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After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

RWSGFY says

After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

Same, but at least I bought it at Costco maybe I'll return it some day.

RC2006 says

RWSGFY says

After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

Same, but at least I bought it at Costco maybe I'll return it some day.

Don't return it. Keep it. I presume you're urban/suburban. If the power is out 24-36 hours all the food in your fridge is trash. Frozen or not. Even if you keep it closed. 4 hour 40º rule. Most fridges are 34-36º so that will go first. Freezer generally 0ºF. 36 hours that's toast too. If I didn't have one I'd be looking at $800-1k worth of food trashed.

I think everyone should have a decent sized portable generator and 5gal of fuel on hand at all times. Obviously the whole home systems are ideal, but then you're reliant on the natural gas system/piping. Battery storage is insanely expensive still to run a house for very long. So a portable gas generator could save your food source for quite some time.

I'm not a prepper by any means, but these are things I just have. Propane heater that is suitable for indoor use is another biggie in cold climate. If it's 20ºF I have one that could keep the house at 50ºF along with wood burning fireplace. Grab some blankets and watch a movie. It's a cheap insurance policy.

No one thinks it will happen to them until it does. We've have state highways shut down for 2-3 days and same with power. It's generally cold though when that happens, so we can always put food outside. Electric is important, but usually it's heat for us.

If you're looking for a hobby drones are good. I have 6 lipo batteries that can charge anything basic like phones and computers for probably 6 weeks. Solar backup battery pack to keep phones charged as well. Ultimately good 'ole crude and a generator will do you good. I'd keep it.

WookieMan says

RC2006 says

RWSGFY says

After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

Same, but at least I bought it at Costco maybe I'll return it some day.

Don't return it. Keep it. I presume you're urban/suburban. If the power is out 24-36 hours all the food in your fridge is trash. Frozen or not. Even if you keep it closed. 4 hour 40º rule. Most fridges are 34-36º so that will go first. Freezer generally 0ºF. 36 hours that's toast too. If I didn't have one I'd be looking at $800-1k worth of food trashed.

I think everyone should have a decent sized portable generator and 5gal of fuel on hand at all times. Obviously the whole home systems are ideal, but then you're reliant on the natural gas ...

I'll probably keep it. I've also been getting large UPS battery that are almost new from industrial UPSs that fail from electronic issues at work.

My generator is dual fuel and I always keep at least a few tanks of propane that are full, each one is good for 20 or so hrs.

RC2006 says

RWSGFY says

After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

Same, but at least I bought it at Costco maybe I'll return it some day.

They eon't accept it back after 6 month.

A fire at a PG&E battery storage facility in Moss Landing, Calif., just south of the San Francisco Bay Area, triggered road closures and a shelter-in-place warning on Tuesday afternoon, officials said. Caltrans said the fire is at an energy plant.

The fire started at 1:30 a.m. today in one Tesla Megapack at PG&E's Elkhorn Battery Storage facility that's near the Moss Landing Power Plant, the utility said in a statement.

A section of Highway 1 is closed, the Monterey County Sheriff's Office said. Southbound traffic is stopped at Struve Road and northbound at Potrero Road and Dolan Road at Via Tanques. A shelter-in-place order was issued for the areas of Moss Landing west of Dolan Road via Tanques, south of Struve Road and north of Potrero Road.

"There is an ongoing hazardous materials incident in Moss Landing," emergency services said. "Please shut your windows and turn off your ventilation systems. In the event of changing weather patterns, impacted areas may change."

California can't provide reliable basic services like electricity and water. BASIC SHIT! When are the TikTok zombies going to wake up?

My friend in Santa Cruz just emailed me about the battery fire in Moss Landing.
They previously had a fire when guys were using cutting torches to dismantle an unused oil storage tank. I don't know if guys died then.
What the hell are batteries doing at a power plant anyway? It makes no sense to me.
If you drive a Tesla in N. California, you are charging it with the electricity generated by Moss Landing (burning natural gas).
We should run our cars on natural gas and we'd avoid a lot of trouble; they can all do it except diesels of course.

clambo says

What the hell are batteries doing at a power plant anyway? It makes no sense to me.
If you drive a Tesla in N. California, you are charging it with the electricity generated by Moss Landing (burning natural gas).

They added them as part of conversion from gas-powered station to "battery storage power station". It makes sense because of the existing grid connection.

What is this about "conversion" to battery storage?

Moss Landing is one of the largest fossil burning plants anywhere; California already doesn't have enough electricity.

clambo says

What is this about "conversion" to battery storage?

Moss Landing is one of the largest fossil burning plants anywhere; California already doesn't have enough electricity.

They have decomissioned half of it back in 2016 IIRC. Only half of gas generators are running now, hence the "excess capacity" for the grid connection.

I'm sure wiki has all the details.

RWSGFY says

RC2006 says

RWSGFY says

After reading a similar letter 3 or 4 years ago I bought a generator. The fucking thing is still sitting in my garage in its unopened box.

Same, but at least I bought it at Costco maybe I'll return it some day.

They eon't accept it back after 6 month.

Where doea it say 6 months its not one of the exceptions? Ive taken things back yeara later.

This reminds me of rolling blackouts when I was in the Dominican Republic in the late 1990s. Every hour for about 10 minutes power would go out in the restaurant or hotel I was visiting. I stayed at small hotels not the resort kind.

.

Hircus says

Gotta love CA democrat government management of the power grid.

A lot of this is a manufactured crisis to condition the masses or population.

One intent is to get the masses to beg for government subsidies of solar and wind as a solution to the Democrat-manufactured crisis.

.

RC2006 says

My generator is dual fuel and I always keep at least a few tanks of propane that are full, each one is good for 20 or so hrs.

That's very wise. One problem with gasoline is that it goes bad after a year or two. Perhaps you could syphon gasoline from a car, too. (Yay gasoline cars!)

I have a pair of 5 gallon cylinders. I usually wait (several years) until one is completely empty and the other is light before refilling. Probably should start refilling a single one as soon as it is empty. I also have a few of the smaller (1 quart?) green canisters which I refill from the large ones. I'm never buying the small ones again after buying the refill adapter!

Since I live in the expensive part of Sunnyvale, I figure any outages would be very high priority, so haven't looked at getting a generator. So far (18 years) I've been OK! There was an outage in Cupertino where a backhoe hit a buried line and took out thousands of homes for a week, though!

SunnyvaleCA says

One problem with gasoline is that it goes bad after a year or two.

I was unaware of this.

https://www.hsoil.com/does-gas-expire.html

SunnyvaleCA says

RC2006 says

My generator is dual fuel and I always keep at least a few tanks of propane that are full, each one is good for 20 or so hrs.

That's very wise. One problem with gasoline is that it goes bad after a year or two. Perhaps you could syphon gasoline from a car, too. (Yay gasoline cars!)

I have a pair of 5 gallon cylinders. I usually wait (several years) until one is completely empty and the other is light before refilling. Probably should start refilling a single one as soon as it is empty. I also have a few of the smaller (1 quart?) green canisters which I refill from the large ones. I'm never buying the small ones again after buying the refill adapter!

Since I live in the expensive part of Sunnyvale, I figure any outages would be very high priority, so haven't looked at getting a generator. So far (18 years) I've been OK! There was an outage in Cupertino w...

It's illegal to transport refilled green cylinders.

PS. You can buy refillable ones of the same dimensions.