Cybersecurity vulnerabilities in solar energy methods pose potential dangers to grid safety, stability and availability, in response to a brand new examine

The SUN:DOWN analysis – carried out by Forescout Analysis, a specialist in cybersecurity – investigated completely different implementations of solar energy era. “Our findings present an insecure ecosystem — with harmful vitality and nationwide safety implications,” says the group’s weblog, which presents these extra regarding ramifications because the potential influence of a coordinated assault towards giant numbers of methods.

The report critiques identified points and presents new vulnerabilities with methods supplied by three main solar energy system producers: Sungrow, Growatt, and SMA. It presents seemingly life like power-grid-attack eventualities with the potential to trigger emergencies or blackouts. It additionally advises on danger mitigation for homeowners of sensible inverters, utilities, machine producers, and regulators.

Forescout Analysis summarises its major findings as follows:

• We cataloged 93 earlier vulnerabilities on solar energy and analyzed developments:
  Because of rising considerations over the dominance of foreign-made solar energy parts, we analyzed their widespread nations of origin:
  • There’s a mean of over 10 new vulnerabilities disclosed per yr up to now three years
  • 80% of these have a excessive or important severity
  • 32% have a CVSS rating of 9.8 or 10 which typically means an attacker can take full management of an affected system
  • Probably the most affected parts are photo voltaic displays (38%) and cloud backends (25%). Comparatively few vulnerabilities (15%) have an effect on photo voltaic inverters straight
• New vulnerabilities:
  • 53% of photo voltaic inverter producers are primarily based in China
  • 58% of storage system and 20% of the monitoring system producers are in China
  • The second and third commonest nations of origin for parts are India and the US
• New vulnerabilities:
  • We analyzed six of the highest 10 distributors of solar energy methods worldwide: Huawei, Sungrow, Ginlong Solis, Growatt, GoodWe, and SMA
  • We discovered 46 new vulnerabilities affecting completely different parts in three distributors: Sungrow, Growatt and SMA.
  • These vulnerabilities allow eventualities that influence grid stability and person privateness
  • Some vulnerabilities additionally permit attackers to hijack different sensible units in customers’ houses

Whereas the brand new vulnerabilities have now been rectified by the distributors in query, Forescout stated they may permit attackers to take full management of a fleet of solar energy inverters through a few eventualities. For instance, by acquiring account usernames, resetting passwords to hijack the respective accounts, and utilizing the hijacked accounts.

Attackers can then intervene with energy output settings, or swap them on and off on the behest of a botnet. “The mixed impact of the hijacked inverters produces a big impact on energy era in a grid,” says the weblog. “The influence of this impact will depend on that grid’s emergency era capability and how briskly that may be activated.”

The report discusses the instance of the European grid. Earlier analysis confirmed that management over 4.5GW can be required to deliver the frequency all the way down to 49Hz — which mandates load shedding. Since present photo voltaic capability in Europe is round 270GW, it will require attackers to regulate lower than 2% of inverters in a market that’s dominated by Huawei, Sungrow, and SMA.

The group offers quite a lot of suggestions. For instance, to deal with PV inverters in residential, business, and industrial installations as important infrastructure. This is able to imply following (within the US) NIST pointers for cybersecurity with parts like sensible inverters in residential and business installations

House owners of economic and industrial photo voltaic installations ought to think about safety throughout procurement, and conduct a danger evaluation when organising units. Different suggestions are outlined within the weblog and full report.

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Ontario’s love affair with hydrogen was all the time going to be an costly fling. However now it’s turning right into a full-blown marriage—regardless of all of the warning indicators from older, wiser jurisdictions which have already filed for divorce. The province is doubling the Hydrogen Innovation Fund to $30 million, a tidy sum that would in any other case purchase a fleet of electrical buses, improve grid infrastructure, or—heaven forbid—really cut back emissions within the subsequent 5 years. As an alternative, Ontario’s taxpayers, by way of the Doug Ford Conservative authorities, are throwing cash at a hydrogen dream that’s already wheezing its final breath in locations like Norway and Australia, each of which have been miles forward into the hydrogen for vitality useless finish and at the moment are backing slowly out, with wallets lighter and eyebrows completely raised.

