How to Enable the Energy Revolution

This weekend, I read what may be the most important book yet for those transforming today's grid into the Intelligent Grid, and transforming today's buildings and the systems inside them into Smart Buildings. No, it is not Thomas Friedman's "Hot Flat and Crowded", although that work has set the table nicely for discussions of the importance and opportunity of this effort. It is not and of the chap books from the Department of Energy, or the IEEE, or EPRI. It is not one of the many books on environmental eschatology. Nor is it any of George Gilder's visionary history books that bring perspective to technology.

I recommend that anyone involved in these efforts read "The Future of the Internet--And How to Stop It" (TFOTI) by Jonathan Zittrain. TFOTI is at first glance a sober history of technology and culture and regulation. TFOTI tells how the internet grew from its roots in telephone systems and closed garden communities into the amazing engine for transformation, innovation, and new wealth creation we know today. This happened because of a series of legal decisions and technological choices that let people place any device on the communication on-ramps, and create or install any program on their devices. Zittrain calls the capability of the internet to generate and support new technologies and new capabilities "generative".

Zittrain warns that we may be losing this generative aspect of the internet. The internet is being neutered by the growing deployment of locked-down devices, systems that do only what their manufacturers allow. The glamour and ease of use of the iPhone is afforded by locking down the system to approved programs. Xboxes and PlayStations offer connectivity on locked down computers. The social networks are becoming walled gardens; once again business users are establishing accounts on FaceBook, MySpace, LinkedIn, and Plexus as they once established multiple email accounts on COMPUSERVE, AOL, Prodigy and others.

Zittrain is concerned that we are losing the future opportunity of the Internet. We are recreating the dynamic of the time share system, and loosing the generative features of the internet. The siren song of ease of use can lock in today's internet and forestall future advances. Even the multimedia free-for-all risks turning into one large Cable TV system, with predicable results and one-way communication. Zittrain shares his vision of how to develop new technologies and social structures that allow users to work creatively and collaboratively, participate in solutions, and to thus preserve generativity of the Internet.

When we look at the power grid today, we see ATT way before the breakup, perhaps even before the Carterphone ruling. Today's power grid is essentially closed to the wall outlet, and with walled garden communications to the meter, at best. You can use power with any technology you want, but no technology that generates, or stores, or converts energy is allowed to participate in the wider grid. All access to the energy networks is jealously guarded by the utilities and the utility commissions. The Carterphone lawsuit opened up the old phone network to new technologies such as answering machines and fax machines. We need a similar opening up of energy networks.

The challenge of interoperability, and standards, as we move into the era of energy technology, is if we can create a system for energy creation, distribution, and use that is generative. Solving the most pressing problems of our time, those of energy and its effluents, requires engaging the creative talents of as many as possible. No one knows what the innovations of tomorrow might be. We must learn from the lessons of other large networks and build something that is generative.

Get TFOTI and read it. Send a copy to your utility commissioner as well.

(Full Disclosure: In the mid eighties, I was coding for CitiNet, briefly the largest walled garden BBS in the Northeast. Last spring, I ran into fellow CitiNet alum and star salesman Myron Kassaraba; he was talking up his smart energy venture Outsmart Power Systems. I see former CEO/CTO Tom Considine at Christmas each year. I would love to hear from any of the rest of the gang ...)

Thomas Friedman and "The End of Green"

In a recent blog post titled "The End of Green", Thomas Friedman ponders whether the current troubles in the financial markets will end investments in sustainable technology, particularly in energy. In his conclusion, he writes:

What we are seeing in this crisis is the need for a whole new financial architecture-and people are recognizing that some problems are just too big to solve unless we approach them systematically. As it is with our economy, so it is with our ecosystem: we need a new system, and we are going to have to think things through very carefully and make some hard choices to get it right.

Although Friedman describes the risks and the opportunities better than anyone, in this point I think while his aim is true, his target selection is off. What we need is new market structures.

Many of the most eco-aware individuals are rightfully humble about are abilities to manage an ecosystem. Ecosystems are tough manage. We have bad results in managing them. We have a long record of unimagined and unforeseen interactions and consequences.

