What environmental considerations should you make when deciding on the location of your new UPS system?

We almost certainly cannot cover them all in a post in any detail, but here are some of the considerations you should make when thinking about your UPS system location.

Is it clean? Fans and vents can fail if they are in a dusty environment, leading to overheating. Ensure your room is clean and if not, utilise a UPS more suited to that environment.

Is it temperature and humidity controlled? A UPS and it’s batteries will perform optimally in around 20C and with a low relative humidity, certainly below 95%. 20-80% would be reasonable if at all possible. If not, consider different batteries and perhaps tropicalised PCBs, although that is unlikely to solve the problem permanently.

Room for ventilation and maintenance. The UPS will need to exhaust heat and if it is too close to walls the hot air may recirculate back into the UPS unit, potentially causing overheating. Maintaining the UPS from the front or side(s) may be required. Ensuring engineers have a suitable arena to work in would alleviate any potential problems.

Footprint. Consider the space required for the hardware. Larger capacity systems with long battery runtimes will require adequate space for the UPS system and battery rack/cabinets, as well as potential wall space requirements for an external bypass switch and DC protection.

Floor strength/capabilities. Lead-acid batteries are heavy. UPS systems are relatively heavy, especially transformer-based ones. Check point loadings on UPS systems and battery cabinets/racks to ensure rooms can allow for the weight required to position your equipment.

Power connection point locations. Is there input power available in the UPS room? Is there an output board available in the UPS room? If not, where are these and how are you going to get input and output connections to and from your UPS system. Do you need to relocate to a close connection point?

Access to the room from the unloading point. Is the access level and obstacle free? If not, how do you/others intend on navigating these obstacles? Perhaps a location on the ground floor may be more practical?

What have we missed? Any other room location considerations we should be thinking of?

If you need any support on your next UPS solution and aren’t sure where best to position the system, we can help. Get in touch below to get the ball rolling.