Home / 2018 / May / Campus electrical service

Planned Power Outage -- Saturday, May 26

To: UC Santa Cruz Community

From: Mike Hanson, Interim Director, Physical Plant

May 18, 2018

PG&E will be replacing a power pole from 8 a.m. to 5 p.m. on Saturday, May 26. This will result in a significant disruption to campus electrical service.

Additionally, the Communications Building will be impacted, but may be supplied with power from the cogeneration plant, if there’s enough capacity.

An updated list is below.


Buildings that will be affected

  • 9/10 Apartments (Generator Gs 31)

  • 9/10 Dining (Partial Generator Gs 31)

  • Arc Center (No Generator)

  • Art Complex (No Generator)

  • Baskin Visual Arts (No Generator)

  • Biomedical Sciences

  • Bookstore (Generator Gs 33)

  • Camper Park (No Generator)

  • Cell Tower (Customer Supplied Generator)

  • Chadwick Garden (Manual Transfer Switch)

  • Classroom Unit 1 (Generator Gs 20)

  • College 10 Academic (Soc. Sci. 2) (Generator College 9/10 (Partial Generator Gs 31)

  • College 9 Academic (Soc. Sci. 1) (Generator Gs 06)

  • College 9 Apts (No Generator)

  • Communications (will switch to the cogeneration plant, if there’s capacity)

  • Cowell Apartments (Generator Gs 42)

  • Cowell College

  • Crown Merrill Apts (Lower) (Generator Gs 05)

  • Crown/Merrill Apts (Upper) (Generator Gs 04)

  • Crown/Merrill College (New Generator, May Not Be Running As Testing Is Scheduled) Kresge College (No Generator)

  • Digital Arts Research Center

  • Engineering Building (E2) 208 Service (No Generator)

  • Engineering Building (E2) 480 Service (Generator Gs 40)

  • Farm (No Generator)

  • Graduate Student Housing: Redwood Grove Apartments and The Village (East) (No Generator)

  • Hahn Student Services

  • Housing Services (No Generator)

  • Humanities (Generator Gs 46)

  • Kerr Hall (Generator Gs 19)

  • Kresge Housing (East) (No Generator)

  • Mchenry Library (Generator Gs 18)

  • Music Facility (Generator Gs 27)

  • Natural Science Woodshop (No Generator)

  • Oaks Apts (No Generator)

  • Oaks College (Generator Gs 17)

  • P.E. Fitness Center (No Generator)

  • Physical Sciences Building (Stand‐By And Emergency Generator)

  • Porter College (No Generator)

  • Porter/Kresge Apts (No Generator)

  • Quarry Village Amphitheater (Generator Gs 62)

  • Quarry/Village (Area A, B, C) (No Generator)

  • Quarry/Village (Area D, E, F) (No Generator)

  • Rachel Carson Academic (Generator Gs 13)

  • Rachel Carson Apartments (Generator Gs 15)

  • Rachel Carson Dining Commons (Generator Gs 14)

  • Rachel Carson Dorms (Generator Gs 16)

  • Stevenson College

  • Student Center (Student Union) (No Generator)

  • Student Center & Iveta (No Generator)

  • Theater Arts (Generator Gs 10)

  • University House (No Generator)

  • West Field House (Generator

 

Buildings that rely on the cogeneration plan and should not be affected

  • Baskin Engineering 480 Service

  • Baskin Engineering 208 Service

  • Center for Adaptive Optics

  • Cowell Student Health Center

  • Earth & Marine Science

  • East Field House / OPERS

  • Fackler Cogeneration Plant (Central Heat Plant)

  • Fire Station

  • Natural Sciences 2

  • ISB

  • Sinsheimer Labs

  • Science Library

  • Thimann Labs

 

I encourage the campus community to plan ahead:

  • charge cell phones before the outages,

  • carry a flashlight,

  • do not perform experiments or other work that rely on consistent power, etc.

  • work under the assumption that electrical power will be unavailable during the times noted.

 

Managers and supervisors have the responsibility for providing direction to employees, students, and volunteers, including operational decision-making. In the event of a power outage, they are responsible for employee safety and for the implementation of all related business continuity actions. Managers are asked to prepare and address any questions that individuals under their supervision may have. Please read this detailed information closely and work to ensure readiness.

 

Facilities information

  1. Emergency power – The standard emergency power supply for the campus, inclusive of emergency lighting, will be operable during the scheduled outage.

  2. Lighting – Managers should ensure that there is adequate lighting to support a safe workplace.  If a workplace does not have enough light to work, please reassign the employee workspace.  It’s also best to ensure that employees and offices have flashlights on hand.

  3. Elevators and accessibility – Building coordinators, divisional facilities staff, building managers, or supervisors will need to post signage at all floors indicating they should not be used during the outage period. Please print the attached signage pdf and assign the posting to a specific person. Use of the elevators during this time could result in entrapment within the elevators requiring a fire department response. Anyone needing an elevator to access their place of work or general campus activity should consult with their supervisor for alternative accessibility options and work locations for the time of the outage.

  4. Dining—Cowell/Stevenson Dining Hall will be closed during the outage.

 

Communications information

If the impacts go beyond the scheduled time, additional information will be posted ucsc.edu/advisory.

 

In addition to updating the webpage as information warrants, the Public Information Office will:

  1. Record information on the campus's communications hotline, 459-INFO (831-459-4636).

  2. Relay information on a regular basis to KZSC Radio (88.1 FM) for broadcast.

  3. Share information via Twitter, twitter.com/ucsc

 

Technology information

All campus services hosted in the Data Center will remain operational. Campus websites, digital and analog telephones, 911, the two-way radio systems, and non-cellular Blue Light phones will also be operational.

 

Please note the following may experience service interruptions:

  1. Network service in many campus buildings will be disrupted.

  2. Wireless connectivity and VoIP phones in buildings without backup generators will experience outages after batteries powering their serving switches run down.

  3. Campus cellular phone service will have limited coverage.

  4. Blue Light emergency phones that rely on cellular connectivity may be impacted. The locations of these phones are as follows:

    1. College 8 -- Footpath between College 8 and Oakes College

    2. Cowell Service Road, near Cowell Apts 3

    3. Grad Student Housing to Porter footpath (behind bldg 7736)

    4. Hagar at Steinhart Bus Stop,by Baytree Bookstore

    5. Hahn Parking Lot

    6. North Remote Parking

    7. Village entrance (not at bus stop)

  5. Research clusters hosted in the Data Center will be shut down.

  6. MyUCSC – although applications housed in the campus Data Center will remain fully functional during the outage, individuals working on campus should be prepared for building network outages which could disrupt connections to campus systems. Faculty especially should take precautions if entering grades via MyUCSC from their office or any campus building during the outage period, as a sudden network outage could result in lost work. Precautions include saving often, working from a non-campus location, or refraining from entering grades (or performing other critical systems-related work) during the outage window.

 

Emergency services

All campus emergency services will be operational including UCSC PD, dispatch and Santa Cruz Fire.  Per standard protocols, emergency response needs should be obtained via 9-1-1. Please do not contact dispatch for general outage questions or issues. These concerns should be directed to campus managers and supervisors.

 

Additional resources

The campus police department and Office of Emergency Services have multiple resources available on their websites. Emergency preparedness, training resources, and contacts:

 

If you have questions, please consult with your direct supervisor or department manager.