Synchronous condensers (SCs) play important roles in integrating wind energy into relatively weak power grids. However, the design of SCs usually depends on specific application requirements and may not be adaptive enough to the frequently-changing grid conditions caused by the transition from conventional to renewable power generation. This paper devises a software-defined virtual synchronous condenser (SDViSC) method to address the challenges. Our contributions are fourfold: 1) design of a virtual synchronous condenser (ViSC) to enable full converter wind turbines to provide built-in SC functionalities; 2) engineering SDViSCs to transfer hardware-based ViSC controllers into software services, where a Tustin transformation-based software-defined control algorithm guarantees accurate tracking of fast dynamics under limited communication bandwidth; 3) a software-defined networking-enhanced SDViSC communication scheme to allow enhanced communication reliability and reduced communication bandwidth occupation; and 4) Prototype of SDViSC on our real-time, cyber-in-the-loop digital twin of large-wind-farm in an RTDS environment. Extensive test results validate the excellent performance of SDViSC to support reliable and resilient operations of wind farms under various physical and cyber conditions.

Communication has always played a vital role in microgrids in maintaining reliable operations and achieving great benefits and will be even more critical with the increasing deployment of renewable energies, information technologies, and real-time automation and control systems. However, existing classical cryptographic methods for securing microgrid communication are based on mathematical assumptions, which are vulnerable to attacks from quantum computers. This chapter reviews the current status of developing quantum-secure microgrids, namely, microgrids that are secure against attacks from quantum computers. Specifically, it introduces why implementing quantum security is important, how quantum security can be integrated into a single microgrid and networked microgrids (NMs), respectively, and how quantum-secure microgrid and NMs testbeds are established. It also discusses some potential issues associated with applying existing quantum cryptography methods in the context of microgrids and provides future perspectives to make quantum security more practical in microgrids.

Imagery-based inspection, with its small size, affordability, high-resolution imaging capability, and mobility, has become a preferred method in power line inspections. Meanwhile, artificial intelligence (AI)-enabled defects detection has been extensively studied to further improve the efficiency and accuracy of inspection tasks. However, traditional defect detection methods exhibit a high rate of false detections when applied to real-world utility data, impeding their widespread adoption. In this paper, we propose a two-step defects detection (TSDD) algorithm to mitigate these issues. During the first step, power components are located and classified, followed by removing the background. In the subsequent second step, defects within the power component region are detected. Our experiments demonstrate significant improvements in detecting small defects like broken bells and woodpecker holes, enhancing the accuracy and efficiency of power line inspections.

Quantum networks are considered to be the future of secure communication in the coming quantum era. However, significant efforts are lacking on developing practical quantum networks for power grids. This paper establishes a quantum network-based power grid (QNetGrid) framework and develops a real-time, reliable, flexible, programmable, and cost-effective QNetGrid software testbed containing repeater-based quantum communication, quantum routing, real software-defined networking (SDN) switches, and real-time networked microgrids (NMs) operations. It makes the following contributions: 1) a repeater and routing based quantum network simulator (QNSim) is developed, 2) repeaters with and without quantum memories are respectively simulated in QNSim, 3) different routing scenarios in QNetGrid are investigated, 4) a real-time QNetGrid software testbed is built in RTDS incorporating QNSim and real SDN switches, and 5) various test cases are designed, and experimental results produced with the QNetGrid testbed provide valuable insights for building quantum networks in power grids.

