In the Bay Area, power loss is not a hypothetical. What a building's backup actually covers, and what it does not.
The short take: Building generators usually cover only emergency lighting and elevators, not your equipment. In outage country, confirm what the backup actually powers, whether you can install your own UPS, and whether there is enough dedicated electrical capacity for your load. Plan for the power going out before you sign, not during the next outage.
Public safety power shutoffs, rolling blackouts, and ordinary outages are a normal part of operating in the Bay Area. For any business evaluating new office space, the question is not whether the power will go out. It is whether the business will be ready when it does.
Most companies assume the building's generator has them covered. It usually does not, at least not in the way they expect.
What building backup really covers
Building generator backup is frequently limited to emergency lighting and elevators. That protects people, which is its purpose, but it does nothing for a tenant's network equipment, servers, or workstations. If power loss means lost data, lost revenue, equipment damaged by an abrupt shutdown, or missed client commitments, building coverage alone is not enough.
The questions worth asking before signing:
- What exactly does the building generator power, and for how long?
- Can the tenant install its own uninterruptible power supply (UPS) equipment?
- Are there building restrictions on battery backup systems?
UPS infrastructure does two jobs. It carries critical systems through an outage long enough for a graceful shutdown or a switch to backup, and it smooths the power fluctuations that quietly damage equipment over time. For most businesses it is not a luxury. It is operational insurance, and it is far easier to plan for before move-in than to retrofit later.
Capacity is the other half
Backup power only matters if there is enough power to begin with. Buildings designed decades ago were not built for a modern office's load. A rough sense of the draw: each workstation with dual monitors pulls 3 to 5 amps, a network rack 10 to 20, a small server rack 20 to 30, a break room another 15 to 20. Added up against the suite's available capacity, the numbers are sometimes closer than anyone expects.
It is also worth learning whether the electrical capacity is dedicated to the suite or shared with other tenants. Shared capacity means a neighbor's peak usage can affect yours, a problem that is hard to diagnose and nearly impossible to fully solve after signing.
FAQs
A new office needs a plan for the power going out, because in this region it will. What the building covers, what the tenant can add, and whether there is enough capacity to begin with are all easier to settle before the lease is signed than during the next outage.
Related questions
What is a PG&E Public Safety Power Shutoff?
A PSPS is a deliberate, preventive shutoff PG&E uses during high wildfire-risk conditions, usually hot, dry, windy weather. It can last hours or days across wide areas, which is why Bay Area offices need a plan for operating without grid power.
How long will a UPS keep systems running?
Typically minutes, not hours. A UPS is built to bridge short outages and shut equipment down safely or hand off to a generator, not to run an office through a long blackout. Size it to your critical load.
Can battery backup power an entire office through an outage?
Not practically. Batteries protect critical equipment for a short window. Running a full office through a long outage takes a generator, which is usually the building's responsibility to provide or permit.
This is one of the infrastructure realities covered in Before You Sign, a guide to the technology risks that get decided at lease signing. Ron DeAngelis, president of Jump Start Technology, drew on 25 years of Bay Area office moves to write it.
