Are You Looking for Authenticated Encrypted Time Signals?

GPS-based time signals could be less robust and reliable - this has been discussed in various forums. Electric power systems rely on time synchronization you can trust.

In a new US DOE project (TASQC - Timing Authentication Secured by Quantum Correlations) experts are planning to develop authenticated encrypted time signals that mitigate known vulnerabilities in GPS-based time. The project aims to:

• Develop and demonstrate a secure time distribution system using quantum-correlated signals over geographically wide area;
• Develop and demonstrate protocols for time-stamp authentication for data reported from power systems;
• Expand capability of the developed infrastructure for secure authentication of broadcast messages;
• Evaluate the system for cyber- and physical-vulnerabilities;
• Partner with industry to develop timing requirements for power systems and to refine design of system and protocols.

Phil Evans, Ph.D., TASQC Principle Investigator, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, respectfully requests your assistance for the TASQC project by both answering the questions in a brief survey, and distributing it amongst your colleagues in the electric power industry.

Discrepancy in GPS Timing of 13 Microseconds

Power Delivery systems rely to some degree on Time Synchronization based on global positioning system (GPS).

A time spike in the global positioning system which rippled through the world on January 28, 2016 was caused by a satellite launched in 1990 failing and triggering a software bug!

Although the timing anomaly measured just microseconds, it could have caused significant navigation errors, Richard Easther, head of the University of Auckland's physics department said.
"The rule of thumb is that for every nanosecond of error, you could be out by as much as a foot," Easther said.

"An error of 13 microseconds or 13,000 nanoseconds works out as just under four kilometres."

What would that error mean for Sampled Values? The 13 microseconds are equivalent  to a difference in the angle of 0.234 degrees in a 50 Hz AC system. This seems not to be very critical. But who knows what happens next.

Be aware that our future power system will rely more and more on GPS or other central time sources. So, the power infrastructure does rely on the GPS (or other means) - which by nature does on the power infrastructure. Everything seems to be highly interconnected.

GPS Time Synchronization - A Single Point of Failure?

The GPS time synchronization is one of the crucial underlying solutions for time synchronization in power system information sharing: in substations, between substation, and wide area applications (with or without applying IEC 61850).

A paper published by SEL discusses the issue of GPS time synchronization - and especially when it may become a single point of failure in a power system.

Click HERE for a paper that discusses the issue.