In the midst of a facility expansion in March
2007, MVP Health Care (MVP), Rochester,
N.Y., decided that a reliable mode of
standby power was required to ensure
smooth operations and to keep all of its
clients’ medical records and information
safely housed. MVP, a health care provider
in Vermont, New Hampshire and New York
state, has been committed for 27 years to
making a positive impact on the health and
wellness of its customers. The need to
keep medical records and information safe
was a logical investment and consistent
with thecompany’s mission.
While there was an immediate need for a
larger location, MVP also needed to allow
for future growth. The goal was that no
matter how much the company grew, there
would always be backup power protection
should there be an outage due to the
inclement weather that is typical of
Rochester, especially during the winter
months. When Generac Industrial Power
dealer R.L. Kistler learned of MVP’s interest
in standby power, Rob Sweeney, sales
engineer, knew he had a system to satisfy
its needs.
Based in Rochester, R.L. Kistler has been a
Generac dealer since 2002, covering much
of the upstate New York area including
Buffalo and the state capital of Albany.
Sweeney was approached for this project
by the engineer, Mark Picard, owner,
Picard Engineering, Rochester, who was
originally looking for backup power that
had either a single engine or a modular
system; this was still up for debate.
“When Mark told me what they were looking
for, I knew right away that the Generac
Modular Power System (MPS) was the way
for them to go. They had an immediate load
demand of 1,100 kilowatts (kW) and
wanted a system that had the potential to
reach 1,600 kW, if needed,” says Sweeney.
“They were also in the market for a system
that ran on natural gas rather than diesel
due to storage limitations stemming from
MVP’s metropolitan location and the fact
that natural gas offered extended run times
without concern for refueling. I told Mark
he’d be hard-pressed to find a competitive
system that would be able to not only meet
their demands, but also be reasonably
priced. After he had an opportunity to shop
around, the job was ours.”
An Installation with Room to Grow
R.L. Kistler administered the paralleled
installation of 4 x 300 kW Generac natural
gas generators in August 2008. Because
MVP intended to grow over time, the
company needed a system that was
modular and did not need to be replaced
every time it expanded. As the installation
began, Sweeney wanted to make it as easy
as possible for the building to add onto the
four existing gensets as needed. “We
installed a concrete pad designed to hold a
maximum of six, 300 kW generators. So
when the time comes to expand the
system, there is room for two more 300 kW
Generac MPS generators, making the
placement less labor intensive,” says
Sweeney.
In addition to the versatility that comes with
a Generac MPS, price was also a factor. In
the past, the high cost of paralleling
switchgear made the multiple unit
arrangement feasible only for expensive,
high-end applications. If MVP had gone
with a traditional paralleling approach, they
would have had to use 14 to 20 controllers
from five different manufacturers. However,
the Generac MPS Power Manager control
technology only requires one digital control
per generator to control all generator
functions: speed governing, voltage
regulation, genset alarm and monitoring,
synchronizing, load sharing and protection
– a much simpler and cost-saving approach.
Advanced microprocessors with highspeed, 32-bit digital electronics are
integrated into the MPS controllers,
providing paralleling capability and
reducing equipment, maintenance and
installation costs. Constantly monitoring
power flow, controlling transfer switch
functions and managing the operations of
all connected generators are just a few of
the features offered by the MPS controllers.
The beauty of the Generac MPS system is
that each genset backs up the others in the
system, so critical loads receive state-ofthe-art redundant protection, in addition to
providing all the benefits of paralleled
power generation in a simple, single-source
system.
Looking to the Future
Today, the Generac MPS system backs up
three floors, one of which houses the main
data center -- a total of 50,400 square feet
- and MVP has no plans to stop there.
“This ear, we’ll be adding another 150
servers to our data center on the first floor
and while we are appropriately sized right
now, we have space to add two more 300
kW gensets and in time that’s exactly what
we plan to do,” says Craig Solow,
supervisor of windows administration, MVP.
“We could not be more pleased with the
natural gas MPS system from Generac. Out
of our 10 sites, the Rochester location is
the only one that has a modular backup
system, the rest are running on single
systems and I am confident that the
Generac MPS system is the most secure.
Since we installed the Generac MPS
system, we’ve had a few outages, some
planned, some unexpected, but whatever
the case, the transition to standby power
was seamless. The MPS system started
right up and kept us operating at business
as usual for the entire length of every
outage. Most companies fear outages, and
while we don’t look forward to them, we
know that we’re covered.”
For more information, contact South Shore Generator in Wareham, MA.
