About Grounding

A generator will work without being grounded properly but it is good practice to properly ground a generator to your home’s grounding rod or to a new grounding rod installed for the generator. A grounding rod is an 8’ long ½” metal rod that is pounded into the ground to reach moist soil. Driving an 8’ metal rod into coral rock so prevalent in South Florida is a hard job.. Proper grounding is essential for safety and preventing damage to the appliances that are running on the generator. Many people have to replace appliances several months after running on generators for extended periods.

Resources

Energy saving tips: http://www.wattbusters.com/

Portable Solar and Gas Hot Showers: http://www.zodi.com

Information o Solar Hot Water: http://www.tctsolar.com or http://www.ecs-solar.com

Information on tax credits for solar power: http://www.dsireusa.org/

Maintenance

Gasoline Storage

If you are going to store gasoline for many months, then you should be adding a gasoline additive to the tanks to extend the life of the fuel. Otherwise, in November, when you pour the as into your car your may have excessive engine pinging and performance issues.

Changing the oil

Every 100 hours of generator running, you will need to change the oil in the ggenerator. This will ensure the optimal operation of your generator.

Off Season

You should start the generator every month for a few minutes to warm up the generator and make sure it is working well. A generator should not sit idle for an entire year without being turned on, it probably won’t start when you need it if proper off season maintenance is not performed.

Using the Generator - How to maximize the Hours per Gallon (HPG)

Flourescent lights – changing all the lights that you want to run from incandescent bulbs to the new replacement flouresent bulbs will increase your HPG. A typical 60 or 100 watt bulb can be replaced with a fluorescent bulb that use 25% of the power. So in a house with ten 60 watt bulbs lit, instead of burning 600 watts, you will be burning 150 watts which will increase your HPG.

Unplug appliances not in use – Most modern appliances have their standby mode which consumes a few watts of power even when they are ‘off’. These devices need to be ‘unplugged’ in order to truly be turned off. If you have 20 devices like cable boxes, VCRs, TVs and Sterios that are in standby, then you will be consuming 100-200 watts just in the standby modes so you might as well unplug them to save that much fuel.

Nightlights – If your kids need nightlights, then purchase some solar powered landscape lighting. Put the bulbs outside to charge during the day and then place them in the kid’s rooms at night, they will provide a dim nightlight that will last all night and not reduce your HPG.

How to connect generator to home power

Back Feeding – what it is and why you don’t want to do it

Backfeeding is what happens if you connect a generator to your home’s wiring and fail to somehow disconnect your home from the power grid. If someone connects a generator and backfeeds the line, and injures or kills an FPL employee then there is pretty much unlimited liability for the homeowner. Usin ONLY extension cords from your generator to individual appliances in the house will not create a backfeeding situation. Backfeeding situations WILL OCCUR whenever someone connects a generator to the inside wiring in a home either through a dryer connection, or other, non-compliant connection method.

As far as I have found out there are 4 ways to connect a generator to your house:

Extension Cords
Pros	Cons
Easy, cheap, no electrician needed , portable, no back feeding	hard to power enough appliances can't use all the generator's watts, make sure you don't overload any one cord, moving from room to room is a hassle. Cords all over the floor.

Extension cords: Pros: easy - cheap, no electrician needed , portable, no back feeding
Cons:
Dryer outlet adapter -
Pros - pretty simple, possibly don't need an electrician, Cheap, select what circuits using the circuit breakers, Portable. Cons: Make sure you flip the main power circuit or pull the meter completely or you will be backfeeding FPL, walking around with a male power cord with 240 is dangerous. No meter to monitor load levels.

Transfer Switch with external power outlet, -
Pros: select circuits with panel switches, meters for load levels, no bac feeding
Cons: a little more expensive, need an electrician to install, have to pre-select which cicuits to power with the switch.

Generlink -
Pros: Simple, portable, use the circuit breakers to select switch, no back feeding, if you are willing to pull a power meter, don't need an electrician. Approved by FPL this year. 

Cons: no meters to ensure load levels, just LED lights

Useful accessories

Electric start

If there is a chance that someone who is not strong enough will need to pull the cord to restart a generator, then an electric start option is a nice accessory. Not all generators have this, so it is something to look for at the initial purchase. The electric start will only start up if the battery is in good working order, so before the storm be sure to charge the battery to make sure it it ready to go after the storm.

Hour meter

Every 100 hours of running you will need to change the oil in the generator. Otherwise, after running for 100 hours, the oil may be breaking down, and not lubricating the generator properly. If this occurs, your generator may fail or it may just start using more fuel and delivering less power. An hour meter is a nice to have accessory so you know how long it has been between servicies.

A great big lock

After a hurricane, generators are in scarce supply and are an easy target. They are easy to find because a running generator announces itself to the neighborhood.