Let’s rewind the tape. Ontario’s hydrogen flirtation formally started in 2022, when the federal government launched its Low-Carbon Hydrogen Technique, proclaiming the province can be a “North American chief” in hydrogen manufacturing, storage, and end-use. The doc was a masterclass in aspirational fluff—brimming with bold targets, imprecise frameworks, and a parade of buzzwords about innovation and vitality independence. It was a political press launch dressed up as coverage, with subsequent to no critical techno-economic modeling behind it. The assumptions embedded within the technique bordered on magical considering: that inexperienced hydrogen prices would quickly decline, that hydrogen would turn out to be a aggressive gasoline for heating and transport, and that Ontario would be capable of export surplus hydrogen regardless of no infrastructure or demand.

One of many evident failures of the technique was its remedy of hydrogen as a Swiss Military knife of decarbonization. Quite than focusing on the handful of hard-to-abate industrial sectors the place hydrogen may make financial and technical sense—reminiscent of metal or fertilizer—the technique proposed mixing hydrogen into pure gasoline grids for heating, utilizing it in long-haul trucking, and even injecting it into gasoline generators for electrical energy era. Every of those use instances has been studied to demise by critical analysts globally, and the consensus is evident: hydrogen is woefully inefficient for many of them. Burning hydrogen for warmth wastes electrical energy. Utilizing it in transport competes poorly with batteries. And injecting it into pure gasoline techniques creates new security, supplies compatibility, and emissions challenges. These weren’t simply harmless oversights. They have been coverage selections made in full view of a long time of scientific literature and up to date worldwide expertise.

What’s worse is what number of stakeholders appeared the opposite manner—or actively enabled the fantasy. Enbridge, Canada’s pure gasoline and pipeline behemoth, was a vocal supporter of mixing hydrogen into distribution networks, which conveniently extends the lifespan of its belongings and enterprise mannequin. The utility business at giant had each purpose to play alongside: hydrogen mixing meant continued justification for capital expenditures, rate-base development, and infrastructure safety in a world slowly transferring towards electrification. In the meantime, native producers and development companies nodded enthusiastically at pilot challenge funding, even when not one of the tasks had viable long-term economics. The schools and analysis establishments, a lot of which depend on provincial funding and partnerships, stayed largely silent somewhat than elevating technical crimson flags. This wasn’t only a failure of coverage design—it was a systemic failure of governance and institutional accountability.

Then got here the Niagara Falls pilot, essentially the most tangible product of the 2022 technique—a 20 MW electrolyzer beneath growth subsequent to the Sir Adam Beck hydroelectric plant. In idea, it might use clear electrical energy to make inexperienced hydrogen. In observe, it uncovered simply how unmoored the technique was from fundamental logistical and business realities. There was no close by industrial buyer for the hydrogen. There was no pipeline. There was no refueling infrastructure. So, the plan turned to truck the hydrogen—at nice expense and emissions—over 150 kilometers to Halton Hills to be burned in a pure gasoline peaker plant. That’s taking zero-carbon electrical energy, changing it right into a leaky, hard-to-handle gasoline at 70% effectivity, trucking it utilizing diesel semis, then burning it in a mixed cycle plant at 55% effectivity. Finest case state of affairs, you get again 30% of your authentic vitality—after spending a fortune. That’s not decarbonization. That’s a Rube Goldberg machine powered by taxpayer cash.

The Niagara pilot wasn’t an aberration—it was the logical consequence of a technique constructed on wishful considering and captured by vested pursuits. It prioritized bulletins over outcomes, ribbon-cuttings over rigorous evaluation. And now, as an alternative of reassessing, Ontario is doubling down—throwing good cash after dangerous, whereas the remainder of the world quietly backs away.

