81 FR 47160 - Draft Outline for the Proposed Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid Strategy

DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY

Federal Register Volume 81, Issue 139 (July 20, 2016)

With this notice, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) seeks public comment on the proposed content and scope of the Joint U.S.- Canadian Electric Grid Strategy as indicated by the draft outline presented here. DOE seeks public comment including the following: (1) Suggestions for how best to describe the cyber and physical risks to electric grid systems, as well as ways to address and mitigate those risks; (2) suggestions for ensuring that the outlined strategic goals and objectives are at the appropriate level for a joint U.S.-Canadian strategy; (3) suggestions for actions under the proposed joint strategy that Federal departments and agencies should take to make the grid more secure and resilient; (4) suggestions for new ways to secure the future grid across North America, as outlined in the final section; and (5) suggestions for timelines to use when considering future planning and investment opportunities. Supplementary background information, additional details, and instructions for submitting comments can be found below.

[Federal Register Volume 81, Number 139 (Wednesday, July 20, 2016)]
[Notices]
[Pages 47160-47162]
From the Federal Register Online  [www.thefederalregister.org]
[FR Doc No: 2016-17133]


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 DEPARTMENT OF ENERGY


Draft Outline for the Proposed Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid 
Strategy

AGENCY: Office of Electricity Delivery and Energy Reliability, 
Department of Energy.

ACTION: Notice of request for public comment.

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SUMMARY: With this notice, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) seeks 
public comment on the proposed content and scope of the Joint U.S.-
Canadian Electric Grid Strategy as indicated by the draft outline 
presented here.
    DOE seeks public comment including the following: (1) Suggestions 
for how best to describe the cyber and physical risks to electric grid 
systems, as well as ways to address and mitigate those risks; (2) 
suggestions for ensuring that the outlined strategic goals and 
objectives are at the appropriate level for a joint U.S.-Canadian 
strategy; (3) suggestions for actions under the proposed joint strategy 
that Federal departments and agencies should take to make the grid more 
secure and resilient; (4) suggestions for new ways to secure the future 
grid across North America, as outlined in the final section; and (5) 
suggestions for timelines to use when considering future planning and 
investment opportunities.
    Supplementary background information, additional details, and 
instructions for submitting comments can be found below.

DATES: Comments must be received on or before August 10, 2016.

ADDRESSES: Comments can be submitted by either of the following methods 
and must be identified as ``Joint Strategy.'' By email: 
[email protected]. Include ``Joint Strategy'' in subject 
line of the message. Submitters may enter text or upload files in 
response to this notice. By mail: Stewart Cedres, Office of Electricity 
Delivery & Energy Reliability, U.S. Department of Energy, Forrestal 
Building, Room 6E-092, 1000 Independence Avenue SW., Washington, DC 
20585. Note: Delivery of the U.S. Postal Service mail to DOE may be 
delayed by several weeks due to security screening. DOE, therefore, 
encourages those wishing to comment to submit comments electronically 
by email.
    Instructions: Response to this Request for Comment is voluntary. 
Respondents need not reply to all questions or topics; however, they 
should clearly indicate the question or topic to which they are 
responding. Responses may be used by the U.S. Government for program 
planning on a non-attribution basis. DOE therefore requests that no 
business proprietary information or copyrighted information be 
submitted in response to this Request for Comment. Please note that the 
U.S. Government will not pay for response preparation, or for the use 
of any information contained in the response.

FOR FURTHER INFORMATION CONTACT: Requests for additional information 
should be directed to Stewart Cedres, Office of Electricity Delivery & 
Energy Reliability, U.S. Department of Energy, 1000 Independence Avenue 
SW., Washington, DC 20585, 202-586-2066, [email protected].

