The SCADA Gold Standard at a Coastal Connecticut Utility

The Town of Greenwich Department of Public Works (the “Town”) has been working closely with CDM Smith’s automation experts since 2014 to keep Grass Island WWTP’s SCADA system operating ahead of the curve. Matt Lick CDM Smith's discipline leader for operational technology & cybersecurity, drove the system’s upgrades forward to modernize operations with enhanced cyber­se­cu­rity measures. 

The initial upgrade started with a Master Plan in 2014 to evaluate the legacy Distributed Control System (DCS) as components were becoming obsolete and difficult to obtain. The Master Plan led to a design for a new state-of the-art SCADA system and instal­la­tion was completed in 2018. The initial upgrade to the system was completed in 2018 after the automation team tran­si­tioned the WWTP from the legacy DCS to the new SCADA system. Though the legacy system had aged, the transition was relatively seamless, which Matt attributes to how robust the new SCADA system was, along with a detailed maintenance of plant operations (MOPO) plan that was developed in collab­o­ra­tion with Town staff during design, and they refined and executed diligently by the team during construc­tion. Additional docu­men­ta­tion was provided to support the new SCADA system to assist the Town with future maintenance, system expansions and trou­bleshoot­ing which included a SCADA standards handbook and the development of plantwide Process and Instru­men­ta­tion Diagrams (P&IDs).

Overall, the upgrade encompassed a few different elements that have set a new standard in automation for the town’s wastewater infra­struc­ture.

A well-supported system with flexibility

“The flexibility this new system provides is significant,” Lick said. Before, the plant was operating on a proprietary system that came with limited support from the original vendor, at a high cost. The modern system is vendor-agnostic, which allows the town to seek technical support from different service providers if needed. “This is a cost-saving feature. They don’t have to be locked in to a high-cost contract—that they might not even use—with potentially slow response,” he added. “Our team wanted to make sure the Town always had an open archi­tec­ture solution that was not tied to any one vendor to keep things operating smoothly.” 

Bolstering cyber­se­cu­rity measures

One of the most critical pieces of ongoing support was strength­en­ing cyber­se­cu­rity measures. Matt’s team assisted with imple­ment­ing security controls needed for the Town to secure proper cyber­se­cu­rity insurance and even installed a new cyber­se­cu­rity appliance to further protect the network. “The wastewater industry, like other sectors of critical infra­struc­ture, is unfor­tu­nately a prime target for cyber­at­tacks. If one part of the plant’s operations became compromised, it could severely impact its ability to function properly and support the Town’s needs,” Lick explained.

Cyber­se­cu­rity measures included multi-factor authen­ti­ca­tion to ensure only authorized personnel could access the system, similar to the security protocols used in online banking where users receive a text with a code for login. Another significant addition to the system was a device designed to contin­u­ously monitor the network, which detects any anomalies in traffic and flags the team if unau­tho­rized devices try to connect. “It’s a static system so if we get a new device trying to connect, it’s a major concern,” Lick said. To bolster security even more, the team implemented a demil­i­ta­rized zone (DMZ) between the plant’s control network and the Internet. Even trusted services like antivirus updates and multi-factor authen­ti­ca­tion are handled through a secure inter­me­di­ary server to prevent critical systems from being accessed from outside networks.