The Federal Communications Commission could
address
the needs of the energy grid soon, especially given the increased focus on cybersecurity.
“To me it’s a gathering storm,” said Morgan O’Brien, the CEO of pdvWireless, a company that builds private telecom networks for utilities.
He sees the electricity sector’s growing reliance on the Internet making it more vulnerable to cyberattack, which was evident from a recent report that showed Russian hackers successfully infiltrated a U.S. utility firm’s plant controls.
O’Brien has helped lead an effort to convince the Federal Communications Commission that the utility industry needs its own dedicated radio bandwidth, known as spectrum, in order to keep its power plants, transmission lines
, and customers safe.
“There is a gathering consensus that something needs to be done,” he said in an interview with the Washington Examiner.
And it appears FCC chairman Ajit Pai is responding to their pleas, said O’Brien. He recalled that Pai told lawmakers on Capitol Hill last week that the commission would
issu
e
a proposed rule soon that could pave the way for freeing up additional spectrum for utilities.
“I can say I am working with our staff, and we are drafting a notice of proposed rulemaking to follow up” on a notice of inquiry issued almost exactly one year ago, Pai told the Energy and Commerce Committee last week in response to a direct question by Rep. Leonard Lance, R-N
.
J
.
, vice chairman on the committee’s communications panel.
O’Brien sent joint comments with the Enterprise Wireless Alliance to the FCC earlier this month as the agency examines possible rule changes for spectrum that could include a dedicated source of bandwidth for utilities.
O’Brien
has explained to the commission that the utility industry represents “critical infrastructure” that needs to be protected. But in order to protect itself it needs its own communications bandwidth freed up for its own private use.
He and the wireless coalition argue
that the 900 megahertz band of spectrum could be made available for utilities without harming the bandwidth used by other sectors.
The recent revelations that Russian hackers successfully breached a utility company’s Internet firewall makes the issue even more pressing, said O’Brien.
“These cyber issues mean utilities need direct control of their assets,” he said. “And they are right.”
Jack Markell, Delaware’s former governor and pdvWireless advis
e
r, said in a statement “few issues should have higher priority than arming our country’s critical infrastructure sectors with private, secure broadband networks.”
Markell said being a former governor makes him aware of “the dangers” of allowing regulatory complexity get in the way of change. “I also know that attacks against our nation’s utility grids are increasing and that improving the security, reliability and resilience of critical infrastructure operations is in everyone’s best interest.”
Utilities cannot rely on the broadband from commercial service providers to run all their operations, but need a source of dedicated radio spectrum to run their critical functions, according to O’Brien.
His company is also part of the Utilities Technology Council, a trade group representing utility firms on telecom issues, which has a campaign underway focused on getting the FCC and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission to collaborate. They also are educating Congress on the realities faced by energy firms when it comes to the need for private, secure, and reliable communications.
The trade group, in a recent letter to Congress, argues that the high-degree of reliability required to keep the lights on during an emergency event requires that the industry be given its own “interference-free” spectrum.
As grid operations become more dependent on bandwidth and the Internet, the industry cannot be reliant on the same commercial bandwidth used by millions of consumers, according to the group. Managing the grid demands a higher standard of reliability, according to the group.
But the “FCC continues to treat utilities as any other commercial entity when it comes to spectrum acquisition,” a letter sent to the Energy and Commerce Committee in June read. “As a result, utilities often find themselves unable to compete with other enterprises for interference-free spectrum.”
O’Brien says large commercial wireless companies like Verizon and AT&T are able to bid more effectively than utilities to gain most of the prized commercial spectrum, making more of a case for why they need their own dedicated resource.
UTC is also calling for the creation of a working group between the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission that regulates utilities and the FCC to address these issues more comprehensively.
