"Backup generators have failed numerous tests, according to project documents,
and officials disagree about whether the cause is understood."
Backup generators are magical unicorns that sit around all day and night until lightning strikes your luck. Likewise, they need regular maintenance and 'idle runs' a few times a year at least to ensure that they will turn over.
Generators aren't store and forget machines, as we've learned a few years back. When Hurricane Sandy hit, we had an extra generator truck available just in case ours wouldn't kick in. This is a very real possibility with generators since, just like a vehicle that runs on fuel and needs oil, if it's not used, it will rot (so to speak) and likely won't start when you really, really, really need it.
I suspect a combination of the savage Utah Sun coupled with freezing temps at night have done these in. Plus, I wonder how long they were in storage and shipping before actually getting installed.
Now that's just the generators. The rest of this mess reads like a poorly thought out wouldn't it be awesome project some high ranking folks at No Such Agency envisaged and a bunch of contractors happily obliged... care be damned as long as profits were made.
We do idle runs once a week (fully automated by the generator controller), and we do planned power cutovers a couple times a year, where the generator and ATS actually get tested by pulling commercial power. The planned cutovers are human overseen, due to the infrequency and the stakes.
If you're seriously only doing idle runs a couple times a year, I'd look into whether you can change that. I don't believe it's good for mechanical equipment to sit idle that long, and with diesel fuel, you want to turn over the fuel some for anti-fungal reasons. (Natural gas doesn't have this second problem, of course.)
You guys make it sound like Bluffdale, Utah is akin to the Mojave. Here along the Wasatch Front the weather's fairly pleasant most of the year. This July we got an abnormally large number of days in the 100s, but usually it's quite livable.
Generators aren't store and forget machines, as we've learned a few years back. When Hurricane Sandy hit, we had an extra generator truck available just in case ours wouldn't kick in. This is a very real possibility with generators since, just like a vehicle that runs on fuel and needs oil, if it's not used, it will rot (so to speak) and likely won't start when you really, really, really need it.
I suspect a combination of the savage Utah Sun coupled with freezing temps at night have done these in. Plus, I wonder how long they were in storage and shipping before actually getting installed.
Now that's just the generators. The rest of this mess reads like a poorly thought out wouldn't it be awesome project some high ranking folks at No Such Agency envisaged and a bunch of contractors happily obliged... care be damned as long as profits were made.