SCADA Management System SimulationUsingOPNET Modeler Software Simulator

Abstract

Supervisory Control and Data Acquisition (SCADA) systems are computer-based monitoring tools that are used to manage and control critical infrastructure functions in real-time, like gas utilities, power plants, chemical plants, traffic control systems, etc. A typical SCADA system consists of SCADA Master which provides overall monitoring and control for the system, local process controllers called Remote Terminal Units (RTUs), sensors and actuators and a network Which provides the communication between the Master and the RTUs. In a SCADA system it is essential to model and simulate communicationnetworks in order to study mission critical situations such as network failures or attacks. Even a simple SCADA system is composed of several units in various domains like dynamic systems, networks and physical environments, and each of these units can be modeled using variety of available simulators and/or emulators. An example System could include simulating controller and plant dynamics in Simulink or Matlab, network architecture and behavior in a network simulator like OMNeT++and OPNET etc. Inadequate simulation of such a system necessitates the use of an underlying software infrastructure that connects and relates the heterogeneous simulators in a logically and temporally coherent framework