Quantum networks present a potent solution to secure microgrid communication in the quantum era. Efficient quantum network routing protocols play an important role in developing practical and resilient quantum network-based microgrids. In this paper, we make the following contributions: 1) establish lightweight-yet-holistic routing tables for scalable and low-latency quantum routing in microgrids; 2) devise efficient distributed local routing protocols for quantum network-enabled microgrids; and 3) integrate the devised protocols in a real-time QNetGrid testbed and evaluate their performance under different scenarios. Experiments validate the efficacy of the devised methods and provide insights for developing efficient quantum network routing for cyber-resilient microgrids,

In collaborative networked microgrids (NMs), distributed energy resources (DERs) utilize intelligent Internet of Things (IoT)-based controllers to coordinately support various smart community functions. Meanwhile, privacy and security issues occur when IoT-based controllers interact with each other. This article presents a cryptography-based, programmable control (crypto-control) scheme to provably preserve the privacy of DERs while ensuring fast, flexible distributed control in NMs. Specifically, it makes the following contributions: 1) a programmable crypto-control-based NMs (PCNMs) architecture, where crypto-controllers are fully virtualized, is devised; 2) a novel dynamic encrypted weight addition (DEWA) approach, which integrates an enhanced partial homomorphic encryption and a secret sharing scheme, is devised to ensure privacy preserving of distributed controls; 3) the DEWA privacy-preserving property is mathematically analyzed; and 4) a real-time DEWA-based PCNMs testbed is deployed by incorporating DEWA, real software-defined networking switches, and IoT devices. The deployable crypto-control scheme is interfaced with and thoroughly verified in a Real-Time Digital Simulator environment, and the experimental results validate the effectiveness, benefits, and superiority of DEWA-based PCNMs. The inherent resilience of the DEWA-based PCNMs is validated by small signal stability analysis.

Electric power systems provide the backbone of modern industrial societies.Enabling scalable grid analytics is the keystone to successfully operating large transmission and distribution systems.However, today' s power systems are suffering from everincreasing computational burdens in sustaining the expanding communities and deep integration of renewable energy resources, as well as managing huge volumes of data accordingly.These unprecedented challenges call for transformative analytics to support the resilient operations of power systems.Recently, the explosive growth of quantum computing techniques has ignited new hopes of revolutionizing power system computations.Quantum computing harnesses quantum mechanisms to solve traditionally intractable computational problems, which may lead to ultra-scalable and efficient power grid analytics.This paper reviews the newly emerging application of quantum computing techniques in power systems.We present a comprehensive overview of existing quantum-engineered power analytics from different operation perspectives, including static analysis, transient analysis, stochastic analysis, optimization, stability, and control.We thoroughly discuss the related quantum algorithms, their benefits and limitations, hardware implementations, and recommended practices.We also review the quantum networking techniques to ensure secure communication of power systems in the quantum era.Finally, we discuss challenges and future research directions.This paper will hopefully stimulate increasing attention to the development of quantum-engineered smart grids.

Quantum key distribution (QKD) has been considered a potent and mature approach to secure communication in the quantum era. However, there exist resilience gaps that hinder the practical usefulness of QKD. This article improves the resilience of a QKD-based microgrid by leveraging software-defined networking (SDN). Specifically, the following contributions have been made. First, a novel QKD- and SDN-based communication framework is devised for microgrids. Second, an enhanced QKD simulator is developed, which can simulate both the number of generated keys and the amount of classical data required, providing a more accurate QKD study in microgrids. Third, an SDN-based resilience enhancement strategy, which incorporates three practical SDN applications, is developed to improve the system's resilience. Finally, a QKD- and SDN-enabled cyberphysical microgrid prototype is built in an RTDS environment using real whitebox SDN switches. Extensive case studies validate the effectiveness and excellent performance of SDN to improve the resilience of QKD-based microgrids in various situations.

This paper underpins the potential of quantum generative adversarial networks (QGANs) for renewable scenario generation in power grids. A single QGAN with either amplitude or angle encoding is hard to construct. To bridge the gaps, this paper devises a Multi-QGAN framework utilizing multiple QGANs. A correlation-based Multi-QGAN (CMulti-QGAN) approach is further established to improve the Multi-QGAN performance. Data from real solar systems in Connecticut are collected for numerical studies. Results demonstrate the effectiveness and robustness of Multi-QGAN and CMulti-QGAN, and also validate the superiority of CMulti-QGAN over Multi-QGAN.

