Interesting thought as the wife came home today from work and she asked me, what would you do if electrical power was out for more than a month?

With all the uprising going on in the middle east I thought about this for awhile and said to her that this is a great discussion. So lets remember
no electric for pumping gas into your vehicle, portable fuel tanks, etc. Plus, it also means no water, (city pumps, cistern and well pumps) .
and no fuel (natural gas, electric furnace, propane , corn pellet stoves) where most of
these stoves need a blower to run except boiler).

If you live with a wood burning stove you can go for quite awhile. But lets get back to no-electric. How are you going to keep your refrigerator cold, freezer, BEER?

We have quite a bit of dried goods and cans that could provide us for about 2 months, This is just a
thought, but wondering if it really did happen!

Bartyr system with the tree huggers next door and they'er pedal generator....I'll provide protection, you rent me some space in yer fridge. Pedal faster, I hate warm beer.

Win Win(chester).

Ah of course, I forgot that BACKWARDS countries like USA and Australia do not yet have such modern conveniences as SOLAR CELLS and 12V Fridges.

I've been thinking about putting a manual pump on our well just for those occasions when we don't have power.

I couldn't find any full size 12 VDC fridges anywhere and I'd hate to think of how big a solar cell it would take to power one!

I'm gad I live close to the lake and have a lot of ammo for hunting. Lots of canned goods and wood at my disposal. I love living in the country.

Pumpkinslinger wrote:

I couldn't find any full size 12 VDC fridges anywhere and I'd hate to think of how big a solar cell it would take to power one!

Ah, but thats cheating!!

There are no mention on fridge sizes and restrictions for solar cell space.

Seriously, a good compression fridge are very economical, so with a 250 - 500 watts solar cell + deep cycle batteries arrangement it is definitely do able.
All you got to do is to ensure that you dont waste energy by opening the fridges unnecessarily.

Over here, I have seen farmers that keep stock medicine/food etc on small Engel fridges run with 12V battery + solar cell on their remote paddocks.
Heck, there are enough leftover power for remote sensing and radio as well.

Mind you most of the heat is happening on day time where the sun is hottest and brightest,
and at night, you only need small battery to keep running.
And Aussie is the Land Of The Sunshine, even in winter we got bright sun.

gas while you have it to run the barbie. white spirits & stove in the cupboard for hunting trips, wood in the shed and we can cook on the woodburning fireplace. candles in the cupboard. the freezer will keep for a week and we would have to eat fast after that. fish in the lake not too far away. ducks in less than 2 weeks time to eat too deer not far away. and I guess with no power there would be no work so lots of time to hunt.we had a big snow over here a few years back and some folks were without power for close to a month.nobody died and we had to get back to doing it simple. O guess the worst part would be no "Nut" fix.

Elvis has got it right...not at all difficult for us Nuts who are used to, or capable of, living off the land.

The fridge is not an unsolvable problem either. I remember as a kid my folks had a kerosine powered fridge. How hard would it be to knock something together like that again. Oh yeah...and I got me PIG, and a camp oven (dutch oven).

But seriously, that is a very interesting question you put up OV1...90% of people, if not more, in the modern countries could not survive for long. Now that is when you will need to ensure that you have a plentiful supply of boolits because I reckon crime would become rife.

Cheers, Vince

I live with a Mormon. I'm set to live without power for longer then a month. I do have a problem with pumkinslinger's hand pump for his well. My well is 350 feet deep. I'll need a generator.

4 years ago we were hit with a major ice storm that toppled electrical poles for miles. I had a generator with 5 gals of gas to power the boiler for heat as we are not allowed to have wood stoves due to insurance regulations. I could have a wood stove but premiums are astronomical.

Knowing the generator would only last about 3-4 days on a 5 gal supply and no way to refuel as the gas stations around a 40 mile radius were also with out power. I ended up buying a 12v - 120v dc inverter, new 12v car battery and wired it in to the boiler which kept us warm in Feb winter.

The food in the freezer was packed in 2 coolers and bought down to the tool shed to keep frozen. I also hooked up a small 10amp charger to the inverter to keep that car battery charged while running heat and lights. I do have a well in the back (hand pump) and that supplied water for drinking and the toilet.

