In a document scheduled to post Friday on the Federal Register, the DOE said it is looking for information that will aid the agency in delivering its public report on AI, due within 180 days of the executive order’s issuance. The order called on the DOE’s report to detail the potential AI could have to “improve planning, permitting, investment, and operations for electric grid infrastructure and to enable the provision of clean, affordable, reliable, resilient, and secure electric power to all Americans.”

The request for information features a lengthy callout for responses on how AI can be used to “strengthen the nation’s resilience against climate change, including opportunities to help predict, prepare for, and mitigate climate-driven risk.”

The “non-exhaustive list of topics” it seeks comments on include the forecasting of extreme climate-driven events such as hurricanes and wildfires, projections on long-term climate impacts on resource levels, and how to improve and expedite numerical weather prediction models.

AI’s potential to “improve the security and reliability of grid infrastructure and operations and their resilience to disruptions” is another callout in DOE’s RFI, which welcomes contributions from private actors, public-private partnerships and all levels of government.

The DOE said it is interested specifically in how AI can improve grid reliability through predictive maintenance for utilities, more efficient load and supply balance, and better demand management for technologies like EV charging and smart devices, and improved flexibility of power systems models and related connected software. 

On the topic of grid resiliency, the DOE is interested in the effects of climate hazards on electricity infrastructure, climate mapping for resilience and adaptation outputs, and AI-enabled threat detection and “real-time self-healing infrastructure.” 

Finally, the DOE wants to know how AI can “improve planning, permitting, and investment in the grid and related clean energy infrastructure.” Leveraging the technology to expedite siting and permitting, improve project planning, validate and monitor current projects, and enhance the compatibility of datasets are among the uses of interest to the agency.

The DOE will solicit information for 30 days following Friday’s publication. Comments can be submitted electronically or mailed to the agency’s Washington, D.C. headquarters.  

The post DOE seeks information on AI uses for climate change mitigation, grid resilience appeared first on FedScoop.

The All-Hazards Energy Resilience funding opportunity will be managed by the DOE’s Office of Cybersecurity, Energy Security and Emergency Response, and a senior CESER official said in an interview with FedScoop that the agency is specifically interested in OT-related proposals that explore how one might produce a zero-trust architecture in an electrical or oil and natural gas environment.

“I think the cybersecurity community has come leaps and bounds in the last decade and a half,” the CESER official said. The OT side of the network will become “even more complex as we move to distributed energy kind of resource footprint. And those architectures modernize those capabilities to do cybersecurity and defend from those persistent threats [that] are a little bit more nascent in that kind of energy sector OT field.”

With awards of up to $5 million in funds, the DOE said it’s looking for universities, tribal nations, companies and others to provide solutions for technology meant to protect critical energy infrastructure from all threats, such as malicious cyber attacks and bad actors. 

The DOE’s release acknowledges that the “growing digital landscapes” put existing energy systems at risk for attacks. For example, two department entities were victims of a cyberattack that resulted from a vulnerability in MOVEit file transfer software.

“There are real risks to infrastructure; a lot of research in the world heretofore has been to prevent entry and detect it once it’s there,” the CESER senior official said. “Things are going to happen and when they do, you have to be able to operate your electrical or oil or natural gas infrastructure in a degraded mode, even potentially through that compromise.”

The official said that the research awards are “threat-informed” but could not comment on any specifically targeted infrastructure from bad actors. 

“The entry vectors into the sector are many,” the official said. “There are IT pathways where you’re coming in the IT front door, traversing the network and getting into the OT network. There are other kinds of pathways to enter the infrastructure, all of which are being considered in this funding opportunity announcement, but also in the broader portfolio of research we run in our office.”

The post Energy Department has cyber threats to infrastructure in mind with $70 million funding offer appeared first on FedScoop.

The update came just after DOE announced the creation of a new Office of Critical and Emergency Technology, which is set to focus on areas including AI and semiconductors. Helena Fu was named that office’s director, as well as the agency’s new chief AI officer. 

Energy also has a new responsible AI official: Bridget Carper, deputy chief information officer for architecture, engineering, technology, and innovation in the Office of the Chief Information Officer.

“DOE is committed to U.S. leadership in artificial intelligence, and the Department has a significant role to play. The recent growth in modern AI capabilities calls for a dedicated, cross-departmental effort on AI. Leveraging AI models in conjunction with other critical and emerging technologies, including biotechnology and quantum computing, will be transformative,” an agency spokesperson said in a statement to FedScoop.

They continued: “In October, President Biden, in his executive order on AI, directed DOE to create an office to coordinate the Department’s work on critical and emerging technologies, including AI. The work of the Artificial Intelligence and Technology Office will be absorbed into other areas of the Department, particularly the Office of Science and the Office of the Chief Information Officer.”

The post Energy Artificial Intelligence and Technology Office’s work transferred to other agency subgroups appeared first on FedScoop.

In a statement to this publication, Sol Oriens said it had appointed a technology forensics firm to investigate the incident, and that law enforcement agencies had been informed. The company became aware of the breach last month.

Sol Oriens is a New Mexico-headquartered consulting company that provides services to federal government agencies including program management, technology management, weapons R&D and product engineering.

“Upon detecting suspicious activity within our network environment, our IT professionals immediately secured the system and we quickly recovered priority company systems. 

 “The investigation is ongoing, but we recently determined that an unauthorized individual acquired certain documents from our systems. Those documents are currently under review, and we are working with a third-party technological forensic firm to determine the scope of potential data that may have been involved,” a spokesperson for the contractor said.

Sol Oriens added that to date it has no indication that the incident involves client classified or critical security-related information. The consultancy firm said also that it would notify affected individuals and entities once the forensic investigation into the cyberattack concludes.