Human activities and more importantly the human innovations are just as tough to manage. Only rarely does direct government action lead to sustained innovation. Central control, whether by mandate or by target financial incentives, can only select winners. It can optimize an existing system at the cost of eliminating diversity; that's how we got the power grid we have today. New central systems for finance and will do little better. Central directives do no reward and sustain innovation; innovation is what we need most right now.

The current financial crisis come from three big picture issues. Direct interference with markets, a thumb on the scale to drive home ownership down the economic scale, increased borrowing amongst those that could not afford it and amongst those willing to game the new rules. Rent-seeking by regulation and lobbying created financial forces that were untouchable. Persistent deflationary policy drove investments seeking better return into the few areas with rising prices. These forces led to the whole arbitrage via derivatives and widespread financial exposure that we have been watching as it breaks up.

In a similar way, we have energy markets that are regulated achieve minimal risk for all and to protect current market participants. All innovations must come to market by way of the existing large utilities, and promise guaranteed results along the way. Even new technologies must promise 20 years warranties. Anything that threatens current market players must first come through utilities commission hearings or legislative mandate. This creates markets that are un-innovative, risk-adverse, and hostile to new entrants.

Two factors are critical to creating the era of E-Tech that Friedman envisions. We must have clean market structures that allow new players and new technologies to enter energy markets and succeed or fail. We must have the technical infrastructure in place to allow a much more heterogeneous market of generation, storage, conversion, recycling, and resale to develop.

Interoperability and the smart grid are at the heart of this new market design. Interoperability is necessary for consumers to swap technologies without rebuilding their entire infrastructure. High barriers to change stifle innovation. This interoperability must include interoperability with the people and business systems; without information behavior and process will not tolerate agile energy decisions. The smart grid is the core locus of interoperability, where changes in energy use and market prices in energy interact.

It's a problem of energy market rules, not financial systems.

SCADA Security, Building Systems, and First Response

The security of the "internet of Things" and the security of the wider internet are about to collide. The Systems that have been hidden or off line will be on-line. Embedded systems, building systems, power supply and distribution must all change their security model. Eggshell security, the hard shell on the outside and no internal security, will be torn apart not only by the Smart Grid, and all its participants and influencers, but by new models for energy interaction as microgrids, pocket generation, and on-site storage increase the number of participants.

It is hard enough to define security for systems that are always on, always connected, always in a web of trust. Federated Identity Management is difficult, but relatively well understood. Outsourcing of system operation, cannot outsource the location of these systems; cloud computing is still grounded in the physical locations of the systems in the building, and as part of the grid . Crises in power and building systems are often interrelated, and failure of one may cut off access to the federation of security providers.

In a system of systems, in which the systems are expected to respond best when the challenges are greatest and the actors are least known. The ventilation system for space holding hazardous materials must communicate its import and explain its mission precisely when the unknown fire fighter logs in and connections to other systems are lost. The microgrid generating enough power for net outflow must accept commands from a stranger precisely when and because the ice storm has ended outside network connectivity.

Take a theoretical mixed use neighborhood and its substation, filled with zero-net energy buildings (internal storage, generation, conversion of energy), its microgrid generation on the parking deck, its demand/response ready buildings, and its electric cars. Consider the linesman, properly, as yet another class of first responder. Is the power line up or down. Is the downstream connection hot or not? If my office is powering my house, who has the authority to interrupt the flow, and what is the liability for damage upstream? What does the firemen know about whether the self generating, power-storing building is on the grid or not?

We will need new architectures for building system security, ones that share information freely with emergency responders, but know which information is pertinent the enough SCADA, ones performant enough for power, but with federated security at each junction. We will need new definitions for security, ones that understand external identities and roles, but that also understand how to interact when the same event that compromised power integrity has cut off access to external identity and role providers.

We will need now architectures for SCADA, ones performant enough for power, but with federated security at each junction. We will need new definitions for security, ones that understand external identities and roles, but that also understand how to interact when the same event that compromised power integrity has cut off access to external identity and role providers.

