Be Prepared

[abc_123]

I'm no longer in fairfax, but durning smowmageddon we were without power for 4 days but had the gas grills, gas water heater and a kerosene heater to keep us above freezing as we hibernated in the basement listening to the superbowl on the batter powered radio.

Being without power in 100deg heat would be worse. I'd think.

[The Reaper]

Originally Posted by booker

Most of the area around me was without power yesterday. We are on the same loop as one of the DoD facilities, so we had power up much quicker that those further out. From what I understand Verizon cell phones were out all through here as well. I got a ham license for this very reason. My mother lives in WV still, and she made the rounds to all her elderly neighbors to recharge their refrigerators with her generator. They don't expect power for at least a few more days. There are more than a few granola head types out here who are pretty smug about having solar panels and the such right now.

On the topic of solar panels, has anyone looked at the solar generators that are out there (example http://www.thousandsuns.com/solarpod...FV4AodWnccEw)?

We were fine with our store of water and such, but it really got me thinking about a generator.

Solar's price per KWH make generators look cheap.

The panels themselves are incredibly expensive and have a life span of 20-25 years. The batteries you need to store the power for cloudy days and nighttime are only good for a few years too. Good for emergency charging or occasional small items, not ready for prime time if there is a utility line within a mile.

I hope they eventually come down in price and improve in efficiency enough to be practical. You would still need a battery bank, charge controller, inverter, etc. and a genset. Right now, a community nuclear reactor is about as practical.

TR

[JJ_BPK]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

Solar's price per KWH make generators look cheap.



TR

That's the problem with GREEN,, you pay 2,3 times as much..

We have friends on No Name Key, about a mile away. They have 40t'y some homes that never had power. Most gave up and sold. The ones that are still there are in the process of paying to have the island powered up. I think they chipped in 25K each to get the poles and will still get to pay to have their homes re-wired from DC to AC.

They think it will be cheaper in the long run..

Our friends were all solar, then switched to a 20KW Diesel gen set 5 yrs ago, and are now the chairpersons to push for power company to light them up..

Some people take longer than others...

[Flagg]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

Life without electricity is not kind to us in our modern hedonistic lifestyles.

That is why I recommend that everyone who can safely operate one get a generator. A basic unit which can run a few lights, fans, and maybe a fridge off an extension cord will run you $500-$1,000. Unfortunately, gasoline is dangerous to store in the home, and has a very limited shelf life. Even if you use fuel stabilizer, you need to rotate it at least annually. And, even if you store 25 gallons, that is only a couple of days of constant running for the 5KW gas powered generator.

If you have $5,000 or more, you can get a whole house model with an automatic transfer switch and hook it up to your NG or LP line. Note that if the power is out for an extended time, the Natural Gas lines will lose pressure when their generators run out of fuel and stop the genset. The LP is IMHO, the way to go, but it is more expensive.

Burning LP to power a 14KW genset at moderate load will use roughly 1.5 GPH of LP, or 36 GPD. That means it will cost about $100 per day to make electricity full time on about half my house (no dryer, range, ovens, water heaters, and only one of the HVAC units). The 14KW genset can, if used continuously, run about seven to ten days on a full 500 gallon tank under normal loads. The power company will provide power to everything for about $10 per day, so this is not something you want to do full time for an extended period. There are about 350 gallons of usable LP in a 500 gallon tank, and running it empty will currently cost roughly $1000 to fill.

You can use it for a couple of hours in the morning, and a couple of hours in the evening, and stretch it for almost two months, if it is full when you start. If we are without electricity for more than two months, we have bigger problems to worry about.

You can also use deep cycle batteries and an inverter to run small appliances like lights, fans, TVs, radios, etc. in the down cycle and recharge the battery bank when the generator is running. Or just use DC powered devices directly off the battery. You can buy most items in a DC version, if they are using a wall wart, or batteries, though some may be specialty items for camping, boats, or RVs.

I had a two tall pines less than 50 ft. from the house hit by a couple of lightning strikes recently. Ran in on the cable line and fried a lot of electronics. I recommend enhanced grounding, whole house surge protection, cable and phone line surge protectors, and point of service surge protection.

Still waiting to see if the trees die and have to be dropped. Hoping that I get to make the call, and they don't come down on their own.