Grid forming inverters provide voltage and frequency regulations for microgrids; in the meantime, new challenges are introduced for microgrid protections. For instance, inverters’ control strategies can affect protection behaviors, and low short-circuit ratios and bi-directional power flows also make protection operations complex. Protection schemes based on conventional principles such as overcurrent and distance relays do not always provide reliable, sensitive, or selective operations. This paper devises a traveling wave protection approach for microgrids using a wavelet-driven deep neural network named WaveletKernelNet (WKN). Compared with conventional methods, the presented approach provides enhanced sensitivity, higher selectivity, and better identification of various faults in microgrids. Extensive case studies validate the efficacy and excellent performance of the devised approach.

This paper investigates the feasibility and efficiency of quantum-circuit-based algorithms for microgrid state estimation. Our new contributions include: (1) a general quantum state estimation (GQSE) formulation is devised for swing-bus-contained microgrids through the quantized Gaussian–Newton iteration, (2) a preconditioned quantum linear solver (PQLS) is developed for tackling the ill-conditioned GQSE with limited quantum resources, and (3) an enhanced quantum state estimation (EQSE) algorithm is further established for hierarchical-control-based microgrids with exogenous disturbances. Extensive case studies demonstrate the correctness of GQSE, PQLS and EQSE in two typical microgrids. The robustness and convergence performance of EQSE are also verified.

Cyberattacks in power systems that alter the input data of a load forecasting model have serious, potentially devastating consequences. Existing cyberattack-resilient work focuses mainly on enhancing attack detection. Although some outliers can be easily identified, more carefully designed attacks can escape detection and impact load forecasting. Here, a cyberattack-resilient load forecasting approach based on an adaptive robust regression method is proposed, where the observations are trimmed based on their residuals and the proportion of the trim is adaptively determined by an estimation of the contaminated data proportion. An extensive comparison study shows that the proposed method outperforms the standard robust regression in various settings.

Communication-dependent and software-based distributed energy resources (DERs) are extensively integrated into modern microgrids, providing extensive benefits such as increased distributed controllability, scalability, and observability. However, malicious cyber-attackers can exploit various potential vulnerabilities. In this study, a programmable adaptive security scanning (PASS) approach is presented to protect DER inverters against various power-bot attacks. Specifically, three different types of attacks, namely controller manipulation, replay, and injection attacks, are considered. This approach employs both software-defined networking technique and a novel coordinated detection method capable of enabling programmable and scalable networked microgrids (NMs) in an ultra-resilient, time-saving, and autonomous manner. The coordinated detection method efficiently identifies the location and type of power-bot attacks without disrupting normal NM operations. Extensive simulation results validate the efficacy and practicality of the PASS for securing NMs.

Communication has always played a vital role in microgrids to maintain reliable operations and achieve great benefits and will be even more critical with the increasing deployment of renewable energies, information technologies, and real-time automation and control systems. The existing classical cryptographic methods for securing microgrid communication, however, rely on mathematical assumptions, which are vulnerable to attacks from quantum computers. This article reviews the current status of developing quantum-secure microgrids, namely microgrids that are secure against attacks from quantum computers. We introduce some potential issues associated with applying existing quantum cryptography methods in the context of microgrids and provide future perspectives to make quantum security more practical in microgrids.

Underwater wireless power transfer (UWPT) is a critical infrastructure for supplying power to underwater devices, such as underwater sensors and autonomous underwater vehicles. Enabling a software-defined architecture for UWPT promises to build a flexible and programmable underwater energy network. Although it is crucial that UWPT be made more resilient to cyberattacks and energy stealing, this remains an open challenge. In this article, we propose a software-defined UWPT (SD-UWPT) system that is both cyber and energy secure. A moving target defense approach and an active synchronous detection method are developed to protect the SD-UWPT against scanning-based attacks and power bot attacks. To enable energy-secure UWPT, an impedance measurement based approach is further established to prevent energy stealing. Through comprehensive evaluations, we validate the benefits of SD-UWPT and demonstrate the effectiveness of the proposed cyber–energy secure strategies against various attacks.

