CISA Resilient Power Working Group

The Cybersecurity and Infrastructure Security (CISA)-led Resilient Power Working Group (RPWG) consists of members across the federal government, state and local governments, non-profits, and private industry. There are over 200 members or ex-members including over 80 active participants with over 50 different entities involved. The RPWG is a well-balanced group that includes contributions from technical (both hands-on and theoretical), operational, and policy subject matter experts.

The Resilient Power Best Practices for Critical Facilities and Sites supports emergency and continuity managers with guidelines, analysis, background material, and references to increase the resilience of backup and emergency power systems during all durations of power outages. Improving power resilience can help the nation reduce risks to, and strengthen resilience of, America’s critical infrastructure. The scope includes:

• Power resilience requirements and mitigation levels.
• Emergency and backup power generation, including clean energy systems.
• Facility/site operations and maintenance, including fuel maintenance, fuel delivery, and telecommunications.
• Power transfer systems, battery storage systems, and microgrids.
• Cybersecurity, physical security, and electromagnetic (EM) security.

The Resilient Power Best Practices Fact Sheet summarizes key recommendations developed by the RPWG to improve resilient power for critical infrastructure. The Resilient Power Assessment Worksheet improves critical infrastructure owners and operators (excluding electrical and natural gas utility companies) ability to collect the necessary data to better analyze their facility’s or site’s resilient power. The Ten Steps of Resilient Power document consists of process-oriented guidelines to help implement the Resilient Power Best Practices using the Resilient Power Assessment Worksheet.

The RPWG was established in October 2019 consisting of subject matter experts from across federal government, state and local governments, non-profits, and private industry sectors. The above CISA documents help meet CISA's 2023-2025 Strategic Plan's Goal 2 to "Reduce Risks to, and Strengthen Resilience of, America's Critical Infrastructure". Further, the collection of documents support the comprehensive, risk-informed Business Continuity and Continuity of Operations (COOP) planning activities as defined in the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) guidance.