Please know that I don’t know or hear anything different from what you’re hearing and, as always, this is not political so please don’t make it so.
With all the talk of potential power issues, the cost of power and whatever else can go wrong, Vince and I were talking about what we would do if our power was out for an extended time during the winter. Vince lived through the winter storm in Texas with no power for 5 days so he’s very willing to take steps to make sure we can survive without power.
We are basically all electric except for propane fireplaces which need electricity for the blowers to work, though the fireplaces will burn without electricity, there will be very little heat produced. The stove tops would both work since they are propane. We could have warm food to eat and, so long as there’s water, we could heat water for baths.
It isn’t normal but we can have winter lows in the -20’s . . that’s the temp, not the “real feel”.
We decided to order good four season sleeping bags. I think we could at least survive with those. The downstairs bedroom has three walls that are thick concrete and the fourth wall is shared by the bathroom that is mostly all concrete with no windows in either room. The basement living room has windows so I ordered heavy duty tension rods for those. We have insulated curtains but we have plenty of quilts and many of them still have hanging sleeves so we could push the insulated curtains, which are also on tension rods, closer to the windows and put the quilts more towards the room so hopefully, the double “curtains” would help block some of the cold from the windows. We also have tension rods so we could hang quilts to help stop the warmer air from the basement from going upstairs.
We also ordered more sweat pants and sweat shirts. I prefer a zip up sweatshirt/lightweight jacket that I can wear over t-shirts so I got those. Of course, we have plenty of wool socks. I prefer mittens to gloves for walking the dogs so I dug out all those and made sure we both have several pairs in case one gets wet.
This is the time to think about what you will do to stay warm if there is no power. And, if you don’t have a gas stove that can be lit by a match, it’s time to think about how you will feed yourself and your family.
If you have a woodburning fireplace or wood stove and firewood, you’re lucky! I so wish we had a wood stove that I could cook on during the winter but Vince does not enjoy having something like that – having to cut wood or clean out the stove or fireplace so . . we do what we can.
Shelley says
Get a portable generator. It has saved us innumerable times.
judy.blog@gmail.com says
A generator is great for short term power outages but if we have something long term, we wouldn’t have the fuel to keep it running. We have several generators and those are what Vince used to keep the well pump running and the fridges/freezers going when Texas was hit with the massive power outages. I’ve lived through hurricanes and ice storms and have friends who have been without power for three weeks or more after a hurricane. We like to plan on how to survive with NO power for an extended period.
Celia Ambrose says
We didn’t have electricity for 8 days during that event in Texas! We have a fireplace and wood. And, a charcoal grill. We used flash lights, and candles. My daughter has never canned food, or had emergency foods until then. We are adding to our food pantry weekly of things we like to eat. I have 2 cast iron skillets, and one deep skillet, but no lid. I’m making a list of hygiene items, bandaids, etc. Hoping we don’t have a worse power grid problem. Judy, do you use water bath canning, or pressure canning? thanks.
judy.blog@gmail.com says
Celia, I’m not laughing at you but I think most of us who try to be prepared for whatever comes our way can look back to one event that changed everything for us. For you, it was the Texas freeze. For me, it was an ice storm in southwest Louisiana in 1997.
I do both water bath and pressure canning. Low acid foods, at least according to the USDA, should be pressure canned. If you’ve never tried it, don’t be afraid. Follow the directions. Pressure canning is much safer than it was in our grandparents and great grandparents’ days.
Mare says
Here in California, we typically lose power at least a few times a year and sometimes for a week or more. Finally after many years of my husband firing up our portable generator, we had a Generac installed a year ago. In the first year, it’s already given us instant seamless power half a dozen times when PG&E has gone down. If it’s affordable, I highly recommend.
judy.blog@gmail.com says
We had one once and I won’t do it again. It’s great for short term and if I felt power would never be out for more than a week or so, I’d do the whole house generator again, but I feel like we all, with the state of things in our country, need to have a plan of how we will survive with no power for a longer term. With friends in Louisiana who went weeks without power, there are brands of whole house generators that did MUCH better than others so for those wanting a whole house generator, do your research. The bottom line is that unless it’s a solar generator, there has to be some kind of fuel. If you have natural gas, that’s the best. In Louisiana, propane trucks could not even get to many places for a week or more so they ran out of propane, even those who had large tanks. We learned after the first tornado in January in Kentucky when we lost power for over a week, that a whole house generator was only worth as much as you were willing to spend to fuel the thing and we’ve never had one since. While it may be inconvenient, unless there’s a medical reason for having to have electricity, I’ll always have a way to survive that does not rely on as much fuel as it takes to run a generator.
We were very thankful for having them when Texas was without power in the winter of 2020 but had that power been out for weeks and weeks, there would have been no fuel. Vince uses a CPAP and we have batteries we can charge using solar and that will run his CPAP. Yes, it’s not as convenient as having a whole house generator come on but we feel more comfortable with that.
Mare says
Fortunately, our winter temps seldom even get below 30 degrees so that’s a plus for us. My husband tells me we would easily have a month of power with the Generac before we’d need more fuel. We have many trees on our property for wood but we’re getting older and yes, it’s a huge job cutting, chopping, stacking, hauling wood in. Years ago when we built our home, our elderly neighbor encouraged us to install EVERY type of heating option available. His house had it all, wood stove, central heating, propane, pellet stove, he had the works. He was prepared – Wise man!?
judy.blog@gmail.com says
Very wise man! I wish we had more options. All I know is what we used (natural gas) when we had a Generac and it was A LOT OF GAS! My friend in Louisiana has about a 1,500 square foot house and when the hurricane hit two years ago, they had to have their 250 gallon tank filled every 4 days. I found online that a whole house generators will use 2 – 3 gallons per hour. A 500 gallon tank will usually hold 400 gallons so that’s about 200 hours. I saw another site that said a 500 gallon tank, which holds 400 gallons max, will run 6 – 7 days. I don’t know much about the whole house generators and I’m guessing there are different sizes and larger sizes would go through fuel quicker.