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By Doug Peeples

SGN News Editor

Lionel Chocron, general manager for Connected Energy Networks Business Unit at Cisco, sees in the years to come a recognition by regulators and policymakers (and utilities) that "intelligent, secure and connected energy networks are key to enabling the lower-carbon, energy independent economy we envision for ourselves."

And because of that optimism, he expects those stakeholders to find and implement the right regulatory changes needed to pave the way for cost-effective smart grid investment, encourage innovation in the electricity sector, bring consumers into the fold so they can make informed decisions about their energy use – and protect critical infrastructure.

While other insiders drew similar conclusions, the opposite view also was expressed: There will be a lot of talk but little action in terms of a significant change in regulatory focus.

How will regulators deal with security?

Regulators had not been very involved in cybersecurity until recently. Rob Wilhite, Global Director for Management and Operations Consulting for DNV KEMA, cited a variety of legislative proposals that have surfaced over the past 12 months to identify what needs to be done "from the voluntary to the prescriptive" to deal with increasing concerns about protecting the country's electric and gas infrastructure.

While some of that legislation would increase the authority of existing agencies such as Homeland Security, Defense and the National Security Agency, the bottom line for Wilhite is "... no progress has been made in reaching a compromise between the Senate and House versions of these proposed bills." He added that a White House executive order intended to get protections in place more quickly, but that it (like some of the legislative proposals) seems to depend on voluntary information sharing of cyber threats and related incidents. "However, given the privacy and protection concerns expressed by key industry stakeholders from the Congressional proposals, it is not likely to have much impact if the President even signs this order."

Although much has been done in terms of security solutions and tools offered, Wilhite points to the European model of public and private organizations working cooperatively and suggests that such collaboration has been missing from discussions in the U.S.

Standards coming... really

Echelon CEO Ron Sege sees stable policies and long-term mandates as "the most important things for the smart grid in the next 10 years and beyond." He went on to say "We have the technology for smart grids. But we don't have the simple policies and standards that will enable those technologies to be broadly deployed."

The problem with our current approach can be found in the smart grid industry itself. "There are so many standards-setting bodies involved that effectively we have no standards." His suggestion for a solution? Pattern smart grid standards development after how Internet standards evolved. He commented that with the Internet, 90% of standards were developed by IEEE, the Defense Advanced Projects Research Agency, the Internet Engineering Task Force and the FCC. Many, many more organizations are involved in smart grid standards development.