An Optimal Scheme for Installation of PMUs and IEDs to Reinforce Electricity Market Immunity Against Data Attacks in Smart Grid

Abstract

An intruder can disrupt the electricity market operation by injecting malicious data into the sensor measurements to induce profit/loss to a utility/consumer. Robustness in the electricity market operation against false data injection attacks (FDIAs) can be achieved by optimal deployment of phasor measurement units (PMUs) and intelligent electronic devices (IEDs). The nonlinear relationship between sensor measurements, state variables, and nodal electricity price, along with the financial constraints associated with deploying high-cost measurement devices, increases the complexity of solving the FDIA resilient sensor placement task. The solution demands a tradeoff between the financial implications of installing PMUs/IEDs and the nodal price deviation during FDIA. To overcome the above challenges, the task of identifying strategic sensor locations has been formulated as a binary optimization problem. The solution of the problem derived using binary Harris hawks optimization identifies the most vulnerable bus/branch measurements with regard to nodal price deviation due to FDIA. To generalize the applicability of the proposed scheme, the formulation has been carried out while considering the realistic constraints related to PMU channel limitations and the location of the zero injection bus. The effectiveness of the proposed work has been validated for benchmark test systems against different degrees of FDIAs.