Best of luck to those stuck in the dark and in this heat. Prayers out.

TR

We went months without power in my patch after a 2nd bad quake last year.

Here's some best practices that worked for us:

While PV may not be very cost effective, we have solar water heating and wetback woodstove heating that we installed quite inexpensively.

Stick N Click LED battery lights like these:

http://www.amazon.com/Ontel-SCN-MC12.../dp/B000J0NL8O

While it may not allow for the greatest illumination in the home, it does the job quite well when the alternative is a flashlight or nothing.

Diesel generators are typically more expensive, but pretty energy efficient compared with petrol.

When it comes to petrol and to a slightly lesser extent diesel, check insurance policies on quantities and conditions for home/garage storage of petrol/diesel. Depending on property layout and location a small external shed away from the house/garage can mitigate a possible insurance fire claim denial risk.

Energy draw on new appliance purchases such as deep freezer, fridge/freezer, and microwave may be worth taking into account to help manage a disaster plan with a gennie to reduce demand for limited petrol/diesel supply.

We mostly used click lights for light(recycling the rechargeable batteries with solar battery chargers) , woodburner/solar water heater for hot water, genset for keeping the freezer frozen(the bottom layer of the freezer containing ice filled containers for efficiency, extra freezer down time, and spare water in a worst case scenario), small lower draw microwave for cooking as well as a single burner LPG camp stove for cooking off of our LPG BBQ bottles.

It was a lousy period made much more comfortable than it would have been without a decent plan.

[Destrier]

http://www.vulcangasifier.com/

Check this out as well. It works, mine is in the garage. Runs a camp stove-BBQ and runs my gasoline generator with a converter on the carb.

[JJ_BPK]

Originally Posted by Destrier

Check this out as well.

Interesting,, Looks like a viable solution for someone in the boonies with access to FREE fuel in the woods??

What is the wood pellet/chip consumption rate??
What is the costs for the chips?
Can an inexpensive yard chipper provide what's needed??

[Diablo Blanco]

Originally Posted by JJ_BPK

Interesting,, Looks like a viable solution for someone in the boonies with access to FREE fuel in the woods??

What is the wood pellet/chip consumption rate??
What is the costs for the chips?
Can an inexpensive yard chipper provide what's needed??

I'd be interested to know this as well and
o which type/brand of generator this setup works best with
o what additional maintenance would need to be performed, how often
o are there plans to make one online somewhere?

[Destrier]

A small wood chipper should would work well.

Some use pellets, not something I would do since there is a cost involved.

I am using hand cut small wood blocks, and pieces from the limbs of trees I log from the property. A full hopper is about a ten gallon pail and lasts about 4-5 hours based on wood type.

Which for me is going to be plenty of time to run my major appliances for the day and recharge Batts. However that is not tested yet and is still only my best estimate.

I am using soft maple primarily. Wood consumption also depends on what your fueling, I am fueling a small 5kw generator. It starts best with crushed charcoal and the wood on top of it in the hopper. I am currently testing using charcoal lumps from my wood burner and crushing them, that I get from the ash daily during the winter.

This system does require some labor, but when the alternative is zero gasoline or diesel available, time may be more available. The generator can still be run on gasoline by switching the valve. It can also be run on propane so I have a friend altering our intake to allow us to switch between, biofuel, a propane tank from my grill and the gasoline tank.

I am still in the testing stage but so far all is looking good. I plan on getting a dump truck of wood chips from a local logger that I worked with awhile ago briefly.

Gasifiers are not new technology. They were utilized in World War 2 and many homemade styles are out there. The United States sent about a million units to post WW@ Europe and they were thrown on tractors and trucks to keep the farms going etc.

The one I have acquired is from MAtt in Michigan and the unit is well built and the cost was reasonable. If your online looking there are some over the top expensive ones out there as well.

I will do more testing but mine is working out fairly well. The interesting thing to me is that the smoke from the gasifier is also turned into the biofuel-gas and enters the carb, so the only smoke is the exhaust of the generator.

A friend and I are also working on my inverter-batts etc to run the house. That will be another month probably even though I have all the equipment on hand.

Time is my limited resource at present.

Doing more horse fencing this week, I will try to post a few pictures of mine working next time I run it.

Apologies for the rambled post, am running out the door to feed horses and get fencing done.

