Fed up and cold, what do you do for power after the storm?
If you are living without power and or frustrated at the power failures impacting your neighborhood as a result of Tuesday’s wind storm and looking to buy a backup generator here’s an explainer.
The TL;DR:
If you have natural gas service: get a whole house natural gas generator with automatic switch over, pay for the annual service contract, and never worry about it again. If you don’t have natural gas service, the same setup but on a LPG tank is your answer. This will keep your food from spoiling and your whole life from being disrupted the next time the power goes out. Get the Generac and be normal and safe, Costco can hook you up with the details.
Below I’ll talk about options and variations, but mostly if you are frustrated and ready to throw cash at making this problem never happen to you again… that’s the story. Smaller, build your own, and portable systems are going to require more time and attention to cover your needs — and the thing you don’t want to be thinking and worrying about during an incident is providing for the basics like electricity.
Background Information: I live in the PNW, at the foothills of the Cascades east of Seattle. We have trees, tall trees, lots of them, and above ground power lines. This leads to wind-throw and frequent power outages. Also, people driving cars tend to crash into power poles from time to time, so my backup generator kicks in 10–15 times a year. Long outages tend to be less common; this will be the second 3-day outage over the last 9 years and by far the most wide-reaching. I replaced a 17 year old generator about 8 years ago and didn’t get the annual service agreement. Earlier this week my backup generator protested the lack of service by placing its oil outside the engine, this model starts itself monthly nominally to let you know before you need it if it is going to be a problem. Those starts and stops caused the oil cap to come off and allowed the oil to escape. Having an interest in self-preservation, it stopped rather than allow itself to run dry, which is generally a good thing but was certainly inconvenient for me to be trouble-shooting a generator failure at 3am during a storm. Fortunately, the fix was obvious, DYI, and swiftly accomplished.
Undecided with Matt Ferrell — Matt and his team review a lot of technology around climate solutions and specifically has been running a series in the context of his net zero home build. These two videos provide a good, quick, overview of the pieces and how they fit together. This channel is usually a good start to get into the right ballpark, but they aren’t experts in everything.
· Breakdown on installed Home Battery Backup System: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q7piAXkqvOM
· Top 5 home batteries: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Dr1VTc-io1k
Why and what is a backup generator?
Rare events are a bad time to make expensive purchase decisions as a general rule, but they do expose limitations in the systems we rely on every day. It sucks for the power to go out. If the power goes out long enough all the food in your fridge can spoil, if you have electric heat or hot water you don’t have any heat or hot water during the outage. If you have an electric car, you can’t recharge it during the outage. It is super inconvenient! Why do we get outages, even in cities? All kinds of reasons, mostly something touched a power line that shouldn’t. Sometimes it is a grey squirrel in a substation, sometimes it is a car knocking down a power pole. This time is was a bomb-cyclone knocking down trees all over Washington. Washington gets big storms, some bigger than others and some big storms on longer return cycles than others. In 1990 the I90 Floating bridge sunk during a Thanksgiving Day storm, these wind and rain events happen from time to time around here. We lost a lot of trees this time, and haven’t lost a lot of trees for a while (Ice storm of 2012?) so many folks are new to the area and haven’t seen that happen before.
If our power lines were underground our electricity delivery wouldn’t be susceptible to this kind of failure. But they aren’t, and we are, so you might be asking “what can I do about this?” I have a backup generator and 10–15 power outages throughout the year, most quite short in duration. It is great to have an answer for when the electrical grid fails and not so great that individuals have to cover up for the lack of reliability in our local power grid. If you have the space, need to the protection, and have the money you can take steps to ensure you have power through local and regional power outages. Depending on your needs and how long you want to protect yourself against outages for,
Batteries
Batteries are great, but they do not generate their own power. They store energy for later, which is super useful when the power is out! Sizing a battery for multi-day outages for a whole house backup is… a lot right now. You have all the expense, the size, the fire hazard, and… when the battery is out your power is still gone. You can’t recharge or refuel; you are just offline until the grid is back. So long as the outage is less than your capacity it works great, but if the outage runs longer you are out of luck.
Which battery chemistry?