SUPPLEMENTARY INFORMATION: During the March 2016 visit by Canadian 
Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, in the ``U.S.-Canada Joint Statement on 
Climate, Energy, and Arctic Leadership,'' the U.S. and Canada agreed to 
``[d]evelop a joint U.S.-Canadian strategy for strengthening the 
security and resilience of the North American electricity grid [and] 
work together to strengthen the security and resilience of the electric 
grid, including against the growing threat from cyber-attacks and 
climate change impacts.'' The Departments of Energy and Homeland 
Security are co-leading an interagency effort, including our Canadian 
colleagues, to develop this proposed joint strategy.
    As a first step, Federal interagency writing teams have developed 
an outline for the proposed joint strategy that consists of three 
overarching strategic goals and objectives in support of achieving 
those goals. The purpose of the draft outline is to give the public an 
initial view of potential goals, objectives, and actions that could be 
taken to strengthen the security and resilience of the electric grid. 
In developing the outline, the writing teams used a ``baseline'' 
document consisting of analytical work that supports both the 
development of this proposed strategy and the next iteration of the 
Quadrennial Energy Review.
    DOE will collate public comments received on the outline. The 
comments will inform the preparation of the full draft joint strategy 
and accompanying action plan, which is scheduled to be released in 
December 2016.
    Comments are sought on the proposed overarching outline that will 
frame the joint strategy. Additional suggestions will be reviewed as 
they relate to the proposed structure of the document.
    Following is a proposed high-level and draft outline intended to 
guide the scope and content of the Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid 
Strategy. DOE seeks public comments on all aspects of this draft 
outline. The proposed outline is presented here in five parts: (1) 
Introduction and Context for the Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid 
Strategy; (2) Goal 1: Protect Today's Grid and Enhance Preparedness; 
(3) Goal 2: Manage Contingencies and Enhance Response and Recovery; (4) 
Goal 3: Build a More Secure and Resilient Future Grid; and (5) 
Conclusion.

1. Introduction and Context for the Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid 
Strategy

    The introductory and context-setting sections of the joint strategy 
will describe the context for the joint strategy.

2. Goal 1: Protect Today's Grid and Enhance Preparedness

    This section will outline opportunities to avoid, deter, and 
mitigate risks before they impact the grid. This includes information 
sharing between and among owners, operators, public, private and third-
party participants whose protection of critical assets would benefit 
from actionable threat and hazard information and would provide 
information utilization for prudent and efficient security investments. 
This section will also highlight the importance of coordinating ongoing 
law enforcement, emergency management, reliability coordination, and 
monitoring and detection activities, the practice of which will improve 
protection capabilities.
    This section will also address the method of preparedness that 
identifies can't-lose aspects of the system to mitigate the outer limit 
of tolerable impacts to the grid. This section will address major 
isolated as well as potentially cascading events that create out-and-
out system failure or balloon into major regional or multi-system 
impacts. This section will examine how to create necessary incentives 
and investments to engage the protective measures for outlier events. 
The section will close by examining the electric grid's 
interdependencies with other critical systems and functions of the 
nations' economies and societies. Given our economic and social 
reliance on electricity, the strategy will identify the importance of 
securing the grid in the

[[Page 47161]]

broader context of our joint and domestic national security goals.
[cir] Objective 1. Enhance Information Sharing
    i. Enhance information sharing between government and industry.
    ii. Build organizational capacity to improve government, and 
industry information sharing and support to improve management of risk 
critical to the success of business mission and goals.
[cir] Objective 2. Develop and Coordinate Existing Forensic and Law 
Enforcement Capabilities
    i. Improve tools, processes, and coordination among relevant 
government entities and industries for monitoring, detecting, 
analyzing, reporting, defending and mitigating threats to the electric 
grid.
[cir] Objective 3. Deter Major Isolated and Cascading Events
    i. Protect critical assets from relevant adversarial, natural, and 
technological threats to prevent and mitigate power loss and system 
failure.
    ii. Develop guiding principles for automatic and manual means of 
preventing cascading blackouts (System Operations).
[cir] Objective 4. Align Standards, Incentives and Investment with 
Security Goals
    i. Align utility incentives for planning and investment with 
regulatory processes and tools for prudent cost recovery, including 
tools for security valuation.
[cir] Objective 5. Understand and Mitigate Vulnerabilities From 
Interdependencies With Other Critical Infrastructures
    i. Mitigate and reduce security risks/vulnerabilities caused by 
interdependence between grid technologies and other infrastructures, 
including telecom, water, and natural gas.
    ii. Identify and manage impacts to other critical societal 
functions (e.g., defense).

