrades that are ultimately paid for by consumers. Managed chargers, such as Vehicle-to-Grid (V2G) chargers, allow control over the time, speed and direction of charging. Such control assists in balancing electricity supply and demand across a green electricity system and could reduce costs for consumers. Smart and V2G chargers connect EVs to the power grid using a charging device which includes a data connection to exchange information and control commands between various entities in the EV ecosystem. This introduces data privacy concerns and is a potential target for cyber-security attacks. Therefore, the implementation of a secure system is crucial to permit both consumers and electricity system operators to trust smart charging and V2G. In principle, we already have the technology needed for a connected EV charging infrastructure to be securely enabled, borrowing best practices from the Internet and industrial control systems. We must properly adapt the security technology to take into account the challenges peculiar to the EV charging infrastructure. Challenges go beyond technical considerations and other issues arise such as balancing trade-offs between security and other desirable qualities such as interoperability, scalability, crypto-agility, affordability and energy efficiency. This document reviews security and privacy topics relevant to the EV charging ecosystem with a focus on smart charging and V2G

Modelling of the Electric Vehicle Charging Infrastructure as Cyber Physical Power Systems: A Review on Components, Standards, Vulnerabilities and Attacks

The increasing number of electric vehicles (EVs) has led to the growing need to establish EV charging infrastructures (EVCIs) with fast charging capabilities to reduce congestion at the EV charging stations (EVCS) and also provide alternative solutions for EV owners without residential charging facilities. The EV charging stations are broadly classified based on i) where the charging equipment is located - on-board and off-board charging stations, and ii) the type of current and power levels - AC and DC charging stations. The DC charging stations are further classified into fast and extreme fast charging stations. This article focuses mainly on several components that model the EVCI as a cyberphysical system (CPS)

Towards a Security Enabled and SOA-based QoS (for the Smart Grid) Architecture

QoS and Security features are playing an important role in modern network architecures. Dynamic selection of services and by extension of service providers are vital in today’s liberalized market of energy. On the other hand it is equally important for Service Providers to spot the one QoS Module that offers the best QoS level in a given cost. Type of service, response time, availability and cost, consist a basic set of attributes that should be taken into consideration when building a concrete Grid network. In the proposed QoS architecture Prosumers request services based on the aforementioned set of attributes. The Prosumer requests the service through the QoS Module. It is then the QoS Module that seeks the Service Provider that best fits the needs of the client. The aforementioned approach is well supplemented with an in depth analysis on existing authentication and authorization protocols. The authors believe that QoS and security can work in parallel without adding extra burden in the Smart Grid infrastructure. This is feasible by building an in advance system for placing, scheduling, and assigning of the requests for energy consumption or production, thus decongesting the traffic in the whole network