In 2015 the Research Council and the Centre for Protection of National Infrastructure (now part of NCSC) established the UK Research Institute into Trustworthy Industrial Control Systems (RITICS) and invited QUB to contribute a project (one of only four).  CAPRICA: Converged Approach towards Resilient Industrial control systems and Cyber Assurance is a collaboration between CSIT and the Energy, Power and Intelligent Control research group in QUB.  CAPRICA addresses cyber security and control issues in federated micro-grid architectures caused by power islanding.  If a micro-grid is isolated from the larger grid then its power characteristics may change over time.  Voltage amplitude, frequency and phase angle may change and when not synchronised with the main grid electrical reconnection can be very dangerous. CAPRICA developed a Phasor Measurement Unit (PMU) used to accurately sample power quality in micro-grids, a control strategy to maintain micro-grid synchronicity with the main grid during periods of islanding, and a secure communications architecture that allows PMUs and control systems to operate without compromise over SCADA protocols.

 

 

CSIT also used this project to develop a vulnerability analysis methodology which addresses compliance requirements within the NIS Directive relating to new product development.

Funding for a further QUB project that investigates the impact of cloud infrastructure on smart-grid control systems has recently been announced by RITICS.