5.7. ERMUSR 03-13-2013 - Laserfiche WebLink

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were excluded from the EQR filing requirements because a member of the White House cyber security staff to address they fall under the wholesale-sales-only threshold.APPA also the January 2013 APPA Joint Action Workshop.APPA staff succeeded in helping to ensure that joint action agencies' was also pivotal in NERC's decision to open up access to sales to its members generally would not have to be reported NERC's voluntary Electricity Sector Information Sharing and in EQRs,even if the joint action agency does have to report Analysis Center(ES-ISAC)to small APPA utility members that wholesale sales.These exclusions will save APPA members are not subject to NERC reliability standards,helped staff many hours in personnel time that would otherwise have APPA member participation in the NERC Electricity Sector been dedicated to completing these reports. Coordinating Council,and served as vice chair of the NERC Critical Infrastructure Protection Committee.APPA Policy Reliability standards and cyber security-APPA policy analysis Department staff worked with the Education Department to staff led the North American Electric Reliability Corp. (NERC) develop and deliver a popular series of webinars for members Standards Committee initiative to develop and gain industry on reliability standards,compliance,cyber security and approval for revisions to the NERC Standards Process performance tracking issues throughout 2012. Manual.These changes should make NERC's reliability standards development process more efficient and timely, AF'PA ccoin�rlis 1meets while preserving NERC's industry-consensus-based standard- g,*, h setting model.APPA policy analysis staff,in conjunction s with member volunteers,played pivotal roles in NERC's completion of nine standards projects in 2012,including FERC approval of its first results-based reliability standard (FAC-003,Vegetation Management). At APPA staff and industry behest, NERC management in Li 444i ‘)(1\ICC' 2012 agreed to work with the industry trade associations and the regions on a complete reform of its compliance i >i and enforcement program, called the"Reliability Assurance Initiative." NERC has also agreed to move ahead on the • \, „ next phase of NERC's Find, Fix and Track(FFT)proposal, k* to Find,Fix and Record violations within the utility,without concurrent reporting to NERC of such items as potential APPA devotes considerable staff resources to electric utility violations. In 2012, Find, Fix and Track procedures reduced operations,from genera on trough utility metering.APPAs engineering services staff half the number of NERC violations that lead to full FERC ff represents public power utilities to enforcement filings. APPA staff have become a key trade federal regulatory agencies,such as the Department of Energy, association contact point with NERC staff for the reliability Department of Homeland Security, Department of Labor, assurance and FFT ni atives. Occupational Safety and Health Administration, National Institute of Standards and Technology,and others.APPAs The NERC Board of Trustees also adopted in 2012 Version Reliable Public Power Provider(RP3)program continues to 5 critical infrastructure protection standards that use bright grow and extend its reach throughout the United States. A line criteria to tailor cyber security controls to the risks few of the 2012 developments in these areas include: and vulnerabilities posed by various types of bulk electric system assets.APPA policy analysis staff worked with Reliability members and the NERC-appointed industry drafting team • Represented public power interests at the IEEE to ensure that this NIST-based framework for cyber security Distribution Reliability Working Group and provided standards substantially reduces or eliminates the regulatory comments on the IEEE 1782 "Guide for Collecting, burden on small public power utilities that are subject to Categorizing and Utilization of Information Related to other NERC standards,by either excluding them entirely Electric Power Distribution Interruption Events"and IEEE from CIP Version 5 or emphasizing the development of 1366"Guide for Electric Power Distribution Reliability organizational capabilities to address cyber security threats. Indices." The CIP standards also incorporate requirements that shift the • Released APPAs biennial Distribution System Reliability emphasis from forcing registered entities to document"zero and Operations Survey report. defect" performance since their last audit to the development • Launched eReliability Tracker service to help public power and implementation of internal programs designed to identify, utilities better collect,categorize and analyze outage data. assess,and correct deficiencies on a forward-looking basis. • Provided public power review and comment for Lawrence NERC staff is working to complete the regulatory filing of the Berkeley National Labs paper"Examination of Temporal OP Version 5 standards with FERC for approval in 2013. Trends in Electricity Reliability Based on Reports from U.S. APPA staff worked closely with the Department of Energy to Electric Utilities." • complete and publicize DOE's Electricity Sector Cybersecurity Participated in NERC's Spare Equipment Database that Capability Maturity Model(C2M2),including arranging for began operation in 2012. •