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Sector · Energy · 29 Jul 2026

Tabletop script BS-3: black start without a hero narrative

Injects, island boundaries, and communication fails decide whether a plant survives a grid loss drill—energy resilience exercise script, not UPS cascade essays alone, not invoice autopsies, not demand-curve annotations.

Tabletop script BS-3: black start without a hero narrative

Exercise: BS-3 Black-start / island tabletop
Mode: Facilitator script with timed injects
Rule: No live switching in this run — decision quality only
Format: Script. Not a brochure about generators.

T+0 min — Inject 1

Facilitator: “Utility under-frequency; site disconnects. You have what is on the UPS islands and what you can start.”

Expected discussion: which islands are qualified (batteries, bypass truth, controls on-island).
Failure mode to listen for: “The diesel will save us” without crank path.

T+8 min — Inject 2

“Diesel #1 fails to crank. #2 is in maintenance.”

Expected: load shed list by process criticality — not by who shouts.
Listen for: attempts to keep packaging live while SIS cabinets brown out.

Tabletop participants around a single-line drawing

If the shed list is not written, the drill is karaoke.

T+15 min — Inject 3

“Radio channel congested. Only one satellite phone works.”

Expected: pre-assigned comms roles; scribe; no parallel unauthorized starts.
Listen for: three people calling the same vendor.

T+22 min — Inject 4

“Partial restore offered on Feeder B only. Feeder A still dark.”

Expected: which processes can accept single-feeder reclose without motor damage / reverse power surprises.
Listen for: “Just close it” without sync/check discipline.

T+35 min — Inject 5

“Rumor on the floor: ‘grid is back.’ It is not.”

Expected: authenticate with utility / control room before any close.
Listen for: bypass of the drill’s own authentication step.

Exercise inject card with time stamp and authentication prompt

Rumors are not interlocking.

Hot wash prompts (mandatory)

  1. Which load would you have shed first — and is it on paper?
  2. Which UPS island is fiction (bypass latched / controls off-island)?
  3. Who authenticates “grid back”?
  4. What decision took >5 minutes that should be a card?

Adjacent fences

UPS process-island cascades own failure trees for dips. Invoice autopsies own tariff lines. Demand-curve essays own interval peaks. BS-3 owns decision sequencing under grid loss. Do not buy a second diesel to skip a shed list.

Facilitator close

Score the drill on decision quality, not on optimism. A clean tabletop that exposes a missing shed list is a win. A heroic story without paper is a loss.

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