considering getting whole house generator

been seriously considering getting a whole house generator. Keep seeing on the news how vunerable our power grid system is. I have a small generator. Never had to use it in the 30 years i lived in my home. I live in New jersey and even when the power goes out for a storm it comes back on quickly. But it keeps nagging me in the back of my mind that i should get one.Especially when i watched 60 minutes report on Sunday. When i mention to my husband he says if the grid goes down there will be no gasoline to fuel it.Just curious what other people thoughts are.

originally posted by: HODOSKE
been seriously considering getting a whole house generator. Keep seeing on the news how vunerable our power grid system is. I have a small generator. Never had to use it in the 30 years i lived in my home. I live in New jersey and even when the power goes out for a storm it comes back on quickly. But it keeps nagging me in the back of my mind that i should get one.Especially when i watched 60 minutes report on Sunday. When i mention to my husband he says if the grid goes down there will be no gasoline to fuel it.Just curious what other people thoughts are.

You should absolutely get one. The ability to have functional electricity for keeping lights on, basic heating/cooling, keeping food cold, preparing food, showering, etc. during a major outage is priceless. Being without electricity for an extended length of time can become very unpleasant very quickly. If you can afford it it's a must-buy.

a reply to: HODOSKE

I have a Generac whole house one for a cabin up in the north Georgia mountains. It runs off propane, so mine will run for at least a few weeks with careful usage (320 gallon tank). So far the longest it's ran was 18 hours during a minor winter snow storm. With natural gas, yours probably wouldn't be able to run too long, but depending on where you are in NJ, propane may be an option.

a reply to: HODOSKE

You may wish to think about it this way.

If disruptions are short-term, having the generator AND a fuel supply for it will be very useful.

If disruptions are long-term ... whatever is going on may carry much more weight than keeping a generator running.

Another thing about long-term ... I think if gasoline sits in containers too long, it is no longer as combustible. I don't think it can be kept for years on end. So yeah, a source of supply for it during periods of disruption is something to think about.

ETA. Some interesting bits about fuel longevity here: rislone.com...

Cheers

a reply to: HODOSKE

Please do not wait until an emergency. Go out right now and see if it will even start after 30 years of sitting idle.

And yes you will need to store gasoline. I have a gas stored at my place, enough to run the home essentials for a month. Not everything at once but the essentials. Once a year, I recycle that stored gasoline into my vehicles and replenish it.

a reply to: HODOSKE

I've never been a fan of large scale generators unless they're communal. To me they represent a significant investment that puts all of your eggs into one basket.

You might be better off investing in a couple of small scale generator, one for your lights and one for key appliances like refrigeration system and a small number of electrical outlets. Plus some small scale solar charging electrical devices.

If one fails then at least you've got the other, and small generators are less likely to draw attention to your home. The sound of a large generator will carry for miles.

If you do have the spare money to invest in a larger generator, go for diesel rather than gasoline. It's safer as it's less flammable.

Being realistic, if the grid goes down for more than a week you're going to be in the kind of trouble that a generator won't get you out of. In which case you'd probably do better investing in propane cooking equipment, like you might get in an off grid cabin. Hot foot and boiling water are your friend more than your AC and TV.

originally posted by: TerryMcGuire
a reply to: HODOSKE

Please do not wait until an emergency. Go out right now and see if it will even start after 30 years of sitting idle.

So long as you regularly spin it up and do basic maintenance. If you leave it sitting idle for too long it will seize up, also bear in mind that things like transmission belts tend to degrade with time as well.

He should be concerned about losing power for even a couple days. You would lose everything in your fridge and freezer. I have a hybrid system. Four solar panels out in the yard, Battery bank in the garage, and three generators. One gen is the Honda 3000i to run the house if the batteries die. One small 4 stroke 700 watt generator, that can run about 14 hours on a gallon of gas. That one is for small appliances and for charging the battery bank. Another gen is an old, new stock Coleman 3000 watt gen for final emergency back up. I keep 40 gallons of preserved gas on hand at all time, switching it out for fresh every two years.

I had a friend that lost power after someone shot at a transformer on a pole. PG and E was angry and left the whole neighborhood without power for 2 weeks. garbage barrels were filled with rotting food. People sat in their hot houses in 100 degree weather, taking showers to cool off, or renting hotels. All generators in rental shops were rented and none available

a reply to: HODOSKE
Go with Propane if at all possible. Gasoline has a finite shelf life and is more dangerous to work with. Even if you don't currently have Propane installed at your house, you can probably run for days on a 40 pound portable tank as used in Propane barbecues and patio heaters. I switched from Gasoline to Propane 5 years ago.

My previous job I had 6 large scale generators ranging from 500 gal tanks to a bulk tank of 8000 gal of diesel where teh business relied heavily on refrigeration and were 100% redundant. Obviously it is a little different than home scenarios but principles will be the same. Maintenance is key as stated above and CANNOT be skipped. Many generators are complicated if you rely on automatic transferring etc. If you are manually transferring power it maybe isn't quite as big a deal. Would you be doing maintenance or a company because that will add cost.

