Summer power outages: the generator, the food and the sump

A thunderstorm takes the power out on a July evening, and within an hour the house has three problems: the air conditioning is off in a heat wave, the sump pump is off in a downpour, and the refrigerator is warming. A generator solves all three, and a generator used wrong is the leading cause of death after the storm has passed. Here is how to use one, and what to do without one.

The generator rules

• Outside. Twenty feet from the house, exhaust pointed away from every window, door and vent, and away from the neighbor's too. Never in the garage, the basement, the porch, the carport or under a window, and the open garage door is not enough. Carbon monoxide from a generator kills whole families every storm season, and most of them had the generator in a place that seemed reasonable.
• Carbon monoxide alarms on every level, tested before the storm. A portable generator with a built-in carbon monoxide shutoff, which the newer ones have, is worth the difference in price.
• Extension cords rated for outdoor use and for the load, run through a window or door that can be secured, not through the gap under the garage door.
• Never plug a generator into a wall outlet. Backfeeding sends power out through the meter into the lines, and it electrocutes the line workers trying to restore the neighborhood. It is illegal everywhere and it is the thing electricians are most emphatic about.
• A transfer switch, installed by an electrician, is the right way to connect a generator to the house. A manual transfer switch with an inlet on the outside wall costs a few hundred dollars plus the install, and it lets the generator run the furnace, the well pump, the sump and the refrigerator on the house wiring, safely. An interlock kit on the panel is the less expensive version.
• Let it cool before refueling. Gasoline on a hot muffler is a fire. Store the fuel outside, in approved cans, with a stabilizer, and run the generator for fifteen minutes once a month so it starts when you need it.

Standby generators

A permanently installed generator on a concrete pad, running on natural gas or propane, with an automatic transfer switch, starts itself within seconds of an outage and shuts off when the power returns. It is the upgrade homeowners in storm country rate highest after they have lived through a two-week outage. It needs a permit, a gas line sized for it, an electrician and a plumber or gas fitter, and a yearly service.

Without a generator

• The sump pump. A battery backup pump, or a water-powered backup that runs on the city water pressure, keeps the basement dry through the outage. This is the one that is worth doing before the storm regardless of the generator question, because the outage and the downpour arrive together.
• The refrigerator. Keep the doors closed. A full refrigerator holds for about four hours, a full freezer for about two days, half-full for one. A thermometer inside tells you the truth when the power returns; food that has been above 40 degrees for more than two hours goes out.
• Heat. The house holds up for a while with the windows shaded and closed while it is hotter outside than in, then opened at night. Anyone frail should be somewhere cool; see the heat wave piece in this section.
• The water heater, the furnace and the air conditioner. Turn them off at the switch or the breaker during a long outage. When the power comes back, it often comes back with a surge, and the equipment that was running takes it.

Surge protection

A whole-house surge protector at the panel, which the current code requires in new work, protects everything at once when the power returns. It is an hour of an electrician's time. Point-of-use strips for the electronics on top of it.

The week before

Fuel, batteries, water, medications kept cold in a cooler with ice, the phone charged, a car with a full tank, and the generator started once. And the carbon monoxide alarms tested, because that is the one thing on this list that is not about comfort.