Power plant & central plant management
Power plants and central plants get run to keep the complaints down — not to control what they cost. Nobody's job is tied to the budget the plant consumes, and deferred decisions quietly become capital emergencies.
We find that gap, put a dollar figure on every piece of it, and hand you the roadmap to take it back.
Illustrative. Every EMP™ builds this curve from your actual meter, fuel and maintenance records — then prices each hour of it.
The real issue
The biggest opportunity in an existing utility plant is almost never found in replacing equipment. It's found in understanding how the whole system actually operates — how load moves through it, what each hour costs, and which decisions are quietly compounding.
Traditional engineering firms start with a replacement list. We start with three years of your data and thirty years of running plants like yours. In that time we have never seen a fully optimized plant.
The math
Typical annual value identified per plant. We don't take an engagement unless we see a path to at least five times our cost.
The portfolio
Three kinds of asset, three different problems, one method. Pick the one that looks like yours.
Generating assets, where the measure is EBITDA, debt service coverage and what the plant is worth at exit. Outage execution and turbine condition drive most of it.
Carried the major load for Detroit's city steam system
A 65 MW turbine pushing up to 500,000 lb/hr of steam into a city district system, poorly maintained, with almost no documentation left behind by previous owners. We wrote the repair specification, ran a competitive bid evaluation across three turbine vendors, gap-analysed the plant's spares against what the outage would actually need, and trained the operations and maintenance departments on their own machine before anyone opened a casing.
When it came apart, the turbine had thrown a blade on the eleventh stage and lost a shroud on the fourth — neither of which anyone knew. Blades were reverse-engineered and manufactured while the rotor was in Houston. We also found the machine sitting ten mils low to the generator when it should have been ten mils high, and hydrogen seals bottoming out on the outer race so the inner rings could never float. That last finding is where the 85% hydrogen reduction came from: nobody had been hunting a leak, because nobody had established what normal looked like.
Repair spec written in-house · Competitive bid evaluation · ~$250K spares sourced against gap analysis · Controls and exciter modernization
Also in this category: emergency response for a Long Island City generating station, and gas turbine inlet air cooling at Brooklyn Navy Yard — both under our founder, detailed below.
Campus and community utility plants — fully integrated systems generating and distributing electricity, heat, cooling and domestic hot water 24/7. Four NYC campuses, including the second, third and fifth largest islanded microgrids in the continental United States.
#3 largest islanded microgrid, continental U.S.
A 45-day Black Plant modernization replaced 450+ isolation valves on temporary power and boilers — with full service to roughly 15,000 residents the entire time. Zero interruptions.
153 acres · 46 towers · 12 MW islanded CHP · No. 6 oil eliminated
#2 largest islanded microgrid, continental U.S.
The OEM said turbine #2 shouldn't be reassembled. We rebuilt it for about half the projected replacement cost — it came back 10% more efficient, with a ten-year warranty. Then we did the same to #1.
120 acres · 5,860 apartments · 21 MW islanded CHP · IUOE Local 94
High-pressure central steam · 4 × 100,000 lb/hr
A steam main expansion joint that drew $400–600K outside estimates was restored for roughly $80K using a different methodology — and practical boiler capacity went from 60,000 to 80,000 lb/hr on training and combustion discipline alone.
121 acres · 160+ buildings · ~12,000 apartments · $10M+ annual budget
#5 largest islanded microgrid, continental U.S.
Cross-connecting the gas supply means every boiler can now run from either service. The plant's largest single point of failure was removed without major construction.
26.7 acres · ~2,585 families · 6 MW islanded CHP · Mitchell-Lama
Owners and managers responsible for hundreds of boiler rooms rather than one plant. The problem isn't any single room — it's that no two are assessed the same way, so there's no honest basis for deciding which site gets the money this year.
Multi-borough boiler inspection and grading programme
Every boiler room in the portfolio physically inspected against one standard checklist, photographed to a fixed convention, and scored on the BoilerRoomGrade™ scale. The output is a ranked portfolio rather than a stack of unrelated site reports — so capital goes where the evidence says it should, and the following year's re-inspection shows whether it worked.
Standardised field inspection · Photographic evidence per boiler · BoilerRoomGrade™ scoring · Annual re-inspection
Scope, scale and references for this engagement are available on request.
Where the method was built
The NYC portfolio is where our founder's method was proven at scale. These are the plants where it was learned — hospitals, universities, refineries, service academies and generating stations, going back thirty years.
The engineers I have shown this to have truly been awed.
Choreographed and executed as well planned outages should be.
Our alarms have been cut by 95%.
TheExperts Roster™
No four people carry every discipline a power plant or central plant needs. TheExperts Roster™ is our vetted network of specialist partners — each one a firm we have worked alongside in real plants, each one holding a defined discipline. When an EMP™ finds a problem, the person who fixes it is already on the roster.
Turbines, generators, motors, pumps and diesel engines — installation, overhaul and field service.
Boiler erection and repair, firetube fabrication, combustion systems and stud welding for outage work.
Valve service across multiple regional specialists, pipe fitting, expansion joints, insulation and hydraulics.
Steam plant operations, distribution, traps and water-treatment chemistry.
Switchgear and breakers, I&C, DCS and PLC integration, telemetry and electrical engineering.
Air and water permitting, SCR catalyst systems, environmental advisory and environmental law.
Outage management, NDE testing, scaffolding access, chillers and prefabricated modular systems.
Power markets, microgrids, solar EPC, equipment rental and large-firm engineering.
Safety, procurement and rep management, legal agreements, insurance and brand merchandise.
No discipline matches that search.