If you go with a gas or diesel how big is you tank and how long will it run for? When it needs filling how are you going to fill it? We ran into significant problems during storms just getting fuel because of the high demand and we were buying it typically 3000-5000 gal at a time depending on what their truck would hold. In some cases we were down to just a few minutes of run time left before the trucks showed up. If you have a smaller consumer will you be able to find a vendor to supply a small tank if demand is high. If there is an ice storm etc will trucks even be able to get out to fill tanks? If you store fuel on-site how will you maintain it and keep it safe? The same principles apply to propane as well. Generators are nice when you have them but most people don't realize they are not just a set-it and forget it piece of equipment. They must be ran and they must be tested to ensure they work as intended

originally posted by: 1947boomer
a reply to: HODOSKE
Go with Propane if at all possible. Gasoline has a finite shelf life and is more dangerous to work with. Even if you don't currently have Propane installed at your house, you can probably run for days on a 40 pound portable tank as used in Propane barbecues and patio heaters. I switched from Gasoline to Propane 5 years ago.

As a bonus, you can cook and heat your home with propane, and run a refrigerator off of it, without the need for a generator. So even if the generator fails you can use the fuel. Plus it's silent and only uses fuel when in use.

We brought a couple of duel fuel refrigeration units and stove back in the 1990s, they can run for weeks on propane, and are completely silent.

a reply to: F2d5thCavv2

You'll be using Sta-Bil in the gasoline before storage. Most people would think the whole house jobs that run on natural gas are a good solution. However, if you're getting one in case of a long term grid failure, I would advise not to. Gas needs to be pumped like everything else - look at what happened last year.

www.nytimes.com...

My tiny home is off grid so if you're hell bent on a whole house solution, get a solar kit or panels, several deep cycle batteries and an inverter so you don't have to worry about fuel.

I'd also suggest not getting a giant whole house generator. If the grid does go down for an extended period and you have to bug out, the squatters will thank you very kindly. What I would do (actually did for the tiny home) is get a portable inverter generator of whatever size floats your boat.

You most certainly don't need to power every damned thing in your home all at the same time so you can sit and sip tea while the world falls apart. You need something to power what you need. That said, my inverter generator will run 16 hours on 1 gallon of gasoline and weighs under 60 pounds. That's what you want to shoot for.

a reply to: billxam

Thank you. People like you are surely better informed about the practical aspects of this than I. My last serious experience with generators was decades ago.



Cheers

a reply to: HODOSKE

If you live in the country get a fuel barrel and also a 1000 gallon lp tank if you've got the money and space.youll be living in luxury.

Sta-bil will allow gasoline to last at least 2 years.

Whole house gen- Your stuck at the house if you want to use it.

a reply to: HODOSKE

I have a Kohler 48 KW standby generator. it is supposed to be able to power everything in my house. I cannot vouch for how well it works in an outage because I have never lost power here, yet. Mine has the tri-fuel conversion kit to run on gasoline, LP, or propane.

I thought about putting in a whole house generator but when I talked to the Electrical inspector he told me that it would be a big enough expense that it would trigger the taxes on our property to go to the full appraised value, we would lose the taxable value here in Michigan which is in our case one third of what the top full value is. That would raise our taxes about twenty two hundred bucks a year....I am not a fool, I will keep the portable generator. I just put a new propane furnace in replacing the old fuel oil one, leased tank on blocks. That was not an improvement on the property, it was maintenance according to the township and county.....but they told me if I put in Natural gas, that unlocks the property value because it would increase the value of our property considerably...so I have propane, our propane won't come close to the twenty two hundred a year our taxes would go up.

Check with your county to see if this will effect your taxes on your house before you do this, they know about this kind of stuff and the local people working in the offices do not want us to suffer, but the people at the top might like the increase in revenue for the city or county....so make sure not to go too high up.

a reply to: HODOSKE

If it's a long term outage you would be much better off with solar panels.

I got a Generac stand alone, whole home installed last year . The gas company supplies the gas. It wasn’t cheap and I hired a qualified electrician and gas fitter to do the work. It is located outside near my electrical panel , so you need a good level spot it will sit on , near that side of your house. The gas company also had to come by and approve the meter. Mine had to be changed after they viewed my usage and what I wanted to operate with it. So all this goes into deciding which one is good for you.

When the power goes out, it detects that is a full outage, not blinking, before it comes on, which is about 8-20 seconds. All your stuff comes back on. Lights, heat, Cooking, TV, WIFI. It’s great! You don’t need to go out in a storm and set anything up. It’s automatic . Mine is quite noisy. This is just info on the type I got, I was so sick of freezing during winter storms. Best thing I ever got.

As to the power grid going down, yes it will work for that. It’s only failure on mine is if a pipeline suffered a cyber attack, which is extremely rare. Another thing to possibly consider as to the type you want to get.

a reply to: AaarghZombies
Ah yes. I’m getting a tune up done on mine once a year and it runs tests every two weeks. The one I chose was for convenience sake. I’m disabled and cannot do anything myself. So far I like it. Not used it in a SHTF scenario yet. Just a mini one where the power went out during the 45C heat dome. I was able to use the AC. I would have died if couldn’t cool off. 700 people did die here, as well as pets that we’re alive at bedtime but dead when the owners woke up.