Charlotte Researchers Building A More Secure Power Grid
Countries around the globe, including the U.S., are in a race to be carbon neutral by 2050. The key to success will be balancing the need for clean energy with the need for security. A team of researchers led by UNC Charlotte is working to build a more secure and reliable power grid, thanks to funding through the UNC System Research Opportunities Initiative.
The team, which includes NC State University and NC A&T University, will receive $1.5 million during the next three years to build advanced cybersecurity research capacity to better understand how to protect and optimize the energy grid while clean energy sources and production continue to advance worldwide.
“This new distributed energy resources paradigm represents an unprecedented cyberattack surface with exceptional national security implications,” said Meera Sridhar, principal investigator and associate professor in the College of Computing and Informatics. “By joining with collaborators at other institutions, it strengthens our capacity-building to promote research at the intersection of the power grid and cybersecurity, ultimately finding ways to understand and mitigate attacks to the state’s energy infrastructure before they happen.”