Business Continuity and Recovery Planning for Power Outages The timely execution of a BCRP strategy is particularly important during extended power outages to avoid costly business disruptions. Business Continuity and Recovery Planning (BCRP) is an ARC Best Practice- based strategy for minimizing downtime and lost productivity during unexpected business interruptions like the recent power outages in the northeastern United States and Great Britain. While power failures may be unavoidable, their impact can be substantially reduced for companies that have been proactive about establishing proper action plans. BCRP addresses the three key stages of business interruption management: Ready & Alert, Respond & Analyze, and Recover & Audit. By developing action plans that address multiple scenarios, including widespread and long-duration power outages, companies can minimize the impact on their business activities and quickly regain control of the situation.

1. THOUGHT LEADERS FOR MANUFACTURING & SUPPLY CHAIN
ARC INSIGHTS
By Houghton LeRoy
INSIGHT# 2003-37E
SEPTEMBER 10, 2003
The timely execution of a
BCRP strategy is particularly
important during extended
power outages to avoid
costly business disruptions.
Business Continuity and Recovery Planning
for Power Outages
Keywords
BCRP, Business Continuity, Disaster Recovery
Summary
Business Continuity and Recovery Planning (BCRP) is an ARC Best Prac-
tice-based strategy for minimizing downtime and lost productivity during
unexpected business interruptions like the recent power outages in the
northeastern United States and Great Britain. While power
failures may be unavoidable, their impact can be substantially
reduced for companies that have been proactive about estab-
lishing proper action plans.
BCRP addresses the three key stages of business interruption
management: Ready & Alert, Respond & Analyze, and Recover
& Audit. By developing action plans that address multiple scenarios, in-
cluding widespread and long-duration power outages, companies can
minimize the impact on their business activities and quickly regain control
of the situation .
Analysis
Ready & Alert
Preventing power outages is very difficult for most organizations. While
backup power generation can mitigate some of the problems, deciding
when and how to deploy these resources can be a difficult decision during
a power outage. Therefore, Ready & Alert plans should define how to
quickly identify lost power, alert responsible individuals, and activate any
backup equipment. While Uninterruptible Power Supplies (UPS) with bat-
tery backup may trigger automatically and be adequate to support data
center and electronic equipment through short disruptions, such solutions
are generally inadequate for medium and long durations. Plans must also
address access to alternate power generators, temporary offloading of op-
erations to alternate locations, and selective shutdown of some operations.

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Respond & Analyze
Unfortunately, it is seldom clear when a short or mid-term power failure
will become long or permanent. The Respond & Analyze phase must ad-
dress this important issue to minimize the impact on business activities. A
very effective approach is to activate a pre-defined emergency response
team when the power outage extends beyond some fixed duration. Plans
should include how this team will be contacted, where they will assemble,
how they will assess the situation, and how they will communicate as a
team as well as with the rest of the organization.
Even mild power outages can result in damage to critical equipment and
extend the outage condition. A walkthrough procedure for all critical as-
sets should be a high priority for the emergency response team. The
current status of all equipment should be recorded and appropriate meas-
ures taken to ensure proper safety conditions. Once all assets are properly
secured, the team can determine the proper course of action regarding use
of backup sources and recovery procedures based on the estimated length
of the power outage and any recorded equipment damage.
Recover & Audit
Recovery from a power outage should never be underestimated. Restarting
equipment often requires considerably more power than normal running
conditions. Phased startup procedures can be equally important as a sys-
tematic shutdown. Once power is fully restored and all operations have
returned to normal the emergency response team should still perform a
plant audit of all assets for damage. Finally, the team should prepare a
BCRP Process Short Term Mid Term Long Term Permanent
Ready & Alert UPS backup
with mini-
mum impact
Backup Power
Generation. Acti-
vate Emergency
Response Team
Notify custom-
ers, partners and
BCRP Suppliers
Activate Relo-
cation Strategy
Respond & Analyze Look for po-
tential asset
damage
Secure safe con-
ditions and
record status of
critical assets
Plan and Execute
safe and orderly
shutdown
Capture critical
data to restart
operations
Recover & Audit Verify safe
and proper
operations
Perform critical
asset audit and
prepare power
outage report
Plan and Execute
safe and orderly
startup with
power monitor-
ing
Duplicate op-
erations at
new location
BCRP for Power Outages

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©2003 • ARC • 3 Allied Drive • Dedham, MA 02026 USA • 781-471-1000 • ARCweb.com
summary report identifying what happened, what actions were taken, how
effective the processes were in minimizing disruption to the business and
what improvements could be made.
Customers and Partners
Power outages are frequently a regional or community problem impacting
many businesses at the same time. Therefore, collaboration with other
businesses including customers and partners is a very useful and practical
strategy that should be included in your BCRP. Contacting other busi-
nesses during a power outage can provide useful information on the
magnitude of the power outage as well as alert others to potential power
problems if the outage cascades. Contacting customers and partners when
you expect a power outage to be lengthy enables them to assess the poten-
tial impact on their business and take appropriate action. They may be able
to adjust their plans to deal with delays in receiving or shipping production
materials that you handle. Such concern will not go unappreciated, since it
demonstrates an interest in their business
needs and helps you to protect your reputa-
tion and maintain loyalty. Your concern
and cooperation may even be rewarded
through reciprocation when one of your
customers or partners experiences a similar
problem.
BCRP Companies and Solutions
BCRP and execution of action plans is an
individual company’s responsibility. But
there are suppliers that offer services that
can help you develop an effective program.
These companies can provide backup
power, data recovery, emergency messag-
ing systems, hardened information
availability services and BCRP consulting support. The
value of such partners was evident during the recent northeastern USA
blackout. Agility Recovery Solutions confirmed that emergency communi-
cations were fully operational and it was prepared to ship backup
infrastructure and power generation equipment to their business continuity
customers. MessageOne activated their Emergency Message System (EMS)
to ensure email continuity for 22 customers. SchlumbergerSema operated
BCRP Supplier BCRP Solution
Agility Recovery
Solutions
Provide backup power, facili-
ties, equipment and telecom.
Kroll Ontrack Data recovery services for most
data loss situations
MessageOne Emergency Messaging Service
to maintain email continuity
SunGard Information availability services
using strategic hardened facili-
ties worldwide
Schlumberger
Sema
Business Continuity Consulting
and Recover Centers
Strohl Systems LDRPS Business Continuity
Planning, Business Impact
Analysis (BIA) and Incident
Manager Software
BCRP for Power Outage Suppliers

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©2003 • ARC • 3 Allied Drive • Dedham, MA 02026 USA • 781-471-1000 • ARCweb.com
two east coast recovery centers so that over 700 staff members from affected
customers could successfully continue their business operations. SunGard
Availability Services provided recovery services for 62 customers using 8
facilities located in New York, Philadelphia, Toronto and Chicago. Recov-
ery centers typically manage backup workstations, computers, phones and
network connectivity to enable customer critical business operations to con-
tinue.
Recommendations
• Perform a risk analysis and use the estimated lost revenues from busi-
ness interruptions and potential production downtime to justify
investment in BCRP for power outages for your business.
• Consider use of external service providers as a key element in your ac-
tion plans. These options may be an economical alternative to internal
solutions that can be hard to justify when there is no imminent emer-
gency.
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information, contact your account manager or the author at hleroy@arcweb.com.
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