Blackout Punch

A California landscaper discovers an unorthodox solution to rolling blackouts, using remote power generation. The AuraGen remote power unit, under the hood of Sepulveda Building Materials’ service truck, could provide enough power to keep the company operating during a rolling blackout. With the onset of the summer months, rolling blackouts are likely to continue, possibly with increasing regularity as California’s energy crunch extends. The result is that many companies will still suffer more from the lack of power supply and the increasing heat. The mainframe computer, an IBM Power P C, is networked and communicates with the other stores using Strata model telephone tie lines from Toshiba Phone Systems. Al Fergades, director of vehicle maintenance for Sepulveda, suggested that the company run cables to his service truck and use the power from the onboard generator. The company has been able to evaluate exactly which office machines need to be operating when a power outage occurs again, because now it has had the chance to think about it.