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2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

bigblue_dl said:
What kW? I am not as familiar with residential/consumer sized versions, but if you're looking for something commercial sized (>150kW), I know quite a bit. My general recommendation is to stick with natural gas powered. If you go with diesel you have fuel storage issues that are now compounded by the use of biofuels. You can't just let diesel sit, unused, waiting for an emergency, it will go bad. I also wouldn't get anything gasoline powered, for similar reasons. It also helps that natural gas is and will be a cheaper fuel to run on, though in most applications there is a premium price put on the nat gas sets.
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I have 2 A/C systems in the house. One a larger one 3.5 tons (gas hot air) and a 2.0 ton (electric heat). 4 fridges (don't ask), and the usual household electronic stuff.

The goal is in the winter is to keep at least one of the heaters running and ditto in the summer with the A/C plus keep the rest of the house running at a minimal level. I THINK a 15Kw may work, but a 20Kw may be overkill.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

joecct said:
I have 2 A/C systems in the house. One a larger one 3.5 tons (gas hot air) and a 2.0 ton (electric heat). 4 fridges (don't ask), and the usual household electronic stuff.

The goal is in the winter is to keep at least one of the heaters running and ditto in the summer with the A/C plus keep the rest of the house running at a minimal level. I THINK a 15Kw may work, but a 20Kw may be overkill.
Click to expand...
Yeah, you probably wouldn't need more than a 15kW set. I would recommend working with a local electrical contractor, and see what they would have for you. You're going to want to put in a nice breaker/switch gear system that separates out your emergency essential power from your extras. They make pretty nice small emergency standby sets for homes that would probably work very well for what you need. I am pretty sure that my company exited that market a few years ago, but I would probably recommend Kohler, over some of the others, even though they are one of our competitors (though, if we exited the market, they really aren't in this case). Personally, I'd avoid Generac, we consider them to be pretty much junk. I'm not sure who else plays in that very low kW node market for home standby power. It is possible that we do, in that case, buy an Onan/Cummins genset. And for the CAT comment earlier, CAT has zero interest in playing in markets with engine this small.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

David Stern just said that Katrina hit NYC last night. Fail!
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

Ralph Baer said:
Studying all the Potomac tributary flow rates and heights http://waterdata.usgs.gov/md/nwis/current/?type=flow&group_key=basin_cd to see if a wall of water will be heading to us. (The link is only the ones in Maryland.) Interestingly, some are already going down, whle others aren't.
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The Potomac in DC is nearing flood stage http://waterdata.usgs.gov/md/nwis/uv/?site_no=01646500&PARAmeter_cd=00065,00060,62620,00062,00054. (See the gage height graph.)
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

we got through just fine although like millions of other have no electric power (at a local grocery store using their battery-powered wi-fi connection for now).

Regarding backup generator, I researched last fall after Irene and the Halloween snow storm and natural gas seems like the best way to go from my perspective as well. Gas service has never been disrupted here at least (being underground) and they have automatic sensors and connectors so that it turns on by itself even if you are away or asleep.

The trick is the venting, depends on local building codes whether you have to have it outdoors or whether you can have it indoors and vent it to a chimney.

They are a bit more expensive, several thousand dollars for the whole package (plumber for gas connection - electrician to connect to circuit breaker box plus the equipment).

Naturally after pricing it all out we decided not to buy one. :(
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

Have not heard from Dr. D. Hope he and Jenny are okay.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

DrD lives in Jersey, right? Anyone know what town?
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

jmh said:
DrD lives in Jersey, right? Anyone know what town?
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DrD and Jenny live in Ocean County (Brick, Toms River) just south of Asbury Park. I would guess that they are without power and other communications for a while. Hope all is well for them and the rest of our NJ posters. They got hammered.

Edit: Does anyone know if Lucy the Elephant survived?
 
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Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

As far as where we live, Irene was much worse than Sandy, because the winds were so much stronger. Much less wind damage around town this time (especially as all the weak limbs were blown off already last year!). The flooding here was not much worse this time than during Irene either.

However, for those along the shore (Long Island Sound, CT) further west, they really saw extreme flooding conditions. High tide plus storm surge plus the Sound narrows at it goes further west.

I haven't had any TV and the internet at the public library is glacial (half the town is here using their wifi, it seems!) It would be ironic if we had a repeat of Katrina in Greenwich (people being evacuated from their roof by helicopter because they ignored the mandatory evacuation orders).

Surviving quite well with no electricity at home. Very lucky: still have running water, hot water, and the range (oven doesn't work until power is back). The only problem would be if it gets cold, as our heating system requires electricity to circulate the hot water. Since the library has power we can recharge things here, and local stores have enough ice that we can keep food cold to avoid spoilage.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

joecct said:
DrD and Jenny live in Ocean County (Brick, Toms River) just south of Asbury Park. I would guess that they are without power and other communications for a while. Hope all is well for them and the rest of our NJ posters. They got hammered.

Edit: Does anyone know if Lucy the Elephant survived?
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39.000 still without power in Toms River. 3,000 turned back on yesterday.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

FreshFish said:
As far as where we live, Irene was much worse than Sandy, because the winds were so much stronger. Much less wind damage around town this time (especially as all the weak limbs were blown off already last year!). The flooding here was not much worse this time than during Irene either.

However, for those along the shore (Long Island Sound, CT) further west, they really saw extreme flooding conditions. High tide plus storm surge plus the Sound narrows at it goes further west.

I haven't had any TV and the internet at the public library is glacial (half the town is here using their wifi, it seems!) It would be ironic if we had a repeat of Katrina in Greenwich (people being evacuated from their roof by helicopter because they ignored the mandatory evacuation orders).

Surviving quite well with no electricity at home. Very lucky: still have running water, hot water, and the range (oven doesn't work until power is back). The only problem would be if it gets cold, as our heating system requires electricity to circulate the hot water. Since the library has power we can recharge things here, and local stores have enough ice that we can keep food cold to avoid spoilage.
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FF

If you have a hot water system, there are usually a thingy at the bottom of each zone valve that opens the valve and allows natural convection to occur. We used to do that in our house in Bergen County when the power went out.
 
Re: 2012 Atlantic Hurricane Season: Non-Minnesotans arguing about the weather...

joecct said:
FF

If you have a hot water system, there are usually a thingy at the bottom of each zone valve that opens the valve and allows natural convection to occur. We used to do that in our house in Bergen County when the power went out.
Click to expand...

Thanks for the suggestion. When I went to implement it, I noticed that the thermostat for the boiler runs off electricity, and so unfortunately there won't be much of a temperature difference 51 hours on.
 
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