NERC

Owners and operators of the 100 most “critical” hazardous liquid and natural gas pipelines, and liquefied natural gas (LNG) facilities will need to act within the next 30 days to align with federal cybersecurity guidance under new mandates issued by the Transportation Security Administration (TSA). The TSA’s May 27-issued pipeline-focused security directive is a notable, […]

A ransomware incident on May 7 that prompted Colonial Pipeline Co., owner of the nation’s largest refined products pipeline, to proactively shut it down underscores the punch cyberthreats can pose to organizations, “regardless of size or sector,” the U.S. Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security Agency (CISA) has warned.   Five days after Colonial Pipeline first learned it was the […]

The fallout from the severe weather that crippled the power grid in Texas and other states over the past week continues, as officials grapple with what went wrong and who should be held accountable for an energy emergency that left millions without electricity. Texas Attorney General Ken Paxton on Feb. 19 said his office would […]

The changing profile of the power system has added new stressors on conventional power generation and may have raised the potential for forced outages. Addressing them requires a closer look at traditional and

Despite COVID-19’s impact on power demand, disrupted pre-season generation preparation, and an expected highly active hurricane and wildfire season, industry appears well-positioned to meet peak demand this summer under anticipated weather in nearly all parts of the North American bulk power system (BPS).  Other than in the Electric Reliability Council of Texas (ERCOT), anticipated reserve […]

Declaring a national emergency over threats to the U.S. bulk power system (BPS), President Trump in an executive order (EO) on May 1 issued a sweeping ban on transactions by U.S. persons for electric equipment sourced abroad if the U.S. government determines they pose undue security risks. Because foreign adversaries are “increasingly creating and exploiting […]

The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) has approved the North American Electric Reliability Corporation’s (NERC’s) motion to defer implementation of seven reliability standards—including for grid cybersecurity—that were slated to become effective this year. In an April 17 order, FERC approved NERC’s April 6 requested motion to defer the implementation of the standards, which have effective […]

The North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) has asked the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission (FERC) to delay the implementation of seven reliability standards that relate to cybersecurity, training, disturbance monitoring and reporting, generator relay loadability, and coordination of protection systems for performance during faults. In an April 6 filing to FERC, NERC noted the rules […]

As part of POWER magazine’s in-depth coverage of the COVID-19 pandemic, its editors are curating a list of resources that may provide actionable information helpful to anyone involved in the world’s vast bulk power systems. Please write to editor@powermag.com if you know of additional resources that should be added to this page.  POWER Magazine’s Live […]

Federal regulators with oversight over U.S. power matters have issued a series of actions over recent weeks to respond to the potentially devastating impact that COVID-19, the new coronavirus, could have on North American power workforce operations and reliability. POWER will update this post regularly with COVID-19 response news and documents from federal and state […]