Investigating Cyberattacks Against Off-Grid Solar-Powered Electric Vehicle Charging Stations

The rapid installation of charging stations is imperative to facilitate the transition to decarbonization of the transport sector and cope with the booming sales of electric vehicles (EVs) in recent years. Yet, the installation of charging stations requires capital intensive and time-consuming network reinforcement investments. The installation of off-grid EV charging stations can be considered as a viable solution to address this challenge in locations where the electric grid is not nearby, or the required investments to upgrade the grid is expensive Solar generation, a battery energy storage system (BESS) and an energy management system (EMS) can be incorporated into EV charging stations to realize off-grid solar-powered EV charging stations. The incorporation of solar generation, a BESS and an EMS transforms the EV charging station into a complex cyber-physical system which is prone to various cyberattacks. In this paper, we investigate vulnerability of off-grid solar-powered EV charging stations to cyberattacks. We demonstrate an attacker can compromise the measurements and control commands in an off-grid solar-powered EV charging station to force the charging station out of service.