IUCRC Phase 1 Florida International University: Center for Infrastructure Trustworthiness in Energy Systems (CITES)

The Center for Infrastructure Trustworthiness in Energy Systems (CITES), a new Phase I IUCRC, focuses on research issues in the critical area of cyber resilience and the trustworthiness of energy systems (e.g., electric grid generation, transmission, and distribution), which have an extensive dependence on cyber technology. Composed of three University sites (University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign, University of Arkansas, and Florida International University), CITES seeks to advance research and technologies that addresses unmet and underserved industry needs to better secure energy systems.

In close partnership with its members (Offices of Emergency Medical Services, energy providers, national labs, and industry associations), CITES will help secure the national defense by developing research that leads to practical means of protecting energy systems against failure within and attacks upon their cyber infrastructures. The fundamental issues addressed by CITES concern cyber resilience in the context of the specialized requirements for these “operational technology” (OT) systems, issues which include the heterogeneity of OT equipment, and integration with much more widely used informational technology (IT) equipment.

The Center will focus on detecting and quickly responding to attacks on the cyber infrastructure, rapidly recovering from the impacts of successful attacks, decreasing the costs and risks of patching operational systems, and ensuring that communication between devices happens fast enough and with enough volume to support operations. CITES will also serve an important role in augmenting the nation’s workforce in OT-knowledgeable cyber-security professionals.

Research methodologies include system analysis, formal methods and other mathematics, and empirical evaluation of prototypes. CITES technical contributions include knowledge creation, knowledge transfer, and practical proofs of concept that utilize Florida International University (FIU)'s specialized testbeds. Energy providers benefit by observing the potential for increased resilience; Equipment manufacturers benefit from proven ideas, and other stakeholders benefit from increased knowledge.

CITES research at FIU is organized in three thrusts. The first thrust is increasing security which addresses issues related to increased energy industry use of power electronics with embedded sensors, converters, actuation, and control mechanisms through wired and wireless connections. Electric grids, electrified transportation, data centers, and Internet of Things (IoT) devices rely on trustworthy power electronics.

The Center seeks to identify the best key management approaches, make the existing solutions deployable to the power grid, and adapt novel solutions that will be lightweight, have significant bandwidth, and be storage efficient. The second thrust - enhancing communications supporting energy cyber-physical systems - provides critical capabilities for securing commercial wireless networks and their interactions with energy systems equipment that operate on them.

The Center utilizes a comprehensive frequency range across the 5G and satellite communications and navigation bands to enable security measures and characterization techniques that serve the growing industry and related energy systems innovations, internet of things (IoT), and navigation in support of current and future energy cyber-physical systems. The third thrust, security of electric vehicle infrastructure - solves diverse problems related to safety and security that are forced by the widespread use of electric vehicles.

A broad space of research problems related to power electronics, placement, and management of charging stations supports aggregate battery power to support renewable energy.

This award reflects NSF's statutory mission and has been deemed worthy of support through evaluation using the Foundation's intellectual merit and broader impacts review criteria.