Thoughts on living without electricity for a few days

[Graeme]

We live in rural Aberdeenshire, and like so many others, lost power for a few days. Off at 4pm Friday, back on 1pm Monday.

When the power went off we had one open fire plus a large supply of coal, kindling, logs, fire lighters and spills. Three portable gas fires, a Gaz lamp with two spare cylinders, a 'proper' kettle and a kitchen hob powered by 47kg Propane cylinders in the garden, candles, several torches and a small battery powered radio, plus spare batteries, several lighters and a utility lighter, plus spare gas. What we didn't have was any form of generator or inverter.

The open fire is in the largest room (two rooms knocked into one, years ago) and that was OK, supplemented by one of the portable gas fires. The other gas fire was in the kitchen, the third kept as spare in case either of the others ran out of gas. The Gaz lamp was great, burning from roughly 4pm to 11pm each evening, but used a cylinder per evening. Cold outside, snow on ground, dark by late afternoon.

We moved into the main room, wife sleeping on the three seater settee, me (and dog!) sleeping on a single mattress on the floor. Plenty of duvets, as we didn't run the gas stove when we were asleep, and the coal fire is not an overnighter. We have an oil boiler and proper hot and cold tanks. The hot water in the cylinder lasted well, although was cold by Monday morning. We don't think we lost water, although could just have been using what was in the tanks, but I didn't notice the tank suddenly filling when power was restored.

Mobiles and laptops batteries expired, but no wi-fi of course, and no mobile signal as no power to the tower, so no great loss.

We always keep tins of soup for emergencies, so had soup and toasties twice. Made toasted sarnies using a wire barbecue fish cage thing, over the coals in the fire. Fried sausages another night. Plenty of hot tea from the gas hob. Dib dib dib :-)

We were lucky the power came on when it did. Just about exhausted whatever was still edible in the fridge, had the last of the soup but had managed without opening the freezer door. When I did open the freezer (upright) stuff like ice cream was binned, but all the meat was still solid, so hopefully safe. We were using the last of the spare batteries, and almost out of camping Gaz for the lamp.

We have an old paraffin lamp. Tall brass affair with frosted glass shade and clear glass chimney. Monday morning, knowing we were almost out of Gaz, I found two wicks in the shed (don't know why it uses two wicks), and filled it using kerosene removed from the tank in the garden. Taped a stick to an empty soup tin to use as a scoop. Luckily, the power came on shortly afterwards, but would running the paraffin lamp using kerosene have been safe? How similar are paraffin and kerosene?

We have had power cuts before, but nothing like this length of time. I think we did well, with our emergency kit coping. Yes, we could have been better prepared, but how much preparation is required for something that may never happen again, or not for many years?

One final thought. When power came on, we found countless Facebook messages on local groups with plenty of information and offers of help, location of mobile hot food vans etc., but of course few without power saw any of it until power was resumed. Yes, a few people charged their phones via their cars, but I didn't bother. Lesson for next time. How did we cope pre Internet?

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

Graeme expressed precisely :

Just as safe to use and was often used, but kerosene has less of a smell to it. If the smell doesn't you, use either. You can also buy lamp oil, which is supposed to be even less smelly.

[newshound]

I would certainly have tried to keep a smartphone alive. We're in a small town and I doubt if we would ever be "out" for more than a day. I do have a woodburner, a small generator, and two or three rechargeable LED "Work Lights" that provide fairly adequate background lighting (also they have USB out ports, so convenient to keep phones alive).

I think if I was somewhere more rural I would invest in a proper "changeover" switch and get something like a 3kW diesel generator with electric start. I'm in my 70's and my wife is slightly disabled, so I am not quite as fit and active as I used to be. I'd be staying put if I was snowed in. I would not want to be without my woodburner (or freezers).

[Chris Green]

I thought that kerosene was simply the USA name for paraffin, is that not correct? Or is it that UK kerosone is something different from US kerosene?

[Dave Plowman (News]

Sounds like you were pretty well prepared, Graeme. If it happened in London, I'd likely perish. Only heat I'd have would be from the gas hob.

[Scott]

On Fri, 3 Dec 2021 14:31:37 +0000, Graeme [e-mail]>

wrote: [snip]

What about one of these power banks (other brands available) for resilience?

