McAlester, OK, February 1, 2011 -- FEMA generators are staged at the Army Ammunition Plant for rapid deployment to support emergency facilities and public buildings.
One of the ways that we were preparing before this past week's severe winter weather struck was by prepositioning commodities including generators, ahead of time in areas that were forecasted to be heavily impacted.
We wanted to be ready in case a Governor's team needed our support, and one of the major concerns was power outages.
When most people see the term "generator", they think of small, personal generators that power homes. At FEMA, when we say "generator", we are talking about industrial generators that power critical public facilities, such as hospitals, nursing homes, shelters, and water treatment facilities (to name a few).
Fort Cambell, KY, February 2, 2011 -- FEMA and U.S. Army Corps of Engineers personnel inventory and inspect generators at the Incident Support Base for pre-deployment of resources that may be needed due to the massive winter storm that struck the heart of the U.S.
As our mission says, we're committed to supporting our state and local communities as they prepare for, respond to, and recover from disasters - and what better way to support them by helping keep their critical facilities up and running?
Here are some facts on our deployment and use of emergency power generators:
- FEMA deploys and stages emergency power generators in configurations of fifty-four units, of varying sizes and capacities, ranging from 15 kW to 800 kW. (A shipment is commonly referred to as “54-pack”). Of the 54 units in a pack, thirty-six generators are of 150kW or less; and eighteen are considered high-voltage, 150 kW or greater. (A 30-watt light bulb would use 1 kilowatt after running for 33 hours and 20 minutes.)
- A lower-power generator, might power a well water pump, lift station, communications tower, waste water treatment plant or temporary hospital, while a higher-power unit, might support powering a school, shelter, assisted living facility or hospital.
- The generators are compatible to support critical response and life saving facilities, such as hospitals, nursing homes, congregate shelters, waste water and water treatment facilities, water wells, pumping stations, emergency operations centers or fire and police stations.
- To ensure proper generator installation and usage, FEMA works with with the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers to perform facility assessments and coordinate installation and maintenance of the units.
This is most needed. I did not know FEMA did this, but it sures makes me feel more confident that our government is protecting us and is interested in our safety and the safety of those who most critically needed it. This was very impressive. THANK YOU.
ReplyDeleteIt is great that the generators are pre-deployed for a power outage. The weak link in the idea is the ready availability of fuel to run the units. Most- if not all - fuel storage facilities have no back up power. Hopefully there is discussion to have transfer switches installed at the storage facilities and a generator of the required size designated for the fuel facility during an extended outage. A review of the After Action Report of the New Hampshire 2008 Ice Storm identified fuel availability as being problematic.
ReplyDeleteIt would help if advance preparations were also made to buildings on the generator receiving list. "Plug and play" style generator docking stations/manual transfer switches can simplify the hook-up process and reduce risk.
ReplyDeleteThere are mini nuclear generators (actually, new mini powerstations), the generator sized like the one in the pic or even smaller would produce as much energy as to supply an entire town. That could be a great option for severe winters but, unfortunately, the recent events in Japan said it is quite risky to fully rely on such technologies.
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