Lightning strike causes outages across parts of Malaysia
Petaling Jaya, Kuala Lumpur, and Johor Bahru affected by temporary shutdown of the Edra Melaka Power Plant.
A lightning strike on a power plant in Melaka caused a temporary interruption of power that saw outages across parts of Petaling Jaya, Kuala Lumpur, and Johor Bahru.
In a statement, Edra Power said that a lightning strike caused a power trip that triggered an automatic shutdown of the 2,242MW Edra Melaka Power Plant. Were data centres affected? Short answer: not that we know of. But it underscores the evolving, asymmetric risks that they face.
Power quickly restored
Power was restored by 5.54pm, according to Tenaga Nasional Bhd (TNB) in a Facebook post. The outage is understood to have started at around 2-3pm in the afternoon.
The combined cycle gas turbine (CCGT) Edra Melaka Power Plant was the largest in Southeast Asia at the time of commissioning in 2021 and remains the largest in Malaysia. The relatively short outage means that even if it affected areas with data centres, it should have been easily shrugged off.
How data centres handle power cuts
Data centres are protected by battery rooms packed with UPS batteries to protect against transient cuts or power dips. They give time for backup diesel generators to power up and stabilise, which can take up to a minute.
Modern data centres typically have enough on-site fuel to keep them powered up for at least 48 hours. They also have standing contracts to truck in more diesel as needed. Barring a nation-wide, protracted grid collapse, data centres are designed to keep humming along for hours or days as needed.
Water is another risk
Personally, I think a more significant challenge might be an interruption in the water supply. When I look at some of the largest data centres in Johor, I see massive tanks of water for cooling servers.
What if the water is cut off by a burst pipe? This shouldn't be an issue if the break is quickly found and fixed, as data centres typically hold enough water for at least one to two days of use.
The bigger danger would be water pollution incidents that saw water from water treatment plants halted. For instance, the 2019 chemical dumping incident at Pasir Gudang saw water supply suspended to 17,000 households for several weeks.
Fortunately, new regulations in Malaysia are forcing data centre operators to look for alternative sources of water, which should make them far more resilient against water disruption. For now, I wonder if data centres have contingency plans to truck in adequate water to keep operational.