[Mills]

Originally Posted by Destrier

A small wood chipper should would work well.

Some use pellets, not something I would do since there is a cost involved.

I am using hand cut small wood blocks, and pieces from the limbs of trees I log from the property. A full hopper is about a ten gallon pail and lasts about 4-5 hours based on wood type.

Which for me is going to be plenty of time to run my major appliances for the day and recharge Batts. However that is not tested yet and is still only my best estimate.

I am using soft maple primarily. Wood consumption also depends on what your fueling, I am fueling a small 5kw generator. It starts best with crushed charcoal and the wood on top of it in the hopper. I am currently testing using charcoal lumps from my wood burner and crushing them, that I get from the ash daily during the winter.

This system does require some labor, but when the alternative is zero gasoline or diesel available, time may be more available. The generator can still be run on gasoline by switching the valve. It can also be run on propane so I have a friend altering our intake to allow us to switch between, biofuel, a propane tank from my grill and the gasoline tank.

I am still in the testing stage but so far all is looking good. I plan on getting a dump truck of wood chips from a local logger that I worked with awhile ago briefly.

Gasifiers are not new technology. They were utilized in World War 2 and many homemade styles are out there. The United States sent about a million units to post WW@ Europe and they were thrown on tractors and trucks to keep the farms going etc.

The one I have acquired is from MAtt in Michigan and the unit is well built and the cost was reasonable. If your online looking there are some over the top expensive ones out there as well.

I will do more testing but mine is working out fairly well. The interesting thing to me is that the smoke from the gasifier is also turned into the biofuel-gas and enters the carb, so the only smoke is the exhaust of the generator.

A friend and I are also working on my inverter-batts etc to run the house. That will be another month probably even though I have all the equipment on hand.

Time is my limited resource at present.

Doing more horse fencing this week, I will try to post a few pictures of mine working next time I run it.

Apologies for the rambled post, am running out the door to feed horses and get fencing done.

Great info. I live on a few acres right now and have plenty of trees that could come down in the event of an overall power outage. My generator on the other hands is somewhat old, it is a mid 90's Generac 5400 series. However I think it would do the job in regards to operating minimal appliances and charging batteries. Something like this would sure come in handy if I could get my hands on a yard chipper.

[Gold Eagle]

Originally Posted by The Reaper

The intent of this thread is to discuss Disaster Preparedness and assist members of PS.com with their personal disaster planning.

We do not specifically teach disaster preparedness or urban/suburban survival in the SF Qualification Course or SERE. Having said that, with a few exceptions, the survival needs are the same.

Last year, I was asked to prepare a briefing on Terrorism preparedness for corporate managers. One of the first things I noted was that the preparations were very similar to those for natural disasters, and that the disasters were much more likely at any given location than a terrorist act. I would say that any significant disruption of basic services to a large number of people qualifies as a disaster. The Department of Transportation defines it as any occurrence that causes damage, ecological destruction, loss of human lives, or deterioration of health and health services on a scale sufficient to warrant an extraordinary response from outside the affected community area.

Regardless of how you define it, the disaster preparation process looks something like this:

Disaster Preparation

1. Identify/prioritize likely threats or disasters.
2. ID resources (internal and external)
3. Develop Courses of Action using a decision making process
4. Initiate disaster preparation; acquire skills, materials, etc.
5. Establish responsibilities, conduct rehearsals, conduct internal and external quality assurance checks, document, revise and repeat.

How you prepare for disasters will depend on the threats you face and the remaining social structure you anticipate during and after a catastrophe. A disaster can be natural, or manmade. It could be pandemic, a hurricane, a wildfire, an earthquake, a flood, or a war. It is likely that sometime in your life, no matter where you live, you will be without normal amenities for an extended period of days, weeks, or even more. A facility based analysis of disaster threats would look as follows.

Disaster Analysis

Frequency of Occurrence:

• Highly likely (Near 100% probability in the next year)
• Likely (Between 10% and 100% probability in the next year, or at least one chance in the next 10 years)
• Possible (Between 1% and 10% probability in the next year, or at least one chance in the next 100 years)
• Unlikely (Less than 1% probability in the next 100 years)

Seasonal pattern?

