Cybersecurity, Reliability & CIP

“Evergy’s strategic tenets are affordability, reliability, and sustainability. If you ever put too much emphasis on one of those tenets at the expense of the others, you’ll get out of balance and run into trouble. Out of balance inevitably creates issues with key constituents.”

“All these resources coming on have a lower accredited capacity than traditional resources. You have to make sure you’re meeting that supply-demand balance in an already tight market. That’s what we’re focused on. We’re also focused on getting more transmission built.”

“To mitigate these risks, utilities must identify, prioritize, and protect key systems and networks by upgrading legacy infrastructure and segmenting networks to reduce the spread of cyber threats.”

Navigating Reliability, Affordability, and Decarbonization: “Like the three legs of a stool, affordability, reliability and decarbonization must each be supported to maintain a stable and forward-looking energy system. At Central Hudson, we’re especially focused on affordability for our customers who are feeling the brunt of the rising cost of living.”

“By clearly distinguishing energy efficiency from electrification and adopting comprehensive strategies informed by full-fuel-cycle data, policymakers can ensure practical, realistic, and effective progress toward achieving shared climate goals.”

Extreme weather events can devastate utility infrastructure. This panel on Weathering the Storm (Resilience and Extreme Weather) discussed resilient, cost-effective strategies for safeguarding energy systems while exploring critical questions on responsibility and costs in the face of extreme weather.

“At an enterprise level, what every utility should do is create a risk profile for these facilities. Not every substation is built the same, and they all face different challenges.”

“In an EY Industrials & Energy Brand Survey from October 2024, 45% of responding executives expected to invest a high amount in sustainability and ESG consulting and reporting over the next 12 to 18 months, compared with 32% among all respondents across sectors.”

“While nearly all organizations now use the cloud, today’s regulated utilities are not able to maximize the use of these technologies due to the lack of clarity within the NERC CIP standards and NERC’s Rules of Procedure.”