10 Tips For Backup Power For Your Home Pt. 2
10 Tips For Backup Power For Your Home Pt. 2
Continues 10 Tips For Backup Power For Your Home Pt. 1
You rely on many appliances and systems in your home for your health, comfort and security. Most depend completely on utility supplied electricity. It makes sense to have a backup system that will keep your family comfortable and your home safe in a power failure.
6. Choose a Backup System
Some of the systems include battery storage, a battery charger and an inverter. The inverter converts 12 volt DC battery power to standard 110 or 220 volt AC power. These systems can also recharge the batteries using photovoltaic (PV) solar panels, a generator and your vehicle, or your vehicle alone—but remember that unless you have a recreational vehicle (RV) your car battery is not a deep cycle type and should not be allowed to go flat. The more expensive systems can power an entire, energy-efficient house.
Please note that solar panels used to recharge your backup system are weather- and size-dependent and may take two to three days to recharge your battery.
7. Hire an Electrician
An electrician or electrical contractor should install and prepare your backup system to make sure it is safe for your family and your home. You will need a manual transfer switch to send electricity from either the municipal power supply or your backup to the vital circuits. The switches cost approximately $100 to $230. Some residential uninterruptible power systems are pre-assembled on wall mounting boards, with all the necessary safety disconnects and code approved wiring already done. More sophisticated inverter power panels that automatically flip the transfer switch and start the backup can cost $3,000 just for the panel with the breakers and an inverter. It is a good idea for an electrician to check wiring and ground, and determine if you need spike protection. In rural areas, voltage fluctuations and even overvoltages that can damage sensitive equipment are not uncommon. Never connect a backup power system without a transfer switch that disconnects your home from the municipal power supply. This is to protect electric utility field crews from being electrocuted by your home power system when working on municipal lines.
8. Don’t Use Unvented Appliances Indoors
Never use unvented combustion appliances, such as barbecues, cookstoves, fondues, propane or kerosene heaters and lamps inside your house. They burn up available oxygen. They produce CO2 (carbon dioxide) and other combustion gases and fumes. Some produce huge quantities of colourless, odourless and deadly carbon monoxide. Sterno cookers, fondues and charcoal-burning devices are especially dangerous. Room ventilation won’t get rid of fumes from unvented appliances. Use portable propane or naptha cookstoves, heaters and lamps outside only. There is a very real risk of fire, explosion, asphyxiation or poisoning from fumes.
9. Install Smoke and Carbon Monoxide Alarms
Install battery-powered smoke and carbon monoxide alarms. They are inexpensive and reliable—and they can save your life. Remember to keep spare batteries on hand.
10. Test Your System Regularly
Regularly test your backup system to make sure it can start your critical loads and keep them running. Remember to disconnect your main breaker before starting your backup system, or you can use an auxiliary circuit panel.
Note that modern inverters can make it possible to use variable speed DC generators which charge batteries directly and use half as much fuel as a constant-speed AC generator. They can produce very high quality AC power, which is crucial for sensitive electronic controls, provided that the inverter is manufactured by an established company and produces sine wave or modified sine wave outputs.
To protect sensitive equipment, such as computers, from power surges, generator owners should run these loads with a pure sine wave inverter instead of directly through the generator. If you are counting on your generator or inverter to power critical house systems during a power failure, test beforehand to make sure that the quantity and quality of power produced will handle the appliances you need to run.
Contact your REALTOR at Coldwell Banker Vantage Realty for more tips and advice on your home maintenance.
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