Story Tools  E-mail Story  Print Friendly Featured Jobs Featured Jobs Feature Your Jobs: call 823-4444 Guest Opinions No Winners in Police Shooting Credit Unions Would Foot Bill for Giant Retailers Loss of NHCC Chief A Blow to Our State Welcome to Albuquerque Not Especially Friendly Basic Dental Care Is Lacking in N.M. Send Message to Troops that Their Safety Is Top Priority Tough Times No Reason To Postpone Big Plans Gov., Legislature Get Failing Grade for First 100 Days Medicaid Grants Would Hurt Young Join Battle Against Sexual Violence More Guest Opinions

          Front Page  opinion  guest_columns

Wednesday, February 23, 2011

UNM Cut Gas Use in Crisis

By Mary Vosevich
Director, UNM Physical Plant Department
          During the deep freeze the first week of February, not unlike everyone else, the University of New Mexico was challenged with how to maintain services. Throughout the event, UNM was in communication with the New Mexico Gas Company discussing strategies to help stabilize the gas system.
        These discussions led to a solution that assisted in recovery of the gas system.
        The unprecedented low temperatures of Feb. 2 and 3 resulted in record heating demands on the UNM heating system. To meet this demand, the utility plant had to use both boilers and the cogeneration unit.
        UNM has the capability to operate our boilers with diesel fuel instead of natural gas, and UNM made the decision Feb. 2 to begin the process to switch to this alternate fuel. Both boilers were burning diesel fuel in place of natural gas by Thursday morning.
        On the morning of Feb. 3, the New Mexico Gas Company's liaison to UNM called UNM to communicate that a system emergency had been declared. This led to a discussion on which natural gas burning equipment could be curtailed without creating undue risk to the university community, including residence halls.
        UNM and the New Mexico Gas Company agreed that the cogeneration equipment should continue burning natural gas in light of switching the boilers to diesel fuel and the necessity of the cogeneration equipment to provide heat to the campus.
        During this entire period the university was aware of the impact our operations have on the gas system and although operating on diesel fuel costs substantially more, the right thing to do was to switch our fuel source.
        This provided reliability to our system and allowed natural gas to be distributed elsewhere in the community.
        We value our collaboration with our service providers and are confident that in emergencies our team efforts will sustain our operations.
       

You also can send comments via our comment form