Page 67 - South Mississippi Living - July, 2022

story by Brian Lamar, NCBC Public Affairs
Around midnight, lights flickered a few times and then the Naval Construction Battalion Center (NCBC), Gulfport, was plunged into darkness as the howling winds of Hurricane Zeta raged on.
Across the base, the hum of diesel generators fired up one by one as backup energy to the installation’s most essential facilities were restored. Emergency managers, first responders, and other vital personnel continued through the night managing the storm that would damage hundreds of buildings on base and knock out power throughout Coastal Mississippi for up to a full week.
For the past few years, NCBC has been working with community partners like Mississippi Power to install a system of redundant energy sources that fuel a specific area known as a microgrid. In 2017, the base cut the ribbon on a 4.2-megawatt solar field and a bank of diesel generators to fuel the microgrid, which was completed
in 2021. These additions add a redundant capability that fits in with the U.S. Navy’s energy strategy known
as the Three Pillars of Energy Security: Reliability, Resiliency and Efficiency, an initiative that seeks to provide cost-effective, alternative energy sources and fuel diversity, and to increase Navy’s energy resiliency and security. Previous to this advancement, when the power failed from the civilian utility grid, certain buildings were reliant solely on their own generators. If those generators failed, mechanics would be potentially called into harm’s way to fix the situation.
“NCBC was one of the first installations in the
Navy to complete a microgrid. The resiliency of the base’s energy infrastructure is an important and vital part of base safety and security. The base has spent considerable planning and resources to ensure that in
a worst-case scenario, we can continue to provide our mission-essential facilities with enough energy needed to continue the base mission,” said Ron Jenkins, NCBC’s community planning and liaison officer.
“The microgrid system has the ability to provide three megawatts of combined solar and generator power
to critical base facilities with an estimated run time of
48 hours, ensuring mission continuity in the event of
an area-wide utility outage,” said Lt. Mandy Caffee, Public Works Department (PWD) Gulfport construction manager.
Caffee noted the NCBC Gulfport microgrid is a $2.8M in-kind consideration project contracted through Naval Facilities Engineering Systems Command (NAVFAC) Headquarters Real Estate Contracting Office with Mississippi Power.
Power Secure, a sister company of Mississippi Power, began on-site construction of the microgrid on board NCBC in mid-March of 2020, and the project was completed in the summer of 2021.
The five diesel generators can supply 3.12 megawatts of power to the microgrid, which reduces the need for having separate generators at each essential facility.
“One of the big positives of the microgrid is that it will allow us to remove 11 dedicated facility generators. So that’s fewer emissions, which translates to better air quality,” said Nottingham, noting the environmental benefits of the microgrid.
Since the completion of the microgrid, NCBC was the first Naval Installation to complete a test of its capabilities known as a Blackstart exercise, which took place in June 2021.
“With the assistance of Mississippi Power, the Blackstart exercise was successful and the base is the first in the entire Navy installation command to conduct the exercise, now they’ll analyze a few deficiencies and prepare for what may roll our way during the 2022 hurricane season,” Jenkins said. “So, what the microgrid allows us to do here is take three megawatts of power and provide to our key operation facilities on the installation. So, in times when Seabees are called along for natural disaster recovery, hurricane landfall, we’ll be able to operate and provide that community support if necessary.”
NCBC recently experienced a short-term energy blackout due to severe thunderstorms that helped base public works officials fine-tune the system and correct any deficiencies found.
SOUTH MISSISSIPPI Living | www.smliving.net July 2022 | 67