Partner firms, named leads, coverage and proof points are provided with the full roster on request — or as part of any EMP™ engagement.
What we do
Whether it is a campus utility plant, a merchant generating asset, or two hundred boiler rooms across a housing portfolio, the approach is the same: measure it against a written standard, put a dollar figure on every gap, then decide together how far we go.
For power plant owners, private equity sponsors and asset managers. The question here isn't comfort — it's EBITDA, debt service coverage and what the asset is worth at exit. O&M+™ bundles the three things owners need but rarely get together: a diagnostic that finds the money, outage management that protects schedule and budget, and long-term service cover that closes the gaps an OEM agreement leaves open.
Figures on this track are engagement targets and typical ranges, not results already booked. For work already delivered, see Detroit Renewable Power under Portfolio.
One engagement, three outcomes. Take the diagnostic on its own if you prefer — but the value compounds when outage execution and long-term cover are run against the same set of findings.
Step one · always
Opportunities Assessment
The diagnostic — always first
Dollarized PIM list
Then, if you want it
Total Outage Management
End-to-end planning and execution
No surprises at closeout
Then, if you want it
Long Term Service Agreement Plus
What OEM agreements don't cover
Covered, not just parts-covered
For hospitals, universities, housing cooperatives and campuses that own the plant their community depends on. Every engagement starts with an EMP™. What happens after it is your call — execute the roadmap yourself, or hand us progressively more of the plant.
Operating cost and capital figures are actual results from the four NYC campuses shown above.
Step one · always
Energy Master Plan
The diagnostic and 25-year roadmap
6–8 weeks · $100,000
Then, if you want it
Central Plant Management
Full operational oversight, 24/7/365
You pay for results
Then, if you want it
The Energy Coalition
Group purchasing and revenue
Plant becomes a profit center
Then, if you want it
Long Term Operating Agreement
Ten-year structure
Your balance sheet stays clean
For owners and managers responsible for many buildings rather than one plant. The problem at portfolio scale isn't any single boiler room — it's that no two are assessed the same way, so there is no honest basis for deciding which site gets the money this year. We put every room on one standard, then rank them.
Step one · always
Every room walked and recorded
One record per site
Then
BoilerRoomGrade™ scoring
Comparable, site to site
Then
One plan across every site
Spend in the right order
Then, annually
Track drift, verify the work
Year over year
The diagnostic — always step one
Nothing gets recommended before it gets measured. Each track has its own entry-point diagnostic, and each one ends the same way — with a dollar figure against every gap and a decision that stays yours.
For power plants. We compare how your plant actually runs against our 28-process PowerPlantExcellence™ standard, then quantify what the gap is costing you. Every finding becomes a Profit Improvement Measure with a number attached and someone accountable for capturing it.
A dollarized PIM list ranked by impact, and an OA™ Report Card that keeps tracking each measure after the report is delivered — because savings that aren't tracked quietly come back.
We run three years of your actual records through PowerPlantExcellence™ and return a prioritized, dollarized list of the EBITDA improvement available in your plant — plus the roadmap to capture it. What you do with it is your decision.
Standard fee
$100,000 Billed in four $25,000 milestones. Travel and living expenses not included.A 25-year roadmap for OpEx, CapEx, emissions and risk — planned, not guessed. A dollarized gap list where every hole in the boat has a number on it. A staged plan that puts the top three first. And a path to execution, whether you run it yourself or deploy CPM™, TEC™ or LTOA™.
For building portfolios. One scoring standard applied to every boiler room you own, so that for the first time the sites can be compared with each other honestly — and capital can be argued for with evidence instead of whoever complained loudest.
The scale
A+ to F Sixteen grades. Always published with the underlying numeric score, so it is never mistaken for a NYC Local Law 33 energy grade.Every room graded, the portfolio ranked, and a photographic record per boiler that stands up when someone disputes what condition a site was in.
Published work
PowerPlantExcellence™ isn't a marketing name for a black box. It is a documented operating system — published, in print, and open to anyone who wants to check our work before they hire us.
The standards, KPIs and preventative-maintenance discipline that replaced a reactive culture at Parkchester, and that every EMP™ has been built on since. It covers how a plant should be measured, how operating decisions should be made, and why the biggest savings in a utility plant almost never come from new equipment.
Read it on Amazon
Jay Sikora
140 years of the American electric industry — how utilities went from gas lamps and isolated plants to the grid we now operate inside, and what that history says about the choices in front of plant owners today.
Jay Sikora
Jay writes continuously on plant operations, management and engineering practice — including The Power Chronicles series. The full catalogue is on his Amazon author page.
Questions we hear
Good. We don't replace them — we make them better, and we align their work to your budget. Most of what we find is not a staffing problem; it's a problem of nobody being accountable for what the plant costs.
The EMP™ finds savings before it recommends spending. And under an LTOA™, we fund the infrastructure ourselves at $0 CapEx to you.
The 25-year roadmap builds emissions targets and compliance costs into every decision — before the penalties arrive, not after. For Mitchell-Lama and other Article 320 properties, the deadline is later than most owners assume, which makes the planning window more valuable, not less.
We don't take engagements unless we see a path to at least five times our cost. In more than thirty years, we have never seen a fully optimized plant.
Measurable impact in 60 to 90 days. The first three improvements are typically fully captured within six to nine months.
Start here
Tell us what your plant is and what's worrying you about it. If we don't see the value, we'll say so on the call.
Opens in your email app so you keep a copy of what you sent. Prefer to just call? 908-770-4955.
References from ownership, management and plant leadership across the portfolio are available on request.
Jay Sikora
Principal
Prefer to put it straight in the diary? Pick a time that works and we will call you.
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