U-Smart is house to the Cyber-Physical System Resilience (CPSR) testbed, which is used to implement, test and verify cyber and physical resilience solutions for cyber-physical systems in the lab environment. The CPSR testbed offers a platform for real-time simulation of cyber-physical systems in concert with real-world monitoring, control, and protection devices. The CPSR testbed comprises a digital real-time power system simulator, cyber-physical system protection, control, and automation devices, software-defined networking, and anomaly detection systems. The architecture and implementation of the testbed are shown in Figures 1 and 2. Together, these components provide a user-defined and flexible testbed platform for the development, testing, and validation of power systems operation architecture and solutions. Please read more about the testbed here, and contact Dr. Masood Parvania (masood.parvania@utah.edu) to learn about gaining access to the CPSR testbed.

 

Figure 1: General Architecture of the CPSR testbed.
Figure 2: CPSR testbed at the U-Smart lab.

Digital Real-Time Simulator (DRTS) simulates the operation of power systems and provides an interface for interaction with CPS model components. The CPSR testbed uses the OPAL-RT OP5700 simulator as the DRTS to simulate real-time power system voltage and current waveforms that interact with real protection and control devices through device I/O ports. The OP5700 simulator contains a powerful target computer, re-configurable FPGAs, signal conditioning for up to 256 analog and digital I/O lines, and 16 high-speed fiber-optic SFP ports.

 

 

Feeder Protection Relays and Reclosers interface with the DRTS to take protective actions during faulty scenarios. The CPSR testbed integrates commercially available protection devices that enable performance testing of the devices in a simulated power system environment while creating real-world communication packets and data flow. The CPSR testbed uses the SEL-751 Feeder Protection Relays to control circuit breakers and reclosers. The SEL-751 relay utilizes various protocols (e.g., Modbus and DNP3) in order to communicate with the real-time automation controller.

Real-Time Automation Controllers (RTAC) are utilized to monitor and control the coordinated operation of protective relays and controllers (including inverters) over the system. The CPSR testbed deploys a SEL-2241 Real-Time Automation Controller (RTAC), which offers high-speed control and coordination of any number of compatible protection relays via communication protocols or analog signals. Importantly, the RTAC provides a platform to design custom protection and control schemes that require high fidelity coordination among relays and controllers in charge of different components and segments of the power system.

Software-Defined Networking (SDN) system dynamically defines communication paths, permissions and traffic flow among power system protection devices according to defined rules. The CPSR testbed network utilizes a SEL-2740S Software-Defined Network Switch to allow for complete configurability of data flows. This switch is managed by an SDN controller that runs on a Windows server to implement routing tables within the SDN for increased control over the network and dynamic routing changes for enhanced network resiliency.

Distributed Controllers
Distributed controllers collect monitoring signals from specific areas and compute advanced distributed control algorithms to manage the operation of different energy devices. Each distributed controller communicates via wireless communications with the central controller that runs on a Windows server.

Power Amplifier
A grid simulator that emulates the behavior of a three-phase controlled voltage source, which enables the integration of real energy devices (e.g., batteries, solar panels). The power amplifier is also capable of acting as a source and sink during the charging and discharging process of the physical energy storage device, respectively, through the bi-directional AC-DC converter.

Battery/Inverter
A 9.6kWh LG Chem Prime lithium-ion battery pack is operated by a SUNNY BOY storage 6.0 SMA inverter. The SUNNY BOY storage 6.0 is capable of converting 6 kw of power between the AC-connected grid and the DC Lithium-ion Battery Pack. On the AC side, the inverter is connected to the power amplifier providing an AC connection with 240v. MODBUS communication is implemented on the inverter enabling remote monitoring and fully controlling the battery pack. The charging/discharging cycle is fully controlled via the MODBUS protocol on python scripts to integrate it with other intelligent algorithms.

Network Function Virtualization (NFV) is a method to virtualize network services, such as routers, firewalls, and load balancers, which have traditionally been run on proprietary hardware. The combination of SDN and NFV helps  improve network capabilities by enabling better management of network traffic flows, network visibility, and deployment and control of network functions using software, instead of hardware-specific middleboxes. The CPSR testbed leverages NFV to make use of a local server acting as an edge cloud to run several functions, such as intrusion detection systems (IDS), physics-based anomaly detection algorithms and firewalls, as shown in Figure 3.

Figure 3: Example of the use of NFV in the CPSR testbed.