NSA power supply problems continue

Siobhan Gorman continues her excellent coverage of the National Security Agency with a story in yesterday’s Baltimore Sun discussing continuing problems with the power supply at NSA headquarters at Fort Meade. The problems with electricity usage at NSA first came to light last summer and they have continued since then.

From the article:

The spy agency has delayed the deployment of some new data-processing equipment because it is short on power and space. Outages have shut down some offices in NSA headquarters for up to half a day. And some officials fear that major problems could occur this summer as temperatures climb.

Gorman’s article goes on to say that internal documents show that plans under consideration for dealing with the problems include rapid response teams and upgrading substations. A former NSA analyst blames the problems on “mismanagement” in that when things were designed a few years ago there was no consideration of future systems that would require more electricity and put out more heat.

The NSA, of course, won’t comment on specifics but the article points out that the installation of new data processing equipment and the agency’s modernization initiative, called Turbulence, have been delayed by the power issues. Congressman Dutch Ruppersberger tells the Sun that Congress recently approved agency requests for more funding for power supply upgrades but NSA apparently earned the ire of some in Congress by using operations funding for electrical upgrades.

Last summer’s events are also recounted - including that fact that equipment had to be shut down and other functions rescheduled for off-peak times to conserve electricity.  Gorman reports that some NSA officials are worried about a large scale blackout this summer as the temperature increases.

One of the results so far has been cold or hot offices depending on the time of year. There’s even one report recounted in the article that employees in one office had to wear gloves to work this past winter. Scheduled outages and rolling brownouts at server farms have also reportedly become more frequent.

Gorman reports that on April 30 and May 1 there were a series of outages that lasted 45 minutes to 4 hours. Ruppersberger says that he was told these were scheduled. The article also points out that classified reports indicate that these issues were predicted 9 years ago.

The Sun mentions that there are 3 substations serving different NSA buildings at Meade and they can’t be rerouted to one building during a spike. The wiring in the buildings is also apparently maxed out in its capacity. Another source tells Gorman of half-day outages and other blackouts and circuit overloads that require hours to fix.

Officials report that there is no easy fix to the problems, which in part result from the ops-centers that never close and all the agency’s supercomputers. Energy conservation measures, infrastructure upgrades, and moving data processing facilities to Texas an Tennessee by 2010 are also discussed.

Gorman reports further on the past efforts to fix the problem and how one unnamed official says nothing really happened until the major issues last summer.