Emergency power
Emergency power in the SpeicherCampus context: needs to be specified precisely in technical terms. Technically, the term is usually described as a general term for supply during a grid outage.
What does emergency power mean?
Emergency power is the colloquial umbrella term for any supply during a grid outage — from diesel generators through battery storage to UPS systems. That is exactly what makes the term dangerous in contracts and offers: it says nothing about transfer time, duration, protected loads or degree of automation.
The technical language distinguishes: UPS (uninterrupted, seconds to minutes), backup power (fast transfer of defined circuits, minutes to hours) and standby generating sets (long outages, start time in seconds to minutes).
What matters in practice
- always be precise: which loads, what duration, what interruption is tolerable?
- question “emergency-power-capable” in offers — usually backup power is meant
- combining systems often covers more than any single technology
- treat statutory requirements (e.g. safety lighting) separately
Practical example
A hotel “with emergency power” discovers during review: the old generator supplies only the safety lighting. Kitchen, refrigeration and the booking system would be offline in an outage. Only precise load lists make the gap visible — and closable.
The SpeicherCampus perspective
SpeicherCampus uses the term emergency power sparingly and instead plans concrete backup power concepts with defined circuits, durations and reserves.