We need ways to express the variety of security decisions that these interactions will require, ways that degrade gracefully with communications, and ways that can be pre-cached for almost-as-good decisions.

These security must be able to interact with local business systems. For the first responder, they must provide access to the right information and to the right control systems. They must have access to the local business agreements for the provision of power, and for the liabilities for non-performance. They must be able to distinguish between what is show by necessity, what can be shown for curiosity, and what will be shared only with a warrant.

Security is fundamentally a problem of situation awareness. The situation involve multiple systems and multiple contexts. It requires federated identity management across the multiple organizational participants that will fail gracefully to temporary local "good enough" security. It requires business policy aware forward-caching of decision making frameworks on a building by building basis.

Buildings, Emergency Response, and Situation Awareness

This week twenty of us met at NIST to discuss situation awareness during emergencies. The centerpiece of the conversation was the NG911 system, or Next Generation 911. NG911 supports better interaction between call centers, and uses policy-based security to let other local call centers, or even centers in other regions take calls as circumstances and policy require. Private call centers, run by alarm services, can be full peers if local policy allows. Even buildings, and building systems, might act as 911 operators. The conveners asked me to lead an effort to develop a security model for these systems.

Interoperability at this level requires standardization of security, of policy management, and even of building semantics. 911 centers will accept even the most basic calls, the narrative that includes the confused description of flames from a building from the confused homeless person without a proper address. Such calls require further guess work and human attention before they can be dispatched. Without standards, other calls are no better once they hit the system.

During a major disaster, the local 911 center may be swamped, or even destroyed. The communication lines to the 911 center may be cut off. When NG911 is deployed, calls to 911 can be automatically re-routed to nearby call centers, which will be able to dispatch calls to first responders just as does the local center. If the operator captures all information accurately, and the local policy permits, the NG911 can dispatch the call irrespective of the originating operator's location. Key elements include the type of emergency, the full address of the emergency, and the geo-location of the emergency.

Private alarm monitoring companies originate many 911 calls. Alarms go off, monitoring systems are checked, owners and tenants are contacted, and, if appropriate, 911 is called. If local policy allows it, this call can go directly from the Private alarm monitoring company's dispatch system into the NG911 network, perhaps even into automatic dispatch; no critical time would be lost in re-entering data. With proper standards, this extra information can be shared through the NG911 system.

Intelligent buildings, in concept, can initiate their own 911 calls. They have the advantage over the indigent of knowing their own address and geo-location. They may know what type of emergency is underway, and where in the building the problem occurred. With standards, they can supply the supporting detail very well; they may have to strain to provide the basic narrative.

911 centers want to be able to call back the initiator, to get more detail. Buildings do not always answer the phone. Call operators could access the building systems directly, but only if the information is made more useful and accessible than we find in the typical building control system. The requirements for creating those semantic standards are similar to those needed for transactive energy management. These standards will rely on descriptive information found in building information models (BIMs) such as NBIMS and buildingSmart.

We want standards for whoever comes to the site wants the same sort of access. This access may be a simple as floor plans or intimate as access to video surveillance. The responder may want to understand what the building systems are telling him and use them to clear smoke from the 4th floor or to shut off additional air. The responder may want to find where hazardous material is stored, or even the last known location of building occupants. Making this information and control simple and easy to access, no matter what brand of system in the building, will require abstraction, standards, and service oriented architectures in the building.

These interactions require careful service definitions, security interactions, and policy. In normal times, the building owner cannot accept passers-by able to see and interact within the building. Access to the video surveillance network for the third floor during an incident does not warrant access on other floors or to archives from the day before.

Good security is always about situation awareness. In an emergency, the situation awareness of the emergency includes awareness of its context within the building, and awareness of the informational context of the building. Awareness of the person accessing these systems will include federated identity management, as it might include the 911 operator, the local police, and even the fire department from the next town over.

I am heading up a group tasked by NIST with defining a security framework for this context in January. We have a good group working on this, but this type of work needs many different perspectives. Drop me a line, or comment here, and let me know what you think.