I understand the phone mast was 'down' but on a different occasion it could be working.

My portable radio charges from USB so I am guessing a power bank could keep it going for a very long time.

[Theo]

I think it's starting to make a lot of sense to have a serious lithium iron phosphate battery - pricing on bare cells is about $130-150/kWh from China these days, so you can make a ~10kWh pack for about $2k (on top of the cells you need a BMS, an enclosure and some way to charge, maybe an inverter/charger unless you want to use it as DC directly).

You might not want to go to the 10kWh scale, but a few kWh would keep a lot of electronics going and run things like boilers, gas cookers and pumps, maybe a microwave. That would keep a lot of low-load 'life support' operating. Obviously not enough to run the heating, although perhaps enough for hot water bottles and such.

You can also use it to store solar generation and timeshift grid power, to charge it at cheap rates. Although you might not want to do that when there's a storm, so it's full if there's a cut.

Theo

[Graeme]

In message <sodak5$2p1$ [e-mail], Harry Bloomfield <?.?@harrym1byt.plus.com.invalid> writes

Excellent, thank you.

[Graeme]

In message [e-mail]>, newshound [e-mail]> writes

We've been here twenty years, and have had the occasional power cut, but usually only an hour or three. The biggest disaster was about ten years ago when the oil tanker could not get through for a few days due to snow, but at least we had electricity, and the mobile gas heaters.

As you say though, the effects of this sort of thing become more worrying as we all age.

[Owain Lastname]

With a landline phone you could phone the local council or power cuts 105 for such information.

With everything being changed to VoIP, you can't.

Owain

[John Brown]

Chris Green [e-mail] wrote

Not just USA

Mostly.

Or is it that UK kerosone is something different from US

Nope.

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

Chris Green formulated on Friday :

The USA call paraffin kerosine, we use the word kerosine to mean a form of cleaner burning lamp oil, though to confuse the issue even more, you can pay a premium for lamp oil, supposed to be even cleaner.

[The Natural Philosopher]

local radio via batteries.

[The Natural Philosopher]

My aga and central heating run on 'kerosene'

[S Viemeister]

We have a number of portable power banks, which I make sure to keep charged. I also have one which has built-in solar panels, and can charge while simply sitting on the window ledge. It was very useful when our power was out for 5+ days.

[David]

<snip>

We have a wood burner which will heat the main living area (and is also suitable to cook on at a push), and a gas hob. So heating and food sorted.

Also have a number (!) of camping stoves and a gas heater which runs off propane as a backup.

Lighting would be the main issue although we do have an LED work light which would do for a while.

The major problem would be keeping the freezers freezing.

We have a very small Honda generator to go with the caravan, so that might keep the big chest freezer going. Alternatively it could probably run the central heating if I decoupled the boiler from the mains. Not both, though.

Oh, the caravan. Push came to shove we could abandon the house and just live in the caravan. Central heating, hot shower, hob and oven. LED lighting. Usually run on mains power but could be run from the generator. Once the battery runs down. However that abandons the big freezer.

An extra larger generator and a change over switch would allow us to maintain services in the house, but we have never (touch wood) had a prolonged outage and our power lines are underground. So far no cost justification for this kind of thing, but who knows what the future holds if we keep shutting down nuclear power stations without replacement?

Cheers

Dave R

[Andrew]

Seems like you have everything except for effective insulation, or just one decent fire should be able to keep the place just about liveable.

[Mark]

:) I lived for almost 3 years without elec, gas or even mains water in the 70s rampant mortgage inflation and the threat of repossession meant every penny we earned had to go to paying the mortgage. Still have the 3 aladdin lamps which were the only lighting. and still have the occasional power cut as we have overhead line wire but now have a 14kW generator powered by a Rolls-Royce K60 engine

[Graeme]

Ditto. The stuff that a local oil company deliver to feed my boiler is described as kerosene on the invoice.

[Graeme]

In message [e-mail]>, "Dave Plowman (News)" [e-mail]> writes

To be honest Dave, were I still living in SE England, I doubt I would be prepared, either. It is not that I think power cuts are more likely in Aberdeenshire, just that the results can be more dramatic in terms of fewer daylight hours and lower temperatures outside, not to mention our rural location and old age.