Heating Plant Shutdown May 12-14

The Ripley Heating Plant will have its annual shutdown for maintenance starting at 10 p.m. Friday, May 12, and continuing through Sunday, May 14.

Jim Inch (Plant Operations) said that heating, hot water and central air conditioning will be affected in most buildings on campus.

“The Lincoln apartments run on their own boiler system, so those won’t be affected,” he said, “But the rest of the apartments and buildings will be.”

In addition to routine maintenance on the steam distribution system, the shutdown will include preparation for the replacement of two boilers. Bob Ryan (Engineering and Planning) said that one is scheduled to be installed in late September, the other in late November.

“Boiler projects have long timelines,” he said. “We ordered the new ones somewhere around Christmas time, but they’re made from scratch in Virginia and then shipped here, which takes several months.”

Ryan added that a power switch in the plant will be replaced later in the summer, which may result in short power outages throughout campus.

“In terms of when it will happen, it all depends on the maintenance,” he said. “I could guess early June, but it could be sooner or later than that. The outages would only be short ones here and there; an hour or so at a time.”

The campus will be notified via e-mail abou thte power switch replacement timeline as it is finalized.

For more information about the shutdown, contact plant operations at ext. 2292.