Stanford Report, August 18, 2008

Power outage hits campus

BY DAN STOBER

A high-voltage PG&E power line shorted out Monday, triggering an electric outage across the Stanford campus.

There were no reports of injuries or damage, university officials said.

Some students studied outdoors while waiting for electricity to be restored, while others tossed a Frisbee in the Quad. A customer of Stanford Hair at Tresidder Union had her haircut finished outside. Emergency generators whirred as they supplied power to crucial buildings.

The campus lost power from both PG&E and the university’s own electric generating station on Via Ortega, known as the Cardinal Cogen. The series of events began at 11:45 a.m. when a metal guy wire intended to support a power pole came in contact with a high-voltage PG&E transmission line that supplies electricity to Stanford and some surrounding cities, according to PG&E spokesman Joe Molica.

The transmission line automatically shut down in circuit-breaker fashion to avoid a power surge. That, in turn, caused Cogen to shut down, resulting in the campus blackout.

About two hours later, PG&E began to re-supply the campus, with electricity switching on a few buildings at a time. The Cogen plant came back on line at 4:30 p.m.

Lucile Packard Children's Hospital and Stanford Hospital, which buy their electricity from the city of Palo Alto, were not affected.

Campus faculty and staff homes that get their electricity directly from PG&E were still without power late Monday afternoon.

In addition to electricity, the Cogen plant supplies the campus with chilled water for air conditioning and steam for heating. Monday’s shutdown did not last long enough to cause serious problems, though some dining kitchens had to get by without the steam they usually use for cooking, according to Susan Kulakowski, the campus energy manager.