National grid exercise simulates wildfires, ice storms and sabotage
GridEx VIII puts GRE to the test

Practice makes perfect. That was the mantra last month at Great River Energy as the two-day GridEx VIII crisis
exercise simulated several emergencies, including a substation fire, cybersecurity breach, wildfire, winter storm
and widespread power outage.
GridEx, the electricity industry’s largest cyber and physical security exercise, is hosted every two years by the
Electricity Information Sharing and Analysis Center (E-ISAC). It provides industry and government partners the
opportunity to practice in real time how they would respond to — and recover from — coordinated security threats
to the grid.
The crisis exercise began with a simulated act of vandalism quickly followed by reports of a wildfire threatening
transmission corridors.
Meanwhile, IT responders were busy reacting to a simulated cloud provider outage and a coordinated
cyberattack that coursed through the cooperative’s network infrastructure.
Throughout the two-day exercise, a team of crisis commanders held regular calls with liaison teams representing
various areas of the company, from cyber and physical security to finance and human resources, to foster
collaboration and communication.
As the crisis exercise grew and evolved, teams across GRE acted quickly to determine the most prudent
solutions to handle the simulated events. The cooperative’s security operations center also remained engaged

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to coordinate responses by employees and local authorities.
According to E-ISAC, participation in the 2025 exercise increased by 48% from the last time it was held in
2023, with more than 370 organizations simultaneously running through their emergency preparedness plans and
protocols.
The national exercise concluded with a tabletop session that brought together industry and government
executives to focus on strategic and policy-level issues raised during the event. A public report on GridEx VIII
will be released by E-ISAC in the first quarter of 2026.
“The crisis exercise reached just about every corner of the company and tested several business-critical
response plans. It was remarkable to watch everyone jump to action to protect our system and serve our memberowners.”
…Walt Ullrich, control center support supervising manager who led the team tasked with creating and facilitating the crisis
exercise at GRE.