Campus & community, Campus news

Power restoration work nears the finish line

By Public Affairs

The work of bringing all campus buildings back on campus power is almost done, with California and Durant halls and the Doe and Bancroft libraries reconnected to the grid last night.

Haas Pavilion (including the Recreational Sports Facility locker rooms), Dwinelle Annex and Alumni House were scheduled for reconnection Thursday evening, completing the restoration of power to all areas of the UC Berkeley campus affected by the Sept. 30 outage and fire.

Power is being restored slowly and carefully, by disconnecting generators that have powered the buildings since the fire and then splicing the cables to reconnect the buildings to the grid. As the power is turned on, Physical Plant and Campus Services (PPCS) has built in time for thorough testing at each step.

Building managers were consulted to make decisions about when each building could be shut down with the least inconvenience to the occupants, and most have been scheduled for evening hours.

Dwinelle was the first building reconnected to regular power, Tuesday night. On Wednesday, crews reconnected Edwards Track, the campus co-generation plant and Environmental Health and Safety, which had been without power since the outage.

Haas Pavilion (including the Recreational Sports Facility locker rooms), Alumni House and Dwinelle Annex were scheduled to be shut down tonight (Thursday) at 8 p.m. on and back on normal power before sunrise Friday.

As soon as all repairs are complete, members of the campus’s High Voltage Team plan to turn their attention to a comprehensive investigation into the cause of the outage. The campus will be kept updated on the investigation.