A DOE spokesperson said: “The Department of Energy is aware of the cyberattack against Sol Oriens, a veteran-owned consulting firm whose clients include the Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration.

“There is no evidence that any DOE or NNSA data was compromised and there is no risk or impact to any government systems. We continue to stay in close communication with Sol Oriens,” the spokesperson added.

The NNSA helps to manage the safety of the U.S.’s nuclear stockpile and is a semi-autonomous agency within the DOE, according to its website. It works closely with the Department of Defense and national labs on nuclear safety and use, including nuclear propulsion in the Navy and the country’s emergency response to nuclear incidents.

Hackers have found a path of least resistance by targeting small subcontractors that often do not have the resources for extensive cybersecurity defenses. Last month hackers targeted USAID by compromising an account held with email marketing company Constant Contact.

The DOE has a cybersecurity test called the “Cybersecurity Capability Maturity Model (C2M2),” companies can voluntarily use to assess the security of their networks.

News of the Sol Oriens breach was first reported by CNBC last Friday.

The post Tech contractor for National Nuclear Security Administration says it is investigating systems hack appeared first on FedScoop.

In a report published on Wednesday, the Atlantic Council issued recommendations for maintaining the country’s leadership in science and technology, and for preserving the resilience of its physical and IT supply chains.

According to the study, which was conducted by the think tank’s Commission on the Geopolitical Impact of New Technology and Data, the federal government must support technological development across many separate spheres of society.

The Atlantic Council says federal government should offer greater support for technologies that underpin the growth of digital economies, as well as more support for innovation that enlarges the spaces where societies operate, such as sub-sea technology.

The Atlantic Council also recommends additional backing for the development of artificial intelligence.

“The sophisticated, but potentially fragile, data and tech systems that now connect people and nations mean we must incorporate resiliency as a necessary foundational pillar of modern life,” said David Bray, director of the Council’s Geotech Center.

“It is imperative that we promote strategic initiatives that employ data and tech to amplify the ingenuity of people, diversity of talent, strength of democratic values, innovation of companies, and reach of global partnerships,” added Bray, former CIO of the FCC.

The recommendations come after the Biden Administration in March published its interim national security strategic guidance, which identified cybersecurity as a “top priority,” and said it would strengthen the country’s capability, readiness and resilience in cyberspace.

According to the Atlantic Council, a revamped strategy is crucial for the country’s national and economic security, and it must also work to increase trust and confidence in the digital economy.

Federal government concerns over cybersecurity have come to the fore in recent weeks, amid a surge in ransomware attacks on private and public sector entities, including against the recent attack on the Colonial Pipeline.

The U.S. is also racing to build a new generation of supercomputers, supported by federal departments including the Department of Energy. It is hoped that exascale computing will have a key role to play in the future energy security of the country, by allowing more efficient management of the energy grid.

The think tank is also calling for wider federal oversight of supply chain assurance and said more must be done to harden the security of commercial space industry facilities and space assets. The latter recommendations follow a report by NASA’s oversight body earlier this month, which identified major cybersecurity weaknesses at the organization.

The Atlantic Council is an Atlanticist U.S. think tank focused on international affairs, which was founded in 1961.

The post Atlantic Council calls on U.S. gov to strengthen cyber strategy and accelerate quantum tech appeared first on FedScoop.

“Without investment, essentially we are going to stagnate scientific innovation,” said Georgia Tourassi, responding to lawmakers’ questions on Wednesday. “We will stop innovating not only across basic sciences but across applied sciences.”

Tourassi is director of the National Center for Computational Sciences at Oak Ridge National Laboratory, which is a multiprogram science and technology laboratory sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. The research leader testified at a subcommittee hearing of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology.

Oak Ridge is developing a new exascale computing system called Frontier, which is expected to be completed in October. It will compute eight times faster than the nation’s current most powerful supercomputer, Summit, which is also housed at the laboratory.

Congress has so far sought to fast-track development of exascale computing by appropriating $1 billion during fiscal 2021 to the Department of Energy’s Advanced Scientific Computing Research program, which is leading development of the Frontier exascale computing system. Exascale refers to a computing system that can perform at least one exaflop – or one quintillion (a billion-billion) calculations per second.

All told, the Department of Energy and the National Nuclear Security Administration within DOE have spent $460 million on their joint Exascale Computing Project to date. The hearing on Wednesday comes as the U.S. races to catch up with China in a supercomputing arms race.

“It is imperative for the United States to expand and enhance the national research computing ecosystem,” added Tourassi, giving evidence at the hearing. “The DOE has asked us to deliver Frontier one year earlier than planned, and we’re focusing our efforts on meeting that effort.”

Another exascale computing system will go to Argonne National Lab in 2022 and a third to Lawrence Livermore National Lab in 2023. But high-performance computing is also an investment priority for U.S. competitors China, Japan and the European Union.

Commenting on the U.S.’s development of supercomputing capabilities, Rep. Frank Lucas, R-Okla., the ranking member of the House Science Committee, said: “We know that our international competitors, like China, are outpacing us in basic research investment and are closing the gap in key computing focus areas like artificial intelligence and quantum sciences.

“Expanding our capacities in these fields requires a strategic effort with strong federal investment and active public-private partnerships,” he added.

Lucas is involved in crafting the Securing American Leadership in Science and Technology (SALSTA) Act that would roughly double ASCR’s funding over the next 10 years.

Lawmakers are also considering the Quantum User Expansion for Science and Technology (QUEST) Act, which would establish a DOE program for forming public-private partnerships around resource use and encourage increased participation in quantum information science.

The post Oak Ridge lab leader says further investment key to U.S. leadership in supercomputing appeared first on FedScoop.