Securing America's Energy Infrastructure/Addressing Cyber and Physical Threats to the Grid: U.S. House Energy and Commerce Committee Hearing

The Subcommittee on Energy of the United States House of Representatives Energy and Commerce Committee held a December 2nd hearing titled:

Securing America’s Energy Infrastructure: Addressing Cyber and Physical Threats to the Grid (“Hearing”).

The focus of the Hearing is described as reviewing:

… how electric utilities and other energy entities, in coordination with the federal government, prepare and respond to cyber and physical threats to the electric grid, as well as threats to other critical energy infrastructure.

Specific issues addressed at the Hearing included:

• What are the challenges to addressing cyber and physical security threats in U.S. energy infrastructure, including the electric grid, pipelines, and gas facilities;
• What is necessary for effective utility-government collaboration on cyber and physical threats to energy infrastructure;
• What are the challenges with addressing cyber and physical threats for nonprofit, municipal and rural utilities;
• What is DOE’s role as the Sector Risk Management Agency;
• What are FERC and NERC’s role in addressing cyber and physical risks; and,
• What are the emerging cyber risks with respect to AI and load growth?

The Hearing’s witnesses included:

• Michael Ball, CEO of the Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center and Senior Vice President, North American Electric Reliability Corporation.
• Sharla Artz, Security and Resilience Policy Area Vice President at Xcel Energy, on behalf of Edison Electric Institute.
• Tim Lindahl, President & CEO of Kenergy, on behalf of National Rural Electric Cooperative Association (NRECA).
• Zach Tudor, Associate Laboratory Director, National & Homeland Security, Idaho National Laboratory.
• Harry Krejsa, Director of Studies for the Carnegie Mellon Institute for Strategy & Technology.

A copy of the Majority Staff Memorandum and a link to the witnesses’ written testimonies can be found here.