Custom Design Solves Hospital’s Power Generation Needs
The third time proved to be the winner for Dmitry Kraskovsky when he suggested a unique solution to MultiCare Auburn Medical Center’s generation needs. The first two bids for improving the generators at the hospital in Auburn, Washington, didn’t quite meet the facility’s needs. Then, Dmitry came up with a hybrid paralleling system for the MTU generators.
“This design was exactly what hospital officials wanted from the new generator system,” he said.
Major Renovations Required New Power Generators
MultiCare needed a new generation system to support a massive renovation at the Auburn facility. The hospital added an adult psychiatric wing, completely renovated the emergency room and added new heating and boiler plants.
Mike Atchley, our project manager, faced the daunting task of fitting the large MTU generators needed to power the expansion into an extremely small space.
Meeting New Facility Needs
The MTU units, which each provide 2000 kW at 4,160 volts, were engineered for an N+1 configuration. This allows the first generator to take the load and once it’s stabilized, the second generator shuts down. The backup system is typical for hospitals, data centers and other mission critical operations.
Dmitry and the Power Generation team has worked with MultiCare on several projects at various medical centers in the Seattle area. Their expertise and experience is what enabled them to continue tailoring the generation design until they found the right configuration for the Auburn site.
Unique Fuel System
Generators were only part of the job. Just as important were the fuel tanks. Hospitals require enough fuel to run the generators for 96 hours. Each generator consumes 147 gallons of fuel an hour. An equally creative configuration for the fuel tanks was employed to achieve the necessary fuel storage capacity without using severely oversized fuel tanks.
Dampening Sound
The final piece to the project was building an enclosure to dampen the sound and contain the generators. The units that were designed for Auburn lowered the generator noise to 68 dB at the nearest property line.
Repeat Customer Satisfied
The unique solution to the Auburn site’s needs was critical in designing a system that best fit MultiCare’s needs. It’s not the first time we’ve been able to serve the not-for-profit health care organization.
“Knowing the organization and working with them on several projects definitely helps in our ability to accurately diagnose the power generation needs that are unique to each facility,” Dmitry said.