LiFePO4 — Lithium Iron Phosphate is great for home systems and a favorite of off-grid installations and DYI setups. The chemistry is stable, long lasting, and works through many cycles. It is also fairly cheap for the power. LFP has been ascendant for a few years and while something better might be in development, this is fine and there is an advantage to not being in the first generation for these products.
We’ve got whole house units that integrate with your panel and electrical system and portable units that you plug appliances into, just like with fueled generators. For whole house units you’ll need an electrician, permits, and space for the battery near your panel. For portable systems you’ll just need a closet to keep it in and to remember to charge it before you need it. Costs are far more modest for portable systems than the whole house systems, you’ll be spending 10s of thousands of dollars for a whole home system, and at that cost you might not be happy with the limited outage resilience (e.g. you spend all that and might only get 2 days). Home systems tend to be modular, in ~10kWh chunks, so you can deploy as much or as little as you need to provide coverage.
The portable units go all the way down to small packs that’ll recharge your phone 5 times, so all possible price points, but this won’t run your major appliances and might not keep a space heater going for long (many space heaters draw 1500W and a big portable system with 20kW/h of storage will last half a day for $20k in portable battery systems — definitely better for point support for small devices and not trying to run big home loads).
Energy Storage
Mostly this is just about connecting the battery and product size you selected above to your panel or critical appliances. The below links connect you to what is out there, and these are all ‘viable options’ where your specific preferences will guide which one to actually purchase. Given past company behavior and duration in market, it is hard to look past the popular brands Anker and Ecoflow, which are just getting busy providing an easy to use product for end consumers. They won’t be the best value, unless you count how much you have to think about making and maintaining the legacy of this decision. Tesla is in the news, LG a big electronics brand to stand behind the product, Franklin and SolarEdge I’m not as familiar with.
House Installed (often solar integrated)
· Tesla Powerwall (https://www.tesla.com/powerwall)
· Franklin (https://www.franklinwh.com/)
· SolarEdge (https://www.solaredge.com/en/products/residential/storage-and-backup)
· LG Home Battery (https://www.lg.com/us/ess)
· Enphase IQ (https://enphase.com/homeowners/home-solar-batteries)
· Anker Solix (https://www.anker.com/anker-solix/home-backup-power)
Portable
Ecoflow (https://us.ecoflow.com/collections/whole-home-backup-power-solutions)
Bluetti Power (https://www.bluettipower.com/)
Jackery (https://www.jackery.com/)
Generation
Mostly this is just picking a brand to provide your engine that you use to turn your generator. Generac is a big ‘safe’ traditional brand in backup generation, CAT and Cummins for diesel on portable or job-site installations. At the smaller scale it is hard to beat a Honda for low-attention reliability. Physically, these will require a pad about 3’x6’ and conduits for natural gas and power to your natural gas line and electricity panel. The easiest way is for this to be located next to your house, but if you have space somewhere else you can run underground conduit to where it needs to go. If you have LPG you’ll have the tank(s) to locate as well. The Generator location should be clear of brush and debris accumulation, have good airflow, and good access for maintenance tasks (especially if you have to refuel frequently).
House Installed
Generac Guardian (https://www.generac.com/residential-products/standby-generators/)
Cummins (https://www.cummins.com/na/generators/home-standby)
Kohler (https://www.kohler.com/en/home-energy/home-generators)
Portable
There are many with output ranges from 1–20 kW at costs from $350-$5,000. Costco, Home Depot, Walmart, Tractor Supply, etc. You can pick one up and plug in your appliances and get things running. Important to remember these are outside machines, don’t run them inside, don’t run them in your closed garage. Buy an extension cord while you are there picking up your generator and fuel tanks. Plenty of brands, I don’t have a strong opinion about which you pick (most are probably rebranded hardware from the same manufacturer). Portable units are often Gasoline, which doesn’t store forever, see below on fuels.
