Main Barriers and Solution Proposals for Communication Networks and Information Security in Smart Grids

The energy market in the world suffers from the lack of energy security and therefore the smart grids appear one of the feasible infrastructures to fill the future gap between energy supply and demand. However, there are some obstacles hindering maturation and deployment of the smart grids. For this purpose, the key contributions of this paper are to discuss briefly on the definitions and concepts of smart grids, to elaborate extensively on the barriers emerging in communication networks and information security, and lastly to provide the corresponding possible state-of-art solutions for the smart grid environment. As a crucial result, this paper is expected to be a guideline for scientists, research communities, manufacturers, industrialists, utilities, policy-makers and governments in order to clarify and overcome the potential barriers associated with the mentioned smart grid technologies.