Independent consultant to the healthcare sector, Dr Melvyn Langford, outlines his concerns that, in many cases, the emergency diesel generators so critical to the resilience and uninterrupted operation of clinical and other functions within healthcare facilities may not be performing to reliability levels set out in guidance and codes of practice, and sets out recommendations to reduce the risk of breakdown, necessitating, he argues, a multi-disciplinary approach.
Abstract
The research evidence cited within this article relates to the reliability of emergency diesel generators, and concludes by recommending that NHS organisations urgently review their corporate strategy, business continuity plans, backlog maintenance schedules, etc., as it appears that these units are not operating to the 99.95% reliability figure suggested by the National Approved Codes of Practice (ACOP), but instead at reliabilities of around 98.5%.
The practical interpretation of this lower reliability figure is that for a typical NHS Trust operating 10 emergency diesel generators, it can be surmised that they can expect to experience 1.81 failures/year, while under test conditions. When combining the requirements for the generators to operate under test plus actual power outage conditions, with the ‘fragility’ of the power supply from the main electrical undertaker, then the Trust can expect to experience >1.81 failures /year, some of which could occur during a power outage.
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