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Critical Infrastructure, Cybersecurity and Resilience

Resilience

Resiliencee

The reliability and resilience of the energy system is drawing increasing levels of attention from state regulators. While reliability is a broadly accepted term with well-defined metrics, resilience—the ability of the system to anticipate, absorb, recover from, and adapt to disruptive events, particularly high-impact, low-frequency events—is not yet incorporated into regulatory processes. NARUC is undertaking efforts to support state regulators’ approaches to defining and quantifying the benefits of resilience investments that reduce the likelihood, duration, and impacts of interruptions to electricity service.

Resilience activities are coordinated with the Committee on Critical Infrastructure, Committee on Energy Resources and the Environment, and Staff Subcommittee on Electric Reliability and Resilience.

Quick Links

Register for the Microgrid Action Planning Workshop, Oct. 3 - 4, 2023, Bethesda MD

Webinar: State Microgrid Policy, Programmatic, and Regulatory Framework report release, Sept. 1, 2023, 1:00 - 2:00 pm ET

State Microgrid Policy, Programmatic, and Regulatory Framework, August 2023

Clean Energy Microgrids, June 2023

Energy Resilience Reference Guide, February 2023

Defense Energy Resilience Key Resources Guide, October 2022

Supporting FAQs for Commissioners on Defense Energy Resilience Topics, October 2022

Workforce Development Toolbox, September 2022

NARUC Cybersecurity Manual

Resources

  • Resilience for Regulators Webinar #1: Climate Resilience Frameworks to Improve Risk Management: Exploring Lessons Learned from NC, January 2022
    The first in a webinar series ‘Resilience for Regulators’ that dives into various topics within the umbrella of energy resilience policy, this webinar featured speakers from North Carolina who talked about the North Carolina Climate Risk Assessment and Resilience Plan and highighted their implementation experiences. Recording, PPT

  • Resilience for Regulators Webinar #2: Building Transmission Infrastructure for a Resilient Energy Future, May 2022
    The second in a webinar series ‘Resilience for Regulators’ that dives into various topics within the umbrella of energy resilience policy, this webinar featured speakers from ACORE, DOE, and WIRES on the opportunity for transmission to enhance grid resilience. Recording,

  • Resilience for Regulators Webinar #3: How Important is Energy Storage to Withstand Extreme Weather Events?, September 2022
    The third in NARUC's webinar series ‘Resilience for Regulators’ this webinar featured speakers from American Clean Power Association, EPRI, and DNV Energy on how energy storage assets can be used to withstand extreme weather events. Recording

  • Regulatory Considerations for Utility Investments in Defense Energy Resilience, February 2022
    Building on NARUC's recent white paper Regulatory Considerations for Utility Investments in Energy Resilience
  • this webinar details the concept of defense energy resilience, the Department of Energy’s defense critical electric infrastructure program (DCEI) and opportunities to enhance productive partnerships among state utility regulators, utilities and critical facilities. Speakers highlight the success of existing defense energy resilience projects in Hawaii as an exemplary model for other states to consider.
  • Defense Community Priorities on Energy Resilience and Opportunities for State Regulatory Partnership, March 2022
    This webinar will feature several defense community leaders describing the strategic priorities of the armed forces and DoD regarding energy security. State public utility regulators should work closely with their regulated utilities and defense community customers to identify critical assets, develop collaborative partnerships, and enhance grid resilience vital to our national defense interests.
  • Advancing Electric System Resilience with Distributed Energy Resources: A Review of State Policies, April 2020
    Utility regulators and other stakeholders need to improve their understanding of resilience and how distributed energy resources can facilitate recovery from disruptions and threats. This report addresses the role of state regulators in electricity system resilience, the relationship of distributed energy resources to resilience, and how states can implement policies to expand DER deployment to improve resilience.
  • Advancing Electric System Resilience with Distributed Energy Resources: Key Questions and Resources, April 2020
    As a companion piece to Advancing Electric System Resilience with Distributed Energy Resources: A Review of State Policies, this publication provides a foundation for state public utility commissions to frame how they review proposed utility investments that could offer resilience benefits and includes a list of relevant resources to improve regulators' ability to oversee resilience investments and obtain better outcomes for customers.
  • The Value of Resilience for Distributed Energy Resources: An Overview of Current Analytical Practices, April 2019
    Planning for long-duration power interruptions caused by high-impact, low-probability events requires new approaches to power system resilience above and beyond previous hardening efforts. This report examines both regulatory decision-making and non-regulatory cost-benefit analyses to determine if, and how, a value of energy resilience was calculated and applied to proposed investments. Four criteria were used to evaluate the methodologies, including the method’s ease of use, scope of outputs, geographic scalability, and power interruption duration analysis capability. Some of the valuation methodologies examined in the report may be useful in regulatory decision-making; however, none of the methods reviewed met all four criteria for regulator usefulness and usability, and no single method is capable of capturing all regulatory concerns regarding the resilience value of DERs.

Activities

  • DOE-NARUC Regulating for Resilience Workshop, San Antonio, TX, November 20, 2019
    As states, utilities, and other stakeholders seek to reduce the consequences of disruptions to the electric power sector from threats such as severe weather, cyber-attacks, and accidents, the need for regulators to consider how resilience can be properly internalized is coming into sharp focus. States, utilities, municipalities, and customers are increasingly taking steps to improve our communities’ resilience yet are doing so without the benefit of an established, clear and comprehensive set of planning considerations for grid resilience. Objectives for this workshop include: (1) to present and discuss work to date on overcoming critical barriers to development of a structured resilience framework; and (2) to explore commission experiences and needs related to important resilience topics.Summary forthcoming
  • PJM-NARUC Joint Stakeholder Workshop: How Can Distributed Energy Resources Advance System Resilience? Orlando, FL, November 14, 2018

Partners

NARUC is grateful for funding from the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE), Solar Energy Technologies Office and the National Renewable Energy Laboratory (NREL) through the Solar Energy Innovation Network (SEIN), DOE Office of Electricity, DOE Office of Grid Deployment (GDO), and DOE Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security, and Resilience (CESER) which have enabled the resources and activities described on this webpage.

For More Information

NARUC staff experts who support these activities include: