During extreme weather events and other climate emergencies, Cambridge-wide power may go down, leaving MIT without electricity, heat, and cooling. Beyond lowering overall quality of life, power outages could halt important research and teaching, as well as cause destruction of expensive, temperature-sensitive equipment. Fortunately, MIT distinguishes itself from other universities by having its own power generation plant which can power campus during an emergency.
MIT’s own power generation plant
Source: Ellenzweig, MIT Capital Projects[1]
The cogeneration plant uses primarily natural gas and occasionally liquid fuel to generate electricity, heating, and cooling.[1] In its current state, the cogeneration plant does not meet enough of MIT’s needs (only 60%) and its control room is in danger of flooding according to the 500-year flood level.[2] However, MIT is already aware of these issues and is currently renovating the cogeneration plant, also known as the Central Utilities Plant (CUP). By 2020, a second turbine will be functional, bringing the energy production of CUP to nearly 100%. Further, the control room will be placed above the 500-year flood level and the new turbines will be able to start even without external power from Cambridge distribution systems, making MIT self-reliant during emergency outage.[2] Read more about MIT’s cogeneration improvement project here.
By Jade Fischer
References
- MIT’s Cogeneration Plant. (2017, August 07). Retrieved November 27, 2017, from https://powering.mit.edu/project-faqs/cogeneration
- Capital Projects (2017). Central Utilities Plant Upgrade. Retrieved November 27, 2017, from http://capitalprojects.mit.edu/projects/cup-upgrade-building-42c