Generator Exchange

On a very cold day I once again followed Christian around during a work day to make a little documentary about his job. – Never have my hands been so frozen and stiff, but it was all worth it

Powering Life

Since he works at the at Greenland’s power company it is essential that they provide power to all citizens as uninterrupted as possible. It is different from at home though, because the power plant in Upernavik burnt down a few years ago before it was ever put to use.

Today electricity is generated in several different places of the town and is made by 6 large generator sets.

Seen before?

Yes it is a lot like on the super yachts, where the boat is powered by the engines in the engine room, and they are also very similar in size and effect.

Up here it is large Volvo Penta 6 cylinder diesel engines that weighs around 4 tons each. They sit in interconnected containers hooked up to all the buildings and is supervised by the computer in Christian’s office

Sometimes they do stop and all of town is instantly turned dark – off corse mostly in the middle of cooking dinner, and then Christian or one of his foremen run out and fix the problem as soon as their little legs can carry them. 5-15 minutes later everyone gets the power back.

More than once the engines has actually broken completely down with a problem that cannot be fixed immediately. That’s why there are four spare engines besides the two engines that run all the time.

Fix fix fix

When one of the generators is broken it must be exchanged with one that is working properly. And this is exactly what I have filmed in this little video

Generator moving day

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And they did it all over again the next day