• No
• Yes. Specify season(s) when hazard occurs:

Potential Impact:

• Catastrophic (Multiple deaths; shutdown of critical facilities for 1 month or more; more than 50% of property severely damaged)
• Critical (Injuries or illness resulting in permanent disability; shutdown of critical facilities for at least 2 weeks; 25% to 50% of property severely damaged)
• Limited (Temporary injuries; shutdown of critical facilities for 1-2 weeks; 10% to 25% of property severely damaged)
• Negligible (Injuries treatable with first aid; shutdown of critical facilities for 24 hours or less; less than 10% of property severely damaged)

Are any areas or facilities more likely to be affected (e.g., air, water, or land; infrastructure)? If so, which?

Speed of Onset:

• Minimal or no warning
• 6 to 12 hours warning
• 12 to 24 hours warning
• More than 24 hours warning

Potential for Cascading Effects?

• No
• Yes. Specify effects:

After living in Hawaii, Central America, the Caribbean, and the US on the Eastern Seaboard and Gulf coasts, I can tell you that when the hurricane is a few days out is no time to prepare a plan and to try to buy your necessities. Given the projections, when Phase V of a pandemic occurs, you will be unlikely to be able to acquire sufficient quantities of supplies to make survival somewhat more comfortable. You need to identify required resources, determine what you have on hand and what you will require, prioritize them according to relative importance, likelihood of need, and consequences, and develop an acquisition plan to meet your needs in a logical fashion (in accordance with your means).

The survival saw goes that you can survive six minutes without air, six days without water, and six weeks without food. While that is generally true, in each of those cases, you will not be doing much effectively after the first third of the respective period expires. It is up to you to see that you and any dependents have their needs (not necessarily wants) taken care of. It is not the government’s responsibility to take care of you, regardless of what our entitlement society's members believe. Those who expect the government to take care of them, review the Katrina tapes. Do you want to be airlifted off your roof to move to the Super Dome? Even well-meaning citizens will scramble and loot when they think they are going to run out of food and water and they see others getting away with it. You saw the looting of stores. If you are going to be the only one on the block with lights on and a generator humming away, once the stores are empty, guess where they are headed?

Thanks to modern transportation and economic efficiencies, your local box store or grocery has no attached warehouse. Everything they have is on the shelf, and to save money and space, it is normally only a few days of merchandise. If you live in an area that occasionally gets snow or hurricanes, you know what happens to the perishables and common necessities like bread, milk, eggs, batteries, bottled water, etc. There will not be more stuff appearing on the shelf until the trucks (and drivers) can get from the warehouse to the stores, and the stores have enough workers to open for business. There will be no more coming to the warehouse till the trucks (and drivers) get it from the distributors and wholesalers. Due to “Just in Time” manufacturing, there will be no more for them until the manufacturers (or growers, in the case of food) get their workers back on the jobs and their parts and components from the sub contractors, or increasingly today, the ports where they are brought in. The component makers will need labor and raw materials. You can see where this is headed. In the US, we live about 48 hours from a disaster. In the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, you saw what is likely to happen in the event of a localized catastrophe, with the rest of the country outside of the few affected states available to respond. Society imploded. Imagine what it would be like if the region, the country, the continent, or the world, are all experiencing their own disasters and are not available to help. The mobs looting and roaming the streets looking for food, booze, drugs, guns, or victims could be your neighbors. You need to decide now if you are going to be a sheep, a wolf, or a sheepdog, and prepare accordingly.

Next, you need to analyze your most likely courses of action. Will you stay where you are or move elsewhere to unite with others or to get away from them? This is an important consideration. If you live in NYC, any disaster of more than a few days is going to be difficult to survive and will require a lot of planning and preparation. If you saw New Orleans in the wake of Hurricane Katrina, you might want to reconsider planning to remain in an urban area during a catastrophe of any duration. There will be little food and clean water, and the wolves will be taking what they need from the sheep. If you are going to relocate, you need to prepare in case you are stuck where you are, and for your destination as well. This means that you will need to ensure that you have the ability to relocate, to include reliable transportation, adequate fuel, a plan to pack what you need to take and secure your home in a certain amount of time, a route (and timeline) that will not leave you stuck on the highway when disaster occurs, and that your destination will be ready when you arrive. If you saw the highways outside of New Orleans and Houston just prior to their anticipated disasters last year, you can see the fallacy of waiting too late to initiate your plan or of not having reliable transportation. This decision can have a number of branches and sequels, depending on the nature of the disaster, prep/warning time, etc. The time to work all of that out is now. If you live in East Nowhere, Oklahoma, you will also need to prepare, but you may not need to travel. Now is the time to sit down and war game what could happen, starting with the most likely/most dangerous contingencies. If you live in the Rockies, a hurricane may be unlikely and relatively less important to you than someone in Florida, who will not be very concerned with an avalanche or blizzard. Work your way down to the lesser events. Plan your fight, then fight your plan, but remain flexible. You always want to have a contingency plan or two. That hurricane may zig, rather than zag. The epidemic may start next month, rather than next year. You may be hundreds of miles from home when the disaster strikes and you may be in a completely different situation at that location, better or worse.

