[69192] in North American Network Operators' Group
Re: UPS and generator interaction?
daemon@ATHENA.MIT.EDU (Daniel Senie)
Mon Mar 29 15:09:31 2004
Date: Mon, 29 Mar 2004 15:08:39 -0500
To: dever@snoopy.net
From: Daniel Senie <dts@senie.com>
Cc: Mike Lewinski <mike@rockynet.com>,
"Brian (nanog-list)" <nanog@confluence.com>, nanog@merit.edu
In-Reply-To: <20040329194154.GA11875@snoopy.net>
Errors-To: owner-nanog-outgoing@merit.edu
At 02:41 PM 3/29/2004, Doug Dever wrote:
>Previously, Daniel Senie (dts@senie.com) wrote:
> > An additional note: some of the small to mid-sized propane/natural gas
> > units come as packaged systems with a generator and transfer switch. These
> > can be a good value and work well too. Do some shopping.
> >
>
>The obvious caveat being that natural gas is one of those fuel sources
>often cut by public safety officials depending on circumstances.
I keep sufficient propane on-site for a week of operation of my genset at
home. Certainly there are concerns with using street gas, but these can be
overcome.
Gas does have significant advantages over diesel in terms of fuel not
getting contaminated. For smaller sites especially, it makes a lot of sense.
Anyone approaching the question of getting a generator for a site needs to
weigh a lot of factors. What's right for your site might not be the same as
for someone else.
As for gas being cut by public safety, that can be a good thing. From what
I read, #7 WTC may well have stayed up had it not been for the diesel
stored there. If they'd been running from street gas, they'd have lost
power, but maybe not lost the building. Sometimes it's a good thing to be
able to interrupt the fuel source to a building that's on fire or
threatened by fire.