Periodic Reporting for period 1 - ELECTRON (rEsilient and seLf-healed EleCTRical pOwer Nanogrid)
Berichtszeitraum: 2021-10-01 bis 2022-09-30
ELECTRON (rEsilient and seLf-healed EleCTRical pOwer Nanogrid) aims at providing a new-generation EPES platform, capable of empowering the resilience of energy systems against cyber, privacy, and data attacks through four main pillars (risk assessment and certification, anomaly detection and prevention, failure mitigation and energy restoration, and addressing internal threats and gaps through AR-VR-based personnel training and certification), while fostering the cyber protection standardisation and certification.
More specifically the project introduces a series of next-generation, cutting-edge, and advanced technologies targeting at: (a) applying a collaborative risk and certification framework by involving all energy actors in line with the Cybersecurity Act, (b) implementing a postquantum-oriented, decentralised, and federated learning-based EPES cyber-defence and protection framework for protecting EPES infrastructure and assets against cyberattacks, privacy attacks, and data breaches, built on a high-visibility and interoperable SIEM tool (c) advancing nanogrid operations, while integrating renewables by allowing them to exchange efficiently energy through a decentralised blockchain mechanism, towards protecting the grid from blackouts, brownouts, and cascading effects by employing proactive islanding, (d) proactively addressing security gaps and threats coming from inside by creating a AR/VR aided cybersecurity training and certification for EPES (operational) personnel, (e) fostering an energy ecosystem on cybersecurity polices and recommendations, by inaugurating the ELECTRON Cybersecurity Lighthouse as an open portal across EU for exchanging information and best practices on cybersecurity and privacy in EPES and critical infrastructure, (f) validating and demonstrating the integrated ELECTRON products and solutions through large-scale, focused, and high-impact use cases, while monitoring and optimising the operation of the three proposed authorities (cybersecurity lighthouse, cybersecurity training and certification authority, and energy trading centre), and (g) increasing the cyber-hygiene across Europe in all levels: design, technical, educational, and institutional.
More specifically the project introduces a series of next-generation, cutting-edge, and advanced technologies targeting at: (a) applying a collaborative risk and certification framework by involving all energy actors in line with the Cybersecurity Act, (b) implementing a postquantum-oriented, decentralised, and federated learning-based EPES cyber-defence and protection framework for protecting EPES infrastructure and assets against cyberattacks, privacy attacks, and data breaches, built on a high-visibility and interoperable SIEM tool (c) advancing nanogrid operations, while integrating renewables by allowing them to exchange efficiently energy through a decentralised blockchain mechanism, towards protecting the grid from blackouts, brownouts, and cascading effects by employing proactive islanding, (d) proactively addressing security gaps and threats coming from inside by creating a AR/VR aided cybersecurity training and certification for EPES (operational) personnel, (e) fostering an energy ecosystem on cybersecurity polices and recommendations, by inaugurating the ELECTRON Cybersecurity Lighthouse as an open portal across EU for exchanging information and best practices on cybersecurity and privacy in EPES and critical infrastructure, (f) validating and demonstrating the integrated ELECTRON products and solutions through large-scale, focused, and high-impact use cases, while monitoring and optimising the operation of the three proposed authorities (cybersecurity lighthouse, cybersecurity training and certification authority, and energy trading centre), and (g) increasing the cyber-hygiene across Europe in all levels: design, technical, educational, and institutional.
In the first reporting period the work was focused on the definition of the user, security, privacy and ethical requirements, on the development of the ELECTRON architecture, and on the definition of the ELECTRON Use Cases demonstration scenarios. These activities have been performed in the framework of work package 2 (WP2) - ELECTRON Architecture, Demonstration Scenarios and Security & Privacy Requirements. In D2.1 – "User & Stakeholder Security and Privacy Requirements", the particular scenarios were defined for each Use Case (UC), and the user, security, privacy and ethical requirements were extracted. The ELECTRON architecture was defined in D2.2 – "Platform Specifications and Architecture" by using the ARCADE methodological framework. The ELECTRON use case demonstration scenarios, evaluation strategy and KPIs were defined in D2.3 including the description of the various scenarios and KPIs of each UC in terms of implementation information in order to achieve the goal of the scenario.
Furthermore, the work in the technical WPs was initiated, in close collaboration with the WP2 activities. WP8 - ELECTRON Integration & Testing implemented the ELECTRON Platform Development Environment in the first reporting period. This environment acts as the baseline for the definition of all the integration points between the ELECTRON components and the use of the ELECTRON Platform environment for the continuous integration process.
In the first year of the project various dissemination and clustering activities have been performed. The main communication channels have been created. The consortium made 5 publications which are available on the ELECTRON Zenodo community, co-organized 3 workshops in collaboration with other projects, while participated in 6 workshops in total. The first dataset on IEC-60870-5-104 was released and published in IEEE Dataport and Zenodo - the publication of this dataset will strengthen ELECTRON’s activities in impact assessment, while it could pave the way for more synergies with relevant projects. Furthermore, ELECTRON participates in the CyberEPES cluster and is a member of the BRIDGE initiative.