The doubling of the fund introduced in March 2025 is a baffling transfer, particularly contemplating the teachings pouring in from nations that sprinted down this highway years in the past. Norway, not precisely a local weather slouch, just lately restructured its complete industrial decarbonization technique to pivot away from hydrogen for vitality. Their extremely publicized hydrogen ferry—the MF Hydra—has been hit with provide points and rising prices and now will get hydrogen transported in diesel vehicles from 1,300 km away, and their goals of piping blue hydrogen from offshore fields to Germany have quietly evaporated within the chilly North Sea air. Norway has seen the sunshine: hydrogen is a boutique answer, not a cornerstone of vitality techniques.

Australia gives one other stark cautionary story. At one level, Canberra dreamed of turning the sun-drenched Outback right into a hydrogen export juggernaut, sending inexperienced molecules to Japan and South Korea. The advertising and marketing sizzle was actual. However then got here the receipts. The $750 million Port Pirie inexperienced hydrogen plant was shelved in early 2025, citing sky-high capital prices and no assured patrons. Across the similar time, Queensland’s flagship Central Hydrogen Challenge requested for a further billion {dollars} in authorities assist earlier than being axed altogether. Australia, as soon as the poster youngster for inexperienced hydrogen exports, is now specializing in home inexperienced business as an alternative—particularly inexperienced iron and ammonia, the place hydrogen use really is smart.

And right here’s the place Ontario’s technique actually begins to appear like a slow-motion automobile crash. Australia and Norway have been on the entrance of the hydrogen line and have now taken their losses and walked away. In the meantime, Ontario—by no means a worldwide chief in hydrogen tech—is simply getting warmed up. The province talks about defending jobs and sparking innovation, however $30 million might electrify plenty of faculty buses or construct megawatts of solar-plus-storage that really decrease payments and emissions. As an alternative, it’s being sprayed throughout pilot tasks with no clear off-take, no business scaling path, and no impartial lifecycle emissions accounting. Keep in mind, hydrogen leaks and has a GWP20 37 instances worse than carbon dioxide.

There’s additionally the inconvenient fiscal actuality. Electrolytic hydrogen from clear electrical energy clocks in at $5 to $9 per kilogram in Canada proper now when it’s performed in any respect, normally the excessive finish. That’s earlier than transport, storage, and conversion losses. Mixing it right into a gasoline turbine system for electrical energy era yields maybe 30–35% round-trip effectivity—much less if you happen to embrace trucking emissions and liquefaction losses. We’re burning $100 of electrical energy to get $30 of it again, simply so we are able to slap a inexperienced sticker on a gray downside. That’s not innovation. That’s thermodynamic malpractice.

The hydrogen foyer loves to border this as an funding sooner or later, however the true future—the fiscally accountable one—is already rising elsewhere. Direct electrification is cheaper. Warmth pumps are rolling out throughout Ontario houses. Battery-electric buses are slashing working prices for transit authorities. Grid modernization and demand response provide 5-to-1 payback ratios. Hydrogen, in distinction, continues to guzzle public cash with all of the grace of a Hummer in a downtown bike lane, at the least those that also exist after the Ford authorities, once more, determined to pay companies like Stantec to tear them up.

Ontario is selecting to disregard the teachings from nations that moved sooner and failed more durable. It’s romanticizing a molecule that is smart as an industrial feedstock for refining oil, ammonia manufacturing and possibly inexperienced steelmaking. Every thing else is a mirage—particularly long-distance exports and residential heating. This isn’t only a dangerous wager. It’s a failure to learn the room, the market, and the maths.

There’s nonetheless time for Ontario to again out of the cul-de-sac. However each million spent now on dead-end hydrogen pilots is one million not spent on scalable, shovel-ready, low-emissions options. The world has moved on. The province simply hasn’t checked the rear-view mirror—or the invoice.