Is there a QP recommended way to store water in a Camel back type pack? Our water is from a well and treated only through a water softener and economical filter.

[The Reaper]

I would not want to leave even treated water in a Camelbak for more than 30 days.

I am pretty sure that you can add sufficent chlorine to keep it safe for that long. The correct amount would depend on the volume of water you were storing. Then rotate it every month or so.

TR

[Crue]

Day 4 so far of no power here in NJ. I am lucky that I only had some minor damage to my fence and believe in preparing.

I am sitting in my truck with my laptop/verizon air card plugged into a power inverter and have a few observations so far ( most pretty obvious but maybe worth repeating)

-Gas is next to impossible to get. Most stations have the gas in their tanks but no way to get it out. A couple resourceful guys down the street rigged up a hand cranked pump and were slowly getting gas out to people. No idea what they were paying. Defiantly was a reminder to look into getting a similar system for myself.

-Generators are loud. I can stand outside at night and pretty much pinpoint the houses that have them. I do not have one ( I will be checking craigslist a week or so after this all passes though ) but if I did I think I would only run it during extremely cold weather to keep the pipes from freezing in my house.

-Switching from a relatively healthy diet to a canned/shelf stable diet will reek havoc on your digestive system. I will spare the gory details but it is something to keep in mind.

- I am was more than prepared for this but my wife thinks it is just terrible what we are going through. I wish I would have thought of having more stuff on hand to keep her busy. Boredom is definitely a problem. I have yet been unsuccessful in getting her to sleep through the coldest/darkest part of the night and awake during the day. She is just not used to living without electricity. I can only imagine what those with kids are going through.

-Looting seems like only a minor problem around here. National Guard was called in pretty fast and curfew put in place. Neighbors are all usually outside during the day and keep an eye out on strangers that come through, which there is a lot of. I am assuming most of these strangers are contractors but I know that there are some wolves out prowling.

-Cell networks went down immediately. Luckily my relatives/family friends figured out to call and check in with a relative out of state. It probably is a wise idea to have something more formal set up. Trying to get a hold of someone in New York was next to impossible. It would make more sense to have a comm plan that involved checking in with someone a few states away instead of waiting for the stars to align and having two cells connect to each other.

[The Reaper]

Crue:

You don't need an inverter for a laptop, if you have the cigarette lighter charging plug for it.

We got hit hard by a hurricane in Hawaii many years ago. The motor pool POL point had no power and we could not pump gas. I took the cover off the base of the pump, got some jumper cables and a 1.5KW genset and hooked the power directly to the pump motor (hey, I was young and bulletproof back then). We were the only unit in the division with a functioning gas pump. If it is your supply, or no one has to account for the fuel, a 12v. electric fuel pump with a long inlet hose will work for siphoning or for drawing fuel up from the underground tanks. Slow, but it works.

Some generators are loud, especially cheap ones. Good portables, like Hondas and Yamahas, and good standby generators, like Kohlers, are much quieter. I have seen some that you had to put a hand on to verify that they were running. That (and the fact that the small ones sip gas) could make it very handy if you wanted to keep a low profile.

If you are eating the canned stuff to start with, there should be no upset when the power fails.

Board games for the wife, or a tablet with lots of books and movies. They run/charge off the lighter as well.

You can use a 12v. splitter in the car and plug in several things at once. If you want to cook, look at Amazon and search for 12 v. cooking or trucker cooking. They make 12v. slow cookers, coffee pots, immersion heaters, etc. I would run my car's engine when using higher draw appliances.