Heavy duty long extension cords

After a hurricane, offering a neighbor without a generator a few watts of AC power with a long extension cord is a couterous thing to do. Make sure you have a spare, heavy duty 100’ extension cord if you want to make such an offer. Even if you are running your own appliances with an extension cord, make sure they are heavy duty and in good shape.

About Hot Water

Hot showers during an extended power outage are a welcome taste of civilization. This luxury comes at a steep price though if your home is equipped with only an electric hot water heater.

There are two ways to ensure hot water after a storm, solar hot water panels and gas fired hot water heaters. If you have either o f these, then you will not need to worry about a hot water heater in planning for emergency power. Assuming the solar panels on your roof were not damaged in the storm, you should have plenty of hot water as soon as the sun comes out.

Tank Water Heaters - A typical 50 to 80 gallon hot water heater will have two 4500 watt heating coils and will require 2-3 hours to completely heat a tank of hot water, they typically heat 20-25 gallons per hour. To heat a tank of hot water, you will need to turn on only the minimal number of appliances for to 2-3 hours that you are heating the water.

Alternatively, If you do not need a lot of hot water, then use of a portable camping style gas or solar powered hot water heater will save the money needed in fuel and larger generator to supply the watts required for a hot water heater. If your hot water heater is old then you might want to look into replacing it with a new energy efficient system or a solar or gas system.

Instant/Tankless Hot Water heaters – These types if water heaters draw an incredible number of watts for a short period of time. A whole house electric instant hot water heater can draw 20KW, more than most generators can supply so if you have an electric instant hot water system it might not be able to supply your needs when running on a backup generator..

About Air Conditioning

Fortunately, there are options to cool your home that do not require a generator large enough to power the central air conditioners. You can buy portable 9000 BTU air conditioner that will cool off a 20’ x 20’ room easily. The rule of thumb if you need 20-25 BTUs per square foot. Every 10 BTUs uses one watt of power. To cool a 450 square foot room with a portable AC unit you will need 9000 BTUs and this will pull about 900 watts of power. Window and “through the wall” AC units draw the same wattage as portable AC units. If you have window or “through the wall” ac units, that are not normally used, then it is advisable to make sure they are in good working order before hurricane season. Powering a couple of high efficiency AC units will be an effective way to increase the comfort levels without guzzling all your fuel.

Note: When looking at window and wall generators, watch out for the plug types, there are generally four plug types on room air conditioners 115 volt 15 amp (115/15), 250 volt 15 amp (250/15) and 250 volt 20 amp (250/20) and 250 volt 30 amp (250/30) they all require different connectors. The 250/20 and the 250/30 are generally used on window ac units that also have heaters included, not something we need in Florida.

Power Quality – Total Harmonic Distortion

All generators are relatively unclean power when compared to utility generated power. The level of ‘uncleanliness’ is called Total Harmonic Distortion” (THD). A generator of 6% THD or lower is considered a high quality generator. If you are intending on powering computers and expensive stereo equipment, then investing in a cleaner generator with lower THD will possibly prevent damage to the equipment. It seems that if a generator is cheaper than others for the same power level that they do not advertise the THD of the motor. So it is probably true that a dirtier motor will not state the THD and will cost your less, but if it causes electronics to be damaged it may cost you more in the long run.

Cars and anti-siphoning devices

Like many people, I thought I would be able to tap into the fuel in my Honda cars last year. Aparently there are anti-siphoning devices installed in the Hondas (I don’t know about other brands) that prevent a hose from getting to the gas in the tank. There may be a way to do this, but I have not found it. The anti-siphoning devices are actually safety devices that prevent large amounts of fuel spillage in rollover accidents, they are not just fuel theft prevention devices.

Gasoline, Diesel, Propane and Natural Gas

Most generators sold use gasoline as a fuel. There are diesel versions, which cost more than gas. Diesel fuel has a nice attribute that it is not as flammable as gasoline, so storing diesel fuel is safer. If you have the foresight to bury an LP or Natural Gas tank in your yard for use with your generator, you will have a safe supply of fuel for your generator. However, make sure that the amount of LP to LNG in the tank is enough to get you through an extended outage. You will be dependent on the vendor to replenish your as supply after the storm and they will be very busy delivering gas to everyone else with a tank in the ground.

How much gas can you store?

The key to balancing comfort versus consumption is the amount of gasoline that you can safely store. A four day supply of gasoline for a 6500 running watt generator at half load will be about 70 gallons (14 five gallon containers about $250 worth of fuel at today's prices). That is a lot of flammable fuel to have around the house. It is also a lot of fuel to be carrying inside a car. Having a severe car accident with 14 containers of fuel in a car will be a very dangerous situation. Please to not travel with your kids in the car when you go to the gas station. If you can, purchase an external carrier that connects to the trailer hitch on your car to keep the fumes and any spills out of your car.

