The power of electricity, literally and figuratively, has been the building block of progress in modern generations. Businesses thrive with power. Homes are comfortable with power. You can’t update Facebook without power, right?
Jokes aside, when hurricane season begins, it greatly affects the power supply on the coast. When a hurricane strikes, you can easily be without power for days or weeks. With hurricanes strong enough to easily topple power lines and destroy power grids, how do you power your home then? Equip yourself with alternative power sources.
When you live in an area that is prone to natural disaster, generators are a great option to turn to. Generators provide immediate power and come in diverse options. You can get generators that can power just the necessary appliances, or whole-home diesel generators, too.
Despite the benefits that generators offer, they also have some negative features to consider.
- Generators require a fuel supply. Fuel can be hard to find in a post-disaster situation. Your alternative is to store fuel, but fossil fuels have a short shelf life.
- Generators are heavy. It may be difficult to seamlessly move your generator to get to a proper position to supply power in the area that you need most.
- Generators can be noisy.
- Generators can be deadly. The exhaust from a generator can kill if not placed outside with proper ventilation. Every year, people in a hurry or scatter-brained as the result of a disaster are killed from carbon monoxide, the bi-product of exhaust from trying to stay warm in a car or from running appliances like a generator.
If you want clean, quiet, non-fuel reserve-requiring energy, you want solar power. Solar power system designs that include strong engineering and battery reserves can help you stay powered up when the grid goes down.
You can even start small with appliances that use alternative energy from the sun. Some devices have small solar-powered cells to keep them going, like phone chargers. But for full peace of mind, you want a whole-home PV design. The benefit of a solar power system with battery reserves is that you don’t need to keep fuel in storage, you don’t have to run noisy generators, and you don’t have to worry about toxic fumes. Your family will have the comfort of a sufficient electricity power despite the grid being down.