ABSTRACT
Infrastructures ..................................................................................................... 494 21.3.2Electric Power Grids ............................................................................................ 497
21.4Infrastructures under Threat ........................................................................................... 498 21.4.1Energy Management System .............................................................................. 499 21.4.2Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition System ........................................ 499 21.4.3Remote Terminal Unit .........................................................................................500 21.4.4Programmable Logic Controller ........................................................................500 21.4.5Protective Relays ..................................................................................................500 21.4.6Automated Metering ........................................................................................... 501 21.4.7Plant-Distributed Control Systems .................................................................... 501 21.4.8Field Devices ......................................................................................................... 501
21.5The Dilemma: Security and Quality Needs .................................................................. 502 21.6Human Performance .........................................................................................................506 21.7Broader Technical Issues ...................................................................................................506 21.8Western States Power Crises: A Brief Overview of Lessons Learned ........................ 507
21.8.1Complex System Failure ..................................................................................... 510 21.8.2How to Make an Electric Power System Smart ............................................... 512 21.8.3Value Proposition ................................................................................................. 512 21.8.4What Are the Economic BeneŽts of Upgrading the Grid? ............................. 513 21.8.5What Role Does Renewable Energy Play in the Smart Grid and What
Needs to Be Done to Access Sustainable Energy Resources?........................ 514 21.8.6Self-Healing Power Grid ..................................................................................... 515 21.8.7End-to-End Technologies .................................................................................... 516 21.8.8Three-Tiered Intelligence .................................................................................... 516 21.8.9Why Do We Need a Smart Self-Healing Grid? ................................................ 517 21.8.10How Does a Smart Self-Healing Grid BeneŽt Consumers? ........................... 517 21.8.11What Is Involved in Creating a Smart Self-Healing Grid?............................. 517 21.8.12Is the Smart Grid Secure, Private, and Safe? .................................................... 518 21.8.13Are There Potential Health Impacts of the Radiofrequency Signal
Emitted by Wireless Smart Meters? .................................................................. 518
The North American power network may be considered the largest and most complex machine in the world-its transmission lines connect all the electric generation and distributionon the continent. In that respect, it exempliŽes many of the complexities of electric power infrastructure and how technological innovation combined with efŽcient markets and policies can address them. This network represents an enormous investment, including over 15,000 generators in 10,000 power plants, and hundreds of thousands of miles of transmission lines and distribution networks, whose estimated worth is over U.S. $800 billion. In 2000, transmission and distribution cables alone were valued at U.S. $358 billion [9-16]. The National Academy of Engineering classiŽed North American electric power grid as the greatest engineering achievement of the twentieth century. Today, the North American electric power grid is a network of approximately 10,000 power plants, 450,000 miles of high-voltage (>100 kV) transmission lines, over 6million miles of lower voltage distribution lines in the United States, and more than 15,000 substations. The transmission system is an interstate grid whose primary purpose is to connect generating plants with electrical load centers like cities and with high demand commercial and industrial facilities. In turn, the local distribution system provides for service to residential, commercial, and small business customers.
