What do you all do to be prepared for long term power loss?

[Omega Woods]

For those who have said "We live in Yada yadaville and haven't lost power more than twice in the last 20 years", these times we're living in aren't out of the last 20 years. Forget those times my friends, these times be a changin. Have you not been watching? What are you talking about, "my power is so reliable". Lol.

I know we have some former lineman on this site who can speak to how easy it would be to take out our grid for a very long time. Especially with the supply chain issues, yeah, you all might want to rethink your security in the good ol power grid.

As I stated earlier, I work for a large utility company and have my entire adult life. I'm not ill-informed, but I am concerned. An EMP or similar attack (or a Carrington event) that damages transformers and switching relays would likely cause damage to the grid that would take months to years to repair. Here's one article of many describing the lead-time issues with large transformers :Supply shortages and an inflexible market give rise to high power transformer lead times | Wood Mackenzie

The power system of today appears to be incredibly reliable and it is, until it's not. It's gruesome to contemplate no power for six months or a year. Unthinkable. This thread has sort of turned into "What kind of generator to have and solar panels." Brother, stop and think about no power for a year. Please, I implore all of you to plan accordingly. That was @Yander 's real initial question. My answer is that I'm contingency planning for no power.

 

[ruffdog]

...........and it is gonna take much more than pray'in too.

 

[Too many Kubotas]

The power system of today appears to be incredibly reliable and it is, until it's not.

Those are key words in my mind.

Then again, I never expect anything to work like it's supposed to, even on a good day,

 

[drssg]

I can check my generator battery without having to start the generator. If it turns out not to be good, not passing a load test, I'll replace it or jump start the generator if that's what it takes.

In my case, the battery (a Group 31 Optima) is but a minor portion of what i want to keep working. I'll jump it if that's what turns out to be why the generator didn't start.That's painfully easy.

I just used the battery as an example. In our case, a circuit board got fried from a local lightning storm, and it required Generac repair service to replace the damaged component under warranty. The weekly test highlighted the issue and allowed me to schedule the repair before the next power outage.

 

[Hay Dude]

...........and it is gonna take much more than pray'in too.

Hmmm. It really isn’t, once you realize that all this, everything you see is in God’s hands. The power of prayer is something you just have to experience.

That doesn’t mean I won’t do everything I need to do to prolong my families life on earth, either. I have taken actions and continue to do so.

 

[FPGT72]

I'm working on building out a solar system with batteries. Even if I don't have everything off grid, having a bulk of it will make me a lot more comfortable if a long term outage occurs. The technology has only recently become cheap enough for it to be economical.

This set is down below $1500 now:

Will does some good work, he looks so darn young.

The folks over at DIYsolar.com are fantastic and really helpful. It would do anyone good to check them out over there if they plan on setting it up on their own.

 

[YanmarFever]

Omega, do those transformers by any chance have a lot of chinese parts in them?
Something tells me they do....

 

[FPGT72]

a generator is an emergency backup device. Weekly runs keep all parts lubed up, but more importantly makes sure it runs. I like heating mine fire up weekly. I have units with 1000’s of hours on them fire up weekly and no issues. Then again, ive seen units with 20 hrs with a blown engine. Who can say why it blew….but its nice to fix it in calm summer and not during a windy, raining power outage.

Mine also does a weekly test, and will run for 30min. That is long enough for it to get everything up to temp. They are really just bigger "lawn mower" engines. Everyone knows that those little batteries if left off a tender just don't do real well. It seems that if a machine has a real alternator the batteries seem to "live" longer. Before everything was on battery tenders I was lucky to get two years out of a lawnmower battery, now year 3 in only everything still cranks right up. The motorcycle has always lived on a tender, I had to replace its battery for the first time this year, the bike is a 17, so roughly 7 years on that original battery.....dat ain't bad.

 

[FPGT72]

Omega, do those transformers by any chance have a lot of chinese parts in them?
Something tells me they do....

The "grid" is pretty weak. It is going to be fairly easy to cause a fairly "large" outage.

 

[FPGT72]

Well….texas has alot of power loss issues. And then cant get power from another source.

The "cause" of their last major issue was largely self inflicted. The reason does not help much, as it did happen. Natural gas has a bit of "water" in it, and the cold caused that water to freeze in the gas turning it into a solid. That added to the "green" push their grid had was enough to make bad things happen when that cold snap came. It is just not suppose to get that cold in TX. They learned a great many lessons, some they will heed others not so much.