Or, if you have a deep cycle battery (do not use a car battery for this, it can't take the deep discharges), you can charge it off your car with jumper cables, and then use it as a portable power source. Just try not to run it out of power, it is hard on the battery. I prefer not to discharge mine below 50% unless it is absolutely necessary.

What is your normal heat source? Do you have gas, fuel oil, or a fireplace?

Ham radio with a patch should be able to work regardless of the networks. More modern is not always more reliable. Think PACE.

A good visible presence will discourage many looking for something to steal. You might want to keep your eyes open at night.

Glad to hear that you are alive and doing well. Hang in there and stay alert.

TR

[Pete]

It's interesting to note that within 24 hours some folks were hollering for Food, Batteries and Fuel.

More by 48 hours - and now in some parts - according to the news - it's starting to get real testy.

Food, Batteries and Fuel are things you use every day. When given notice that a major storm is going to hit your area how hard is it to start buying the basics a few days out? Too hard for many it appears.

Crue had a plan - it appears many of the neighbors in the greater area didn't.

Oh, well........

[JJ_BPK]

Glad you're surviving.

A couple observations to your points.. We have had two major and 11?? minor canes here in the last 16 yrs.

Originally Posted by Crue

Day 4 so far of no power here in NJ. I am lucky that I only had some minor damage to my fence and believe in preparing.

I am sitting in my truck with my laptop/verizon air card plugged into a power inverter and have a few observations so far ( most pretty obvious but maybe worth repeating)

-Gas is next to impossible to get. Most stations have the gas in their tanks but no way to get it out. A couple resourceful guys down the street rigged up a hand cranked pump and were slowly getting gas out to people. No idea what they were paying. Defiantly was a reminder to look into getting a similar system for myself.

As we are on a rock, with boats, everyone has 6-8 gas cans(6-7 gal). They need to be rotated into the vehicles. Should last several days.


-Generators are loud. I can stand outside at night and pretty much pinpoint the houses that have them. I do not have one ( I will be checking craigslist a week or so after this all passes though ) but if I did I think I would only run it during extremely cold weather to keep the pipes from freezing in my house.

I have had a Honda 2500 for ever. It runs 12-14 hrs on 2.5 gals and is very quiet. They aren't cheap, but when your EL-Cheapo 5000 gensets from home depot run one(1) gal of gas an hour...


-Switching from a relatively healthy diet to a canned/shelf stable diet will reek havoc on your digestive system. I will spare the gory details but it is something to keep in mind.

Beans,, good fiber,, and they make music...


- I am was more than prepared for this but my wife thinks it is just terrible what we are going through. I wish I would have thought of having more stuff on hand to keep her busy. Boredom is definitely a problem. I have yet been unsuccessful in getting her to sleep through the coldest/darkest part of the night and awake during the day. She is just not used to living without electricity. I can only imagine what those with kids are going through.

My wife is an avid reader, storm coming,, she raids the local library for 8-10 books..

We also have neighborhood parties most every night. The comradeship is good mentally..



-Looting seems like only a minor problem around here. National Guard was called in pretty fast and curfew put in place. Neighbors are all usually outside during the day and keep an eye out on strangers that come through, which there is a lot of. I am assuming most of these strangers are contractors but I know that there are some wolves out prowling.

Be careful,, VERY careful of contractors. Warn all your neighbors to only deal with LOCALLY licensed and insured builders. South Florida lost 100+ million dollars from scam contractors during Andrew. Monroe country now has a ordinance that you need a unique county license, immaterial of any state or federal license your may have..

As far as prowlers,, not a problem when you can open carry on your property, besides it's 100 miles to the mainland on one 2-lane road..

-Cell networks went down immediately. Luckily my relatives/family friends figured out to call and check in with a relative out of state. It probably is a wise idea to have something more formal set up. Trying to get a hold of someone in New York was next to impossible. It would make more sense to have a comm plan that involved checking in with someone a few states away instead of waiting for the stars to align and having two cells connect to each other.

Our local code says ALL primary services (gas, LP, medical, radio and CELL) must have secured & sustainable self-powered systems. Also the Cell companies have 300 ft towers that are build to 250 MPH wind load.

Good Luck,, Be Careful...