Wisconsin's Largest Utilities Say They're Prepared to Respond to Possible Physical Attacks

Sunday, December 11th, 2022 -- 8:01 AM

(By Danielle Kaeding, Wisconsin Public Radio) Some of the state’s largest utilities say they’re prepared to respond to physical attacks on their facilities after a recent incident in North Carolina where substations were hit by gunfire, leaving thousands without power.

According to Danielle Kaeding with Wisconsin Public Radio, a targeted shooting at two Duke Energy substations by one or more people damaged equipment and left more than 45,000 customers without power on Saturday.

Thousands remained without power until the company repaired damaged equipment and gradually restored power Wednesday. Federal authorities have warned the power grid is a target for domestic extremists who have been developing "credible, specific plans" to attack infrastructure since at least 2020, according to the Associated Press.

In February, Oshkosh resident Jackson Matthew Sawall pled guilty to conspiring to provide material support to terrorists after plotting to attack the U.S. power grid. According to a plea agreement, Sawall planned to attack a Midwest substation using powerful rifles to penetrate transformers.

He and his co-conspirators said they were willing to die in the scheme. We Energies serves more than 1.1 million electric customers in Wisconsin. Brendan Conway, the utility’s spokesperson, said it focuses extensively on the security of critical infrastructure whether it involves a physical or cyberattack.

"We've actually done training pretty regularly on similar scenarios to what happened in North Carolina," Conway said. "Obviously, we're going to invest a lot of time and efforts to make sure we can prevent those attacks. But, if they were to happen, we also spend a lot of time planning and preparing to make sure we can respond as quickly and safely as possible."

He said they hold trainings at least twice a year on such scenarios. The utility also takes part in GridEx, which is the largest grid security exercise in North America. The North American Electric Reliability Corporation hosts the exercise every two years to practice response to physical security incidents.

Conway said the utility also incorporates security measures that include high, barbed-wire fencing and 24-hour monitoring of substations or power plants while working with local, state and federal law enforcement.

While every scenario is different, Conway said the utility would draw from experience repairing equipment damaged by storms. Fallen trees and equipment failures accounted for the largest share, 61 percent, of outages in Wisconsin from 2020 to 2021, according to the Public Service Commission.

Damage from the public made up 13 percent, but it's unclear whether those acts were intentional. Utilities have upgraded aging equipment and placed more infrastructure underground to reduce the risk of outages.

Burying critical transmission lines is one method to make the grid less vulnerable, according to Vicki Bier, an energy expert and professor emerita in industrial engineering at the University of Wisconsin-Madison.

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