Remember before a hurricane, you will be storing 70 gallons of fuel somewhere, not in your house. Where will you put these 70 gallons of fuel so they will be there after the storm. One good place seems to be in the fuel tanks of a boat on a trailer. Assuming the boat makes it through the storm, a hand pump for pulling the gas out of the tank will be a useful tool. Otherwise, your 14 containers of gas need to be put somewhere away from where fumes will not accumulate and away from flames and high winds. Perhaps a hole in the ground! There are some generators, called “tri-fuel” that run on LP, N and gasoline. The best part of these generators are that they can run off of LP or N from a large tank buried in the ground. If the tank in the ground runs out of fuel and new supplies can not be delivered, then they can also run off of gasoline. This type of generator is very flexible in surviving an extended outage.

													Half Load			Full Load
Brand		Cost		Weight lbs		HP		Surge Watts		Run Watts		Tank	Run Time	Gallons/Hour	4 Day Supply	Run Time	Gallons/Hour	4 Day Supply
Coleman		700		99		5.5		3750		3000		3	10	0.3	28.8	8	0.38	36
DeWalt		1550		219		8		4300		3800		5	11	0.45	43.2	9	0.56	54
Coleman		750		158				6250		5250		6	12	0.5	48	9	0.67	64
Tecumseh		650		158		11		6875		5500		5	9.5	0.53	50.88	7	0.71	68
DeWalt		2200		256		13		7000		6000		5	8	0.63	60.48	6	0.83	80
NorthStar		2000		260		13		8000		6600		6.5	9	0.72	69.12	7	0.93	89
Northstar		3200		378		20		13000		10500		10	10	1	96	8	1.25	120
NorthStar		3400		460		25		15000		13500		10	8	1.25	120	6	1.67	160

Surge Watts and Running Watts

Just like when you drive a car, your car needs more energy to leave a stop light than to cruise on the highway. Electric motors in pool pumps, AC units, refrigerators etc all require additional power momentarily at startup. If too many thing try to start up at once, then the combination of surges could trip a circuit breaker. Most generators advertise both numbers, running and surge.

Selecting a Generator

How much power do you need?

There are a lot of things to consider when selecting a generator, fortunately, we have a wide variety of generators to choose from at varying price ranges. For me the balance comes down to how much power do I need to be comfortable versus how much gasoline I need to have on hand at the onset of the power outage. Some home owners want to power their homes just like they are on utility power without any inconvenience but that choice does not make economic sense for most home owners. Selecting the ‘right’ size generator for your home emergency needs requires some decisions on how comfortable you want to be and how much you are willing to pay for that comfort.

To start, I am just going to rule out trying to run your central air-conditioning; most homes are just too big to do this. While you can purchase a generator big enough to do this, you will either need a large tank buried in the ground or a supply of natural gas to your home. Otherwise, trying to run a large generator on gasoline will mean you will spend a lot of time on as lines filling up 5 gallon containers.

How comfortable do you want to be? – Having a working refrigerator during an extended outage makes planning for emergencies a lot easier. If you have kids, having food, milk, juice etc cold and not spoiling makes a big difference, at least hunger is not a problem. Then there is the need to cook some foods. Outside propane grills with side burners allow you to cook anything you would normally cook inside. If you have a well pump then just having running water is another comfort that

Comfort Items –

High Priority

• Running Water
• Refrigeration
• Fans & Lights

Medium Priority

• Hot Water
• Televisions and Stereos
• Phones
• Some Air Conditioning

Low Priority

• Outdoor lighting
• Central Air conditioning
• Pool pumps

Room	Appliance	Running Wattage Required	Additional Wattage Required at Startup	Notes:
All	Room Air Conditioner: 10,000 BTU	1100	2200	Cools a 500 sq’ room
All	Central Air Conditioner (for 2200 sq. ft. home*)	10,000	11,250
All	Lights	As indicated on bulb	0	Use fluorescent bulbs to save fuel
All	Hot Water Heater (60 gallons)	4500	0	Needs to run 2-3 hours per tank of hot water
Family	Color Television	300	0
Family	Radio	50-200	0
Family	Cable Box	50	0
Kitchen	625W Microwave	625	800
Kitchen	Dishwasher: Cool/Dry	700	1400
Kitchen	Refrigerator or Freezer	700	2200
Kitchen	Electric Fry Pan	1300	0
Kitchen	Coffee Maker	1750	0	Most important appliance
Kitchen	Electric Range: 8in. Element	2100	0
Laundry	Automatic Washer	1150	2300
Laundry	Electric Clothes Dryer	5750	1800
Office	Laptop	200-250	0
Office	Monitor (CRT)	200-250	0
Office	Laser Printer	400-600	1000
Office	Desktop	600-800	0
Office	Fax	600-800	0