Generac Portable Generator (https://www.generac.com/residential-products/portable-generators/)
Big Box Options: Honda, Westinghouse, WEN, Dewalt, Champion Power Equipment, Duromax, Briggs & Stratton, Pulsar, Ryobi, Sportsman, Powermate, A-iPower
Fuels (Source of Power)
Solar (or Wind) — If you’ve got the panels (or turbines) you can attempt multi-day backup with batteries, you could already have a battery system to collect your extra mid-day power and use it overnight. Challenges locally as Seattle has the solar insolence of Germany (lowest in the contiguous US) and tends to be cloudy and dark when backup power is needed most. Likely to fail in island mode for multi-day outages.
Natural Gas — Let the utility provide. If you’ve already got the natural gas hookup you can minimize local storage by using natural gas. Natural gas lines are buried and don’t frequently fail when the power lines come down.
LPG — Liquid Propane Gas — for long-duration coverage or off-grid demands an LPG powered generator is a common option. This is a go-to solution for rural installations, where the local utility hasn’t run a buried natural gas line to your location. LPG tanks come in all sizes, depending on how long you need to go between deliveries, how much you use, and how much LPG you are willing to physically have on-site. Both my grandparents had 1,000 gallon tanks that we played on as kids (submarines!), my neighbor has 120 gallons for his generator, despite the natural gas furnace — it’s a choice. If roads are blocked (trees, floods, snow) refueling is a risk to plan around.
Diesel or Gas — these are more conventional fuels and you’ll see a lot of crossover in hardware with portable or job-site units. Fuel storage and fuel availability is owner serviceable. Gas storage has aging issues — 6 months to 1 year storage is possible without degradation. For a standby generator you’ll have the risk of water, oxidation, or microbial growth between the times you need the generator and fuel storage. If you only stock up fuel when needed, you’ll run into everyone else’s emergency buying at the onset of the incident. Using old fuel might not be a show-stopper, it decreases performance and increases maintenance requirements, and your backup generator probably isn’t a finely tuned part of your electrical system. But if it stops working that’s a problem, and if you can’t refuel that’s also a problem. Horror stories have films and gels of growth in your disused fuel tank gumming up the works, one can filter fuels periodically (passing from tank to tank through a filter) or cycle out the fuel on a 6-month schedule. This may be cheap and easy up front but expensive in time and upkeep in service.
Of the fuels, Natural Gas and LPG are the easiest and most reliably available sources.
What do I have, what would I have in a perfect world?
In a perfect world I’d have a reliable grid connection with a battery buffering load spikes at my panel. With a 25kWh battery I could double my annual power delivered to my home from the grid while cutting by 30% the peak power draw from the grid. This is what we need *everywhere* to support broad electrification, where total energy use goes down but electricity demand goes way up and load spikes get more extreme. Power utilities should be installing these batteries in your panel to better provision their service and protect their systems; but we are a long way from there today.
For perfect world power generation/storage I’d love to leverage my ground source heat pump’s vast reservoir for storage to charge up multi-week thermal storage under my yard. My heat pump is a heating and cooling unit, not an electricity generation loop, so that’s not really possible out of the box. Solar and wind at my home are unreliable (wind for consistency, solar for siting reasons). I’m left with fueled options.
What I have is a 22kW natural gas generator (Generac Guardian) with automatic switch-over at the panel. My 200A panel is too much for the generator (because of code and configuration, the peak draw of 9kWh/h is less than the rated output from the generator) so not every circuit is on the backup. Unfortunately, the electrician made some decisions without consultation and made sure the dryer, central vacuum, and jacuzzi tub are on the generator but not the heat pump — so we’re keeping warm with space heaters right now. It is sub-optimal. I’m going to have to design a new panel and power solution and find someone to install it for me — but this is also something normal people should not have to do.
This storm isn’t our first power outage of 2024, and it won’t be the last. In 8 years, losing oil containment was the first problem we’ve had, and that’s a few minutes of maintenance and a new oil filter to resolve if I’m doing it myself (assuming I had the right oil and a replacement filter on hand, which I didn’t, but was able to find in short order). I’d prefer to have not encountered a maintenance issue in the middle of the night, but given the cost of repair (around $40) and the maintenance cost of the annual service ($700/year) I don’t regret making the trade-off. A whole house generator isn’t going to burn through the engine’s lifetime in terms of hours of service, it’ll be the degradation of time at work and I’ll just have to put it on the list of things to check as the season cycle going forward.