The supremacy and fast development of quantum techniques are stimulating the arrival of an ultra-secure and super-fast quantum internet, which accordingly will shape future electric grids. This paper develops a novel scheme for resilient electric grids by using a quantum direct communication (QDC) network. The novelty of this work includes: (a) a novel QDC-based electric grid architecture is devised to provide ultra-secure communication; (b) we investigate QDC protocols for grid communication and analyze the impacts of attacks and noises; and (c) we demonstrate how to establish a QDC-enabled electric grid testbed to evaluate the system's performance.

Existing microgrid communication relies on classical public key systems, which are vulnerable to attacks from quantum computers. This paper uses quantum key distribution (QKD) to solve these quantum-era microgrid challenges. Specifically, this paper makes the following novel contributions: 1) it devises a novel QKD simulator capable of simulating QKD protocols; 2) it offers a QKD-based microgrid communication architecture for microgrids; 3) it shows how to build a quantum-secure microgrid testbed in an RTDS environment; 4) it develops a key pool sharing (KPS) strategy to improve the cyberattack resilience of the QKD-based microgrid; and 5) it analyzes the impacts of critical QKD parameters with the testbed. Test results provide insightful resources for building a quantum-secure microgrid.

Quantum key distribution (QKD) provides a potent solution to securely distribute keys for two parties. However, QKD itself is vulnerable to denial of service (DoS) attacks. A flexible and resilient QKD-enabled networked microgrids (NMs) architecture is needed but does not yet exist. In this article, we present a programmable quantum NMs (PQNMs) architecture. It is a novel framework that integrates both QKD and software-defined networking (SDN) techniques capable of enabling scalable, programmable, quantum-engineered, and ultra-resilient NMs. Equipped with a software-defined adaptive post-processing approach, a two-level key pool sharing strategy and an SDN-enabled event-triggered communication scheme, these PQNMs mitigate the impact of DoS attacks through programmable post-processing and secure key sharing among QKD links, a capability unattainable using existing technologies. Through comprehensive evaluations, we validate the benefits of PQNMs and demonstrate the efficacy of the presented strategies under various circumstances. Extensive results provide insightful resources for building QKD-enabled NMs in practice.

Obtaining high-fidelity information on extreme photovoltaic (PV) power is critical for electric utility system planning and operations. However, a scarcity of extreme data has previously made achieving an accurate estimate of extreme PV power an intractable challenge. In response to this challenge, this paper presents Extreme PV Power Analytics (EPVA). It utilizes k-means clustering to determine which PV systems have similar behaviors in their extreme capacity factors (ECFs) in order to incorporate more extreme data in an extreme value analysis. This extreme value analysis is subsequently applied to obtain the distribution of ECFs. Zone partitioning results and ECF distribution results for The United Illuminating Company service territory are presented to validate the effectiveness and efficacy of EPVA.

Nowadays, microgrid controllers are often embedded in specialized hardware such as PLC and DSP. The hardware-dependency and fit-and-forget design make it difficult and costly for microgrid controllers to evolve and upgrade under frequent changes such as plug-and-play of microgrid components. Furthermore, different distributed energy resources in a microgrid require customized controllers, leading to long development cycles and high operational costs for deploying microgrid services. To tackle the challenges, a software-defined control SDC) architecture for microgrid is devised, which virtualizes traditionally hardware-dependent microgrid control functions as software services decoupled from the underlying hardware infrastructure, fully resolving hardware dependence issues and enabling unprecedentedly low costs. A generic SDC prototype is designed to generate microgrid controllers autonomously in edge computing facilities such as distributed virtual machines. Extensive experiments verify that SDC outperforms traditional hardware-based microgrid control in that it empowers a decoupled cyber-physical microgrid and thus makes microgrid operations unprecedentedly affordable, autonomic, and secure.