Earlier quoted context omitted.
Even the high profile datacenters I had to deal with in Frankfurt had the same issues. There were regular maintenance tests where they made sure the generators were working properly... I can imagine this is more of a pray and sweat task than anything that's in your hands. I have no clue why this is the status quo though.
I wonder why we don't put battery backups in each server/switch/etc. Basically, just be a laptop in each 1U rack space instead of a desktop. Sure, you can't have much runtime, but if you got like 15 minutes for each device and it always worked, you could smooth over a lot of generator problems when something chews through the building's main grid connection.
It’s pretty common to have a rack of batteries that might serve an isle. The idea of these is that you’d have enough juice for the generator to kick in. You couldn’t run these for longer periods, and even if you could, you’d still have the AC unpowered, which would quickly lead to machines overheating and crashing. Plus the building access controls need powering too. As does lighting, and a whole host of other critical systems. But the AC alone is a far more significant problem than powering the racks. (I’ve worked in places when the AC has failed, it’s not fun. You’d be amazed how much heat those systems can kick out).