Furthermore, the work in the technical WPs was initiated, in close collaboration with the WP2 activities. WP8 - ELECTRON Integration & Testing implemented the ELECTRON Platform Development Environment in the first reporting period. This environment acts as the baseline for the definition of all the integration points between the ELECTRON components and the use of the ELECTRON Platform environment for the continuous integration process.
In the first year of the project various dissemination and clustering activities have been performed. The main communication channels have been created. The consortium made 5 publications which are available on the ELECTRON Zenodo community, co-organized 3 workshops in collaboration with other projects, while participated in 6 workshops in total. The first dataset on IEC-60870-5-104 was released and published in IEEE Dataport and Zenodo - the publication of this dataset will strengthen ELECTRON’s activities in impact assessment, while it could pave the way for more synergies with relevant projects. Furthermore, ELECTRON participates in the CyberEPES cluster and is a member of the BRIDGE initiative.
In the project’s work-plan there are several approaches, that differentiate ELECTRON methodology from the current state-of-the-art.
ELECTRON will provide a contemporary certification framework aligned with Cybersecurity Act towards integrating the risk assessment and certification processes of products, devices, and services within EPES. The introduced framework takes risk assessment a step further ensuring collaborative evaluation of vulnerabilities among different stakeholders of the energy sector.
In Privacy-Aware Intrusion and Anomaly Detection domain, a cybersecurity protection framework is introduced adopting a federated learning approach. In particular, under the orchestration of XL-SIEM, the FL-IDPS AI models will focus on detecting intrusions and anomalies against the EPES protocols.
In Post-Quantum Privacy-Preserving for Energy Systems, ELECTRON provides a post-quantum public-key cryptosystem, which is resilient against the known cyberattacks performed by conventional computers and fulfils the EPES requirements, such as the low storage and computing resources of the EPES devices (e.g. smart meters).
ELECTRON also aims to deliver a nanogrid-based architecture to apply intelligent energy management and protection from cyberattacks and failures in different scales. Nanogrid introduces local optimisation and intelligent control to increase reliability and power quality. Moreover, ELECTRON will leverage SDN by deploying a distributed and fault tolerant SDN architecture.
Furthermore, ELECTRON will apply AR/VR-based training to ensure that EPES personnel can efficiently react to security incidents in different parts of the smart grid infrastructure.
ELECTRON will also foster an energy ecosystem on cybersecurity polices and recommendations to facilitate the assessment, compilation, and approval of cybersecurity certification programs for energy systems processes, devices, applications and services.
Finally, ELECTRON is expected to have a contribution to the following impacts: built/increased resilience against different levels of cyber and privacy attacks and data breaches; ensured continuity of the critical business energy operations and resilience against cyberattacks, taking into account the real-time constraints of an electric system; promote the implementation of the NIS directive by the EPES stakeholders; provide a set of standards and rules for certification of cybersecurity components, systems and processes in the energy sector; promote the cyber protection policy design and uptake in the energy sector.
ELECTRON will provide a contemporary certification framework aligned with Cybersecurity Act towards integrating the risk assessment and certification processes of products, devices, and services within EPES. The introduced framework takes risk assessment a step further ensuring collaborative evaluation of vulnerabilities among different stakeholders of the energy sector.
In Privacy-Aware Intrusion and Anomaly Detection domain, a cybersecurity protection framework is introduced adopting a federated learning approach. In particular, under the orchestration of XL-SIEM, the FL-IDPS AI models will focus on detecting intrusions and anomalies against the EPES protocols.
In Post-Quantum Privacy-Preserving for Energy Systems, ELECTRON provides a post-quantum public-key cryptosystem, which is resilient against the known cyberattacks performed by conventional computers and fulfils the EPES requirements, such as the low storage and computing resources of the EPES devices (e.g. smart meters).
ELECTRON also aims to deliver a nanogrid-based architecture to apply intelligent energy management and protection from cyberattacks and failures in different scales. Nanogrid introduces local optimisation and intelligent control to increase reliability and power quality. Moreover, ELECTRON will leverage SDN by deploying a distributed and fault tolerant SDN architecture.
Furthermore, ELECTRON will apply AR/VR-based training to ensure that EPES personnel can efficiently react to security incidents in different parts of the smart grid infrastructure.
ELECTRON will also foster an energy ecosystem on cybersecurity polices and recommendations to facilitate the assessment, compilation, and approval of cybersecurity certification programs for energy systems processes, devices, applications and services.
Finally, ELECTRON is expected to have a contribution to the following impacts: built/increased resilience against different levels of cyber and privacy attacks and data breaches; ensured continuity of the critical business energy operations and resilience against cyberattacks, taking into account the real-time constraints of an electric system; promote the implementation of the NIS directive by the EPES stakeholders; provide a set of standards and rules for certification of cybersecurity components, systems and processes in the energy sector; promote the cyber protection policy design and uptake in the energy sector.