A DER Attack-Mitigation Differential Game for Smart Grid Security Analysis

Information and communication infrastructure will be extensively deployed to monitor and control electric power delivery components of today's power grid. While these cyber elements enhance a utility's ability to maintain physical stability, if a subset are compromised by adversaries, disruption may occur. In this paper, a novel framework based on the principles of differential games is proposed that demonstrates stealthy worst-case strategies for attackers to disrupt transient stability by leveraging control over distributed energy resources. We demonstrate that if the electric power utility is able to identify uncompromised components, countermeasures can exist that effectively reduce the impact of attack for a fixed time interval. Based on our results, we develop insights to construct safety margin recommendations for cyber-physical smart grid actuation elements that promote system resilience during a cyber attack.