STUDIO CASE STUDY

A Timely Solution Ensures A Quick Film Studio Reopening After COVID

For many businesses, COVID-19 has presented a major challenge. The combination of safety concerns and government restrictions has left many scrambling to adapt, with some businesses even being forced to close up shop indefinitely.

It goes without saying that the sooner a company can resume business, the better.

But emergency outages can happen at any time – even in the midst of a pandemic – as a recent client discovered.

When an outage can’t be prevented, it needs to be remedied as quickly as possible, which is exactly what we did.

The Client: A Major Film Production Centre

With 18 stages and over 350,000 square feet of facilities, this Vancouver-area client is one of the largest film production centres in North America. Despite being a new facility, this state-of-the-art studio has seen the production of a diverse array of projects, including high-budget feature films and television series.

The Challenge: A Poorly Timed Transformer Failure

Due to government regulations, our client had ceased operations during the COVID-19 lockdown. Now, with restrictions easing for the film industry, the show was finally allowed to go on. Our client had brought back their employees — some of whom had to spend 14 days in isolation after arriving from abroad — to restart production work. And then the main 2000kVA 12.5V-600V transformer at their Back Lot studio failed, leaving the entire facility without power.

The lead time for a new transformer was 6-8 weeks: a delay our client was not willing to accept. With a studio in the dark and a workforce in limbo, the studio contacted Trinity Power.

Our Approach: A Full-Service Solution, Delivered Fast

Working quickly, the Trinity team provided a portable 1250kVA 12.5kV-600V packaged substation along with 50 feet of medium and low voltage cable in order to bypass and isolate the existing transformer.

This approach restored power to the facility right away, while allowing our client to replace their failed transformer with a new permanent one without delaying operations.

Not only did we deliver the right equipment, we also brought a third party contractor on board to complete the installation, and engineered the drawings required by BC Hydro to approve the project.

The Result: A Major Setback Becomes a Minor Inconvenience

Thanks to Trinity’s comprehensive temporary power solution, our client was able to keep to their production schedule as planned, allowing them to find a permanent solution without compromising their projects.