Powerside helped keep the action “live” for fans worldwide.
To host a live event in front of more than 350 million global viewers takes endless hours of advanced planning, preparation, and coordination. Thousands of details must fall into place for successful execution — and we’re not just talking about team playbooks and the electrifying entertainment. Many behind-the-scenes elements have to come together on cue to ensure an uninterrupted, enjoyable fan experience from start to finish.
One of the most important considerations? A reliable power supply.
PQube® 3 and QubeScan Flexed Their Power Monitoring Muscles
It’s no secret that the widely watched football game draws massive amounts of electric power. But you may not have considered just how mission-critical this electricity is. If power feeding the multitude of TV broadcast trailers is lost, millions of viewers may end up staring at blank screens rather than the game-changing touchdown, that star-studded halftime show or those award-winning commercials.
The primary power system feeding these broadcast trailers has changed in recent years. Event operators no longer rely on a utility power supply for the most critical applications. Instead, a series of portable power generators and uninterruptible power supplies (UPS) are used to ensure broadcast continuity and to put control in the hands of the local event team.
Delivering reliable power from these sources requires real-time local and remote monitoring of every detail of the power quality. Powerside partnered with CES Power and Wenzlau Engineering to handle this mission-critical role using the PQube 3 power analyzer.
An All-Star Power Team: CES Power, Wenzlau Engineering and Powerside
CES Power specializes in ensuring stable, secure, and continuous power in critical applications, including significant entertainment events like the NFL’s Super Bowl. To support their efforts, Wenzlau Engineering provides power source equipment (UPS, twin-set generators, etc.) and partners with Powerside for the real-time condition monitoring of these power sources.
Powerside’s PQube 3 monitors everything from voltage stability to UPS battery and environmental conditions — providing a complete fleet view of the assets deployed during the event (in this case, 5.4 MWs of redundant power and 1.4 MWs of UPS).
For February’s Super Bowl at State Farm Stadium in Arizona, the team implemented the PQube 3 power quality analyzer in combination with Powerside’s QubeScan remote power quality monitoring platform — giving CES engineers visibility into the entire fleet of power sources simultaneously on a single dashboard. Personnel no longer had to run long distances from unit to unit to ensure correct functionality. If an error were to occur, they could quickly identify the problem unit and work to remedy the situation before it could interrupt the transmission.
Next year during the Super Bowl, enjoy a few extra scoops of that 7-layer bean dip — because the power quality experts at Powerside, CES Power and Wenzlau Engineering will ensure the show will go on until the final buzzer.