Cyber-physical System Modelling for Cyber-security Analysis in Electricity Systems

This PhD project aims to develop a holistic cyber-physical modelling framework for electricity system in order to analyse the impact of cyber-security on the reliability and resilience of future low carbon systems. Specifically, the project aims to enhance cyber-physical security in power systems through the development of novel forms of cyber-attack and proprietary forms of defence.

This project aims to have direct applications for the security of power systems. In a sense the work is multi-disciplinary interacting with the ESPRC strategic themes of Energy, Engineering and ICT with research area applications across control engineering, ICT, digital signal processing and energy networks. Specifically, the studentship will focus on the problem of False Data Injection attacks and how they can be circumvented using the physical system assets themselves via novel application of Moving Target Defences (MTDs). Areas of focus will include target selection, attack detection via probabilistic and analytics methods, developing fall-back states in case of attack and the application of data analytics with respect to cyber-attacks.

To implement the research the student will first engage in literature review of the state-of-the-art journal and conference papers in the field of cyber-security for power systems. They will then devise a mathematical formulation for the problem they wish to solve and use power system simulation tools (such as MATPOWER and Simulink) to create models of systems under attack and evaluate appropriate defence strategies.

In the first year of the PhD, a journal paper has been submitted for review to IEEE transactions on making use of dimensionality reduction and DBSCAN clustering to enhance FDI attacks. The paper (currently subject to 2nd round of corrections) made contributions in both the attack and defence of power systems and focused on enhancing cyber-attacks by countering conventional MTD and employing new ways of enhancing MTD to be resilient. The paper focused on using system assets already in place to drive attack detection of sophisticated cyber-attacks and reduce the overall cost to the system from the application of defence.

Going forward, collaboration with other institutions will be explored with the development of a specialised topology learning cyber-attack in combination with Tsinghua University. This work will build on a number of exciting areas and may culminate with a foreign student exchange toward the end of the 2nd year. Also, considerations for potential commercialisation of the research will also be made. Cyber-Security as a field has received much focus recently with accelerators such as CyberASAP offering venues for academics to bring research to market. The prospect of developing a low cost Multos based analytic tool for distributed state estimation and attack detection will be explored and a conference paper published in this area.

This Centre will train students in the blend of traditional and emerging power network concepts and advances in information and communication technologies, consumer and demand side technologies, and integrated energy systems required to deliver future power networks. This targets the skills challenge in the electrical power networks industry, and the lack of high quality graduates able to deliver the smart grid. The training will deliver doctoral level engineers that are prepared for key technical tasks within the power networks and utility industry, and this is a positive impact for society.

A number of industrial partners have agreed to provide placements in which projects are undertaken with the company and on their premises. This will provide an immediate industrial impact where research concepts, systems and approaches can be delivered as knowledge exchange impact, leading to enhanced performance of the UK power networks industry. Direct engagement with the industrial partners, and their funding of the research programme and strong engagement, will lead to new intellectual property that can be capitalised upon by UK manufacturers (new products), consultancies and service providers (new offerings, analyses, services) and network operators (increased efficiencies and reduced capital and operational expenditure). Overall, this will lead to the impact of reduced energy costs for the UK consumer.

Academic impact will be achieved through the internationally leading and novel research activities planned for the Centre. Extensive links and engagement with leading international academics are being put in place to underpin this.

Society will benefit directly by the CDT helping to elevate the standing of the engineering profession and producing more engineers aware of the implications of their technical work for policy and their wider responsibilities to the public, with a particular emphasis on energy. The CDT's impact on policy will be accentuated by the key roles played by our senior staff in government-industry steering groups such as ETI Strategic Advisory Groups, Ofgem Innovation Working Group, IET Power Networks Joint Vision Group, Scottish Grid and Economics Group, and the Scottish Smart Grid Sector Strategy Group to name a few. Our international links through CIGRE, CIRED, and the IEEE will ensure that our outcomes influence a global community.

Our CDT cohorts, alongside our early career research communities, are central to our ambitions to inspire a generation through impact and engagement. Strategic engagement initiatives, such as Strathclyde's Technology and Innovation Centre, are intended to transform the way in which universities work with industry and communicate effectively with all stakeholders, including the public. The CDT cohort will benefit from interactions within this environment, leading to further uptake of the research among stakeholders.