I also had an electric 1 portable burner where we could cook hot meals and warm the baby bottles for next door neighbors infant. It took almost 3 weeks to get electric restored to our area and I have to say it was an eye opener as far as what to have during outage.

We were fortunate enough to have plenty of food, canned goods, kerosene lamps and good people. But like you said Vince, with the crisis in Japan, them people set the standard with almost non existence crime, looting etc. I'm sure it would be a different ballgame over here if the outage was to last for longer periods.

As far as the fridge, I took out a 12v/Lp gas powered unit out of a rv camper and its ready to keep the beer cold should something happen in summer time.

gelandangan wrote:

SOLAR CELLS and 12V Fridges.

Oh- we can get solar cells...but only on your roof, to create 110v to sell back to the crumbling grid, and, the install is like a million dollars.

I like the 12v idea though. I'd rip out the co-piot seat in my truck, plaster them things in the bed and have a keg-er-ator ridin' shotgun w/ a wig and lipstick on so I can cruise the HOV lanes while I'm sippin...cold beer AND I'
m not stuck in traffic.

Bushmaster wrote:

I live with a Mormon. I'm set to live without power for longer then a month. I do have a problem with pumkinslinger's hand pump for his well. My well is 350 feet deep. I'll need a generator.

Hey Bushy...you got two horses there to do the hard work for ya mate. I'm pretty confident with your expertise and abilities you could knock up a horse driven pump mate...and a generator of some sort.

Stovey wrote:

Oh- we can get solar cells...but only on your roof, to create 110v to sell back to the crumbling grid, and, the install is like a million dollars.

Solar cells are not really expensive over here for some reason. Check this out...this is a typical camp set up for charging deep cycle 12v batteries.

Solar Power

OV1 wrote:

I could have a wood stove but premiums are astronomical.

Are you allowed to have a wood fire in your back yard mate? I have built a hot water "system" for a camp site that is run on a wood fire and all you need is a 44 gallon drum and a 2 foot length of steel pipe the diameter of the larger hole in the top. Make a stand out of 4 steel fence posts crossed (2 by X)...put the drum on them on its side with the steel pipe to the top and angled slightly downwards. Cut a hole in the side uppermost towards what was the bottom of the drum. Fill it with water and build a fire under it. When you want hot water, put a bucket under the pipe (now the spout) and pour another bucket full of cold water into the opening you cut. Simple physics...the cold water sinks to the bottom and the hot water it displaces pours out the spout. We call them a Jumbo cause it sorta looks like an elephant. The other option is to build a "Donkey"...a vertical fire container with a water jacket around the outside. Connect a hosepipe to it and have an outlet as well.

Cheers, Vince

Here we are...the kerosene powered fridge. These things are not cheap, but they do an admirable job.

Kerosene Fridge

This is nothing like the one my folks had back in the 50's...theirs had a wooden cabinet and was not as tall.

Cheers, Vince

Solar cells are cheap when your not looking at units that are supposed to feed power back to the grid.

A 12V or 24V system can be made with car batteries on your roof for a much cheaper cost then a 120V system, and you will probably see some money back in real savings if you ran it all the time.

There are also tons of 12V appliances and the like available, and many times they are more efficient then the 120V ones so running them all off solar cells can work decently well.

Actually if I ever build a house, I am going to wire the house for both 120VAC and 12VDC probably, and run what I can off the panels (things that must work such as fridges). But things like computers and washing machines will be off the 120V.

Dimitri

Picked at random:
12 VDC fridge, 43 quart - $422 www.compactappliance.c...ge_Freezer

Solar panel big enough to power it and charge some batteries - $850 www.bcf.com.au/online-...escription
They don't give any physical dimensions.

Some time back I looked at using an effective (as in actually moving some air) 12 VDC fan in my truck camper and powering it with a solar panel. At the time I figured I'd need a panel somewhere around 2' x 3' to get enough current to drive the fan alone. I know that the panels are somewhat more efficient now than they were then (10 years ago) but you're still looking at a LARGE panel to get any serious amount of power.

A friend of mine has jumped on the solar power stuff hot and heavy. To put my house (14,000 sq ft) on solar was going to cost about $70,000. Not knocking it at all but, IMO, I don't think the technology is there yet.