3. Goal 2: Manage Contingencies and Enhance Response and Recovery 
Efforts

    This section will address response and recovery options during and 
after an incident, examining public and private resources available, 
including through mutual assistance efforts for physical and cyber 
capabilities. This section will also highlight the complexity and 
potential issues with supply chains, which are compounded in an 
emergency. Finally, this section will highlight the importance of 
adaptation through recovery and rebuilding efforts, restoring 
capabilities through smarter, more efficient, and forward-looking 
solutions.
[cir] Objective 1. Improve Emergency Response and Continuity
    i. Enhance public and private resources for response to and 
recovery from major loss-of-power events.
[cir] Objective 2. Develop or Enhance Mutual Assistance for Physical 
and Cyber Threats
    i. Foster robust mutual assistance programs for physical grid 
assets, and develop a cybersecurity mutual assistance program.
[cir] Objective 3. Identify Dependencies and Supply Chain Needs During 
an Emergency
    i. Address effects from power outages, such as loss of services.
[cir] Objective 4. Recover and Rebuild
    i. Adapt via recovery to result in more resilient investments, 
practices and processes.

4. Goal 3: Build a More Secure and Resilient Future Grid

    The final section of the strategy will take on the challenge and 
opportunities to adapting through recovery efforts, underscoring the 
end-goal of grid resilience. The first part of the final section will 
explore post-incident actions in the context of evolving grid design, 
technologies, and a changing climate (that is, the potential impact of 
more frequent and severe natural disasters). The first part of this 
section will also address the opportunities to develop and advance the 
deployment of tools and technologies to address the security 
vulnerabilities addressed in this strategy.
    The second part of this final section will outline opportunities to 
integrate security and resilience into planning, investment, 
regulatory- and policy-decision making for joint, cross-border security 
goals. This includes enhancing modeling and risk analysis capabilities 
to characterize vulnerabilities for decision-making and investments, 
suggesting ways to align utility and market incentives, and addressing 
workforce risks and opportunities for evolving technical knowledge 
needs. Finally, this section will point to the importance of pursuing 
optimal domestic security goals to coordinate cross-border where 
possible, and noting where domestic-specific goals do not lend 
themselves to joint coordination.
[cir] Objective 1. Understand and Manage New and Evolving Risks From 
Grid Technologies and Grid Design
    i. Identify, understand, and, to the extent possible, neutralize 
emerging threats (including through supply chains).
    ii. Ensure that continued integration of grid and IT 
infrastructures accounts for the security benefits and challenges of 
that enhanced integration.
    iii. Meet national security goals in a changing climate and energy 
landscape.
    [ssquf] Improve preparedness in the context of increased natural 
disaster intensity and frequency and
    [ssquf] Integrate security considerations into energy policy 
making, as well as utility and project planning, design, and 
implementation.
[cir] Objective 2. Develop and Deploy Security and Resilience Tools and 
Technologies
    i. Ensure that the technological and institutional and 
architectural evolution of the grid enhances security and resilience.
    ii. Be resilient to, and secure against, a range of grid threats.
    iii. Coordinate with industry and operator practices to detect and 
mitigate grid anomalies quickly and effectively.
[cir] Objective 3. Integrate Security and Resilience Into Planning, 
Investment, Regulatory- and Policy-Decision Making, and Coordinate 
Cross-Border Grid Integration Between the United States and Canada
    i. Enhance modeling and risk analysis capabilities to better 
characterize grid vulnerabilities, understand impacts of loss-of-power 
events, and support risk-informed decisions, including investments.
    ii. Align utility and market participant incentives for planning 
and investment with regulatory processes and tools for prudent cost 
recovery, including tools for security valuation.
    iii. Continue to pursue optimal domestic planning, investment, 
regulatory- and policy-decision making for security and resilience, 
noting where domestic-specific approach do not lend themselves to joint 
coordination.
    iv. Address the need to reinforce existing and develop new 
workforce capabilities.

5. Conclusion

    The conclusion of the strategy will summarize major findings and 
highlight the way forward.
    DOE seeks public comments on all of the draft outline sections 
described above for the Joint U.S.-Canadian Electric Grid Strategy.


[[Page 47162]]


    Authority: Presidential Policy Directive 21--Critical 
Infrastructure Security and Resilience (PPD-21), Presidential Policy 
Directive 8--National Preparedness (PPD-8), Fixing America's Surface 
Transportation (FAST) Act (Pub. L. 114-94) and Robert T. Stafford 
Disaster Relief and Emergency Assistance (Stafford) Act (Pub. L. 93-
288) as amended.

    Issued at Washington, DC on July 14, 2016.
Patricia A. Hoffman,
Assistant Secretary, U.S. Department of Energy, Office of Electricity 
Delivery and Energy Reliability.
[FR Doc. 2016-17133 Filed 7-19-16; 8:45 am]
 BILLING CODE 6450-01-P