Saint Paul, MN. The 2024 Regional Risk Assessment published today by Midwest Reliability Organization (MRO) identifies the eight highest reliability and security risks to which the region is susceptible. One of these eight risks—Uncertain Energy Availability—was elevated to an extreme priority. This is the first extreme priority risk in the assessment’s history. Seven other risks fell into the high priority category.
Of the 15 risks assessed, the following 8 rise to the top as most likely and impactful within MRO’s footprint:
- Uncertain Energy Availability
- Generation Unavailability During Extreme Cold Weather
- Supply Chain Compromise
- Inadequate Inverter-based Resource and Distributed Energy Resource Performance and Modeling
- Material and Equipment Availability
- Physical Attacks
- Malicious Insider Threat
- Loss of Essential Reliability Services
The Regional Risk Assessment is published each year as part of MRO’s ongoing efforts to inform industry leaders and other key decision makers of the greatest risks to reliability and security of the regional power grid. The 2024 report finds that extreme cold weather, increasing consumer demand, early retirements of relied-upon resources, and increasing threat of cyber and physical attack continue to challenge grid planners and operators.
“The risks highlighted in this report provide valuable insight to the challenges the industry faces and the policies and regulations that will help define a variety of proposed solutions,” said senior vice president and chief operating officer Richard Burt. “This report and others published by the ERO Enterprise underscore the need for multiple stakeholders to work together in a coordinated and collaborative fashion towards the common goal of a reliable and secure power grid.”
The above risks will be primary focus areas for MRO’s activities throughout 2024 as the organization works to increase awareness and help industry participants develop or improve mitigating controls.
Read more in the 2024 Regional Risk Assessment │ Infographic │ Video
###
Midwest Reliability Organization (MRO) is a non-profit organization dedicated to ensuring the reliability and security of the bulk power system in the central region of North America, including parts of both the United States and Canada. MRO is one of six regional entities in North America operating under authority from regulators in the United States through a delegation agreement with the North American Electric Reliability Corporation (NERC) and in Canada under similar arrangements. The primary focus of MRO is developing and ensuring compliance with reliability standards and assessing the grid’s ability to meet the demands for electricity.