From licensed electrician to Critical Facilities Technician
A way in from outside the industry.
There’s a page for this pathway in , with its licences and local details.
What’s different
Comes in with the licence; learns the cooling plant, the site’s switching rules and how a live data centre controls change.
Skills to build
What a Critical Facilities Technician needs. Some of it will come with your background.
Site safety
- Assess risk and plan safe work Independent
- Electrical safety awareness Independent
- Work under a permit to work Independent
Procedures and documents
- Carry out a method of procedure (MOP) Independent
- Complete work orders and maintenance records Independent
- Keep the shift log and hand over Independent
- Follow an emergency operating procedure (EOP) Assisted
- Work within change management Assisted
Power transfer and generation
- Check the generator fuel system Independent
- Prime and behind-the-meter power Assisted
- Respond to a utility failure Assisted
- Start, load-test and stop a generator Assisted
- Transfer and retransfer at an ATS by hand Assisted
LV distribution
- Connect rack power and busway Independent
- Trace the power path and its redundancy Independent
- Operate LV switchboards and breakers Assisted
- Survey electrical plant with a thermal imager Assisted
- Work on in-rack DC busbars and power shelves Assisted
Monitoring and response
- Escalate to the right people Independent
- Keep incident tickets Independent
- Triage DCIM and BMS alarms Independent
- Read trends and capacity Assisted
Physical access and security
- Escort visitors and contractors Independent
- Work under the two-person rule Independent
Safe isolation
- Isolate and lock out a single energy source Independent
- Isolate mechanical and stored energy Independent
- Prove dead before touching Independent
- Remove isolations and restore plant Independent
- Isolate plant with several energy sources Assisted
Cooling plant
- Operate air handlers and respond to their faults Independent
- Psychrometrics and the thermal envelope Independent
- Operate chilled water pumps and valves Assisted
- Respond to rising temperatures Assisted
- Start, stop and change over chillers Assisted
Emergency response
- Rescue from a live electrical incident Independent
- Recognise and report a suspected cyber incident Assisted
BMS and fire
- Respond to a fire alarm Independent
- Fire system cause and effect Assisted
- Operate the BMS Assisted
Commissioning
- Work in a site that is part live and part under construction Independent
- Run functional performance tests Assisted
- Take part in integrated systems testing Assisted
UPS and batteries
- Inspect and test batteries Assisted
- Put a UPS into bypass and return it Assisted
- Respond to a UPS alarm Assisted
Liquid cooling
- Connect and disconnect a rack’s liquid loop Independent, desirable
- Liquid-cooled IT and its loops Independent, desirable
- Maintain filtration Independent, desirable
- Operate and monitor a CDU Independent, desirable
- Respond to a coolant leak or a CDU failure Independent, desirable
- Sample and test coolant Independent, desirable
Questions about data centre careers? Ask about data centre careers
Sources and licences
- Critical Facilities reference framework © Facility Labs. (CC BY 4.0)
- ISCO-08, International Labour Organization, as published in ESCO v1.2.1. This service uses the ESCO classification of the European Commission. (Commission Decision 2011/833/EU on the reuse of Commission documents)