Reliability analysis for the smart grid : from cyber control and communication to physical manifestations of failure.

PDFTech ReportNUTC R203Project #00016751DTRT06-G-0014CyberneticsReliabilityGrids (Transmission lines)Communication systemsFailure analysisElectric power transmissionMissouriMissouri University of Science and Technology. Center for Transportation Infrastructure and SafetyFaza, Ayman Z.Sedigh, SahraMcMillin, Bruce M.Missouri University of Science and Technology. Center for Transportation Infrastructure and SafetyUnited States. Dept. of Transportation. Research and Innovative Technology AdministrationUS Transportation CollectionThe Smart Grid is a cyber-physical system comprised of physical components, such as transmission lines and generators, and anetwork of embedded systems deployed for their cyber control. Our objective is to qualitatively and quantitatively analyze thereliability of this cyber-physical system. The original contribution of the approach lies in the scope of failures analyzed, which crossesthe cyber-physical boundary by investigating physical manifestations of failures in cyber control. As an example of power electronicsdeployed to enhance and control the operation of the grid, we study Flexible AC Transmission System (FACTS) devices, which areused to alter the \uef\uac\u201aow of power on speci\uef\uac?c transmission lines. Through prudent fault injection, we enumerate the failure modes ofFACTS devices, as triggered by their embedded software, and evaluate their e\uef\uac\u20acect on the reliability of the device and the reliability ofthe power grid on which they are deployed. The IEEE118 bus system is used as our case study, where the physical infrastructure issupplemented with seven FACTS devices to prevent the occurrence of four previously documented potential cascading failures