[Pops]

Merry Christmas.
The President’s National Infrastructure Advisory Council Report
Executive Summary: The grid is vulnerable. We are totally dependent on it. If it goes down we're on our own. [Need I mention the government is not even able to keep the lights on the National Christmas Tree lit let alone keep Fatherland Security (which includes FEMA) from furloughs for the third time this year.]

Significant public and private action is needed to prepare for and recover from a catastrophic outage that could leave large parts of the nation without power for weeks or months, and cause service failures in other sectors— including water and wastewater, communications, transportation, healthcare, and financial services—that are critical to public health and safety and our national and economic security.
...
People no longer keep enough essentials within their homes, reducing their ability to sustain themselves during an extended, prolonged outage. We need to improve individual preparedness.
o Most preparedness campaigns call for citizens to be prepared for 72 hours in an emergency, but the new emerging standard is 14 days.

One of the first threads I started here was about putting together a 72hr kit. Sheltering in place, or even going on the lam for 3 days can be an adventure but aside from dangerous temperatures most can do 72hrs with no prep at all. Two weeks, on the other hand, might get rough, especially when the babies start to cry. Even at that, with a little toilet tank and water heater water and whatever is in the back of the cupboard most are gonna do fine. We were out of power for 3 weeks once due to an ice storm, and didn't use much more that what we had in the cupboards, and most folks around did fine aside from problems with the cold.

But any event that is truly regional or larger... is gonna make life interesting for a lot longer than 2 weeks. That's likely the point where things start looking tough for the average guy who's run out of food, used up the batteries, burnt the camp fuel, the generator gas if he had one, probably the gas in the vehicles too (charging phones with no service) and is starting to get either thirsty or the badwater trots — or both.

Anyway you get the picture. Any thoughts about being a survivalist?

[AgentR11]

Not to keen on the prospect myself. 3 days is of course no big deal; but 14 days would certainly challenge my ability to put potable water on the table. Food isn't quite as big of a problem, but finding a way to cook it after the gas and power are off, definitely not a pretty picture.

[Pops]

Hey Agent, haven't seen you in a while.

Sawyer Mini is available at amazon or Wally's for $20. You can go up from there, I think the Camp Kit guarantees like a million gallons at 500gal/day for $150.

Stumbled across a company called Azure Standard that carries bulk foods at good prices. they have their own trucks that drop at certain locations monthly - you meet them. You would need to do your own packing for long term storage— mylar pouch, O2 absorber and all that, but the price is still half of the prepacked stuff even before shipping.

The survival food is wheat berries. Store them for 40 years then soak em, sprout 'em, mush em up into a patty and set in the sun or on a hot rock, voilå, Essene bread. Not quite whole wheat nutritionally but about as long term and low tech as it gets.

[vtsnowedin]

I'm pretty well set on water, heat,and stored food.
Two weeks or more without gasoline available would run out the backup generator so we would have to due without. Might consider a solar setup as a backup (Grid free) as the wife sleeps with a Cpap machine.
I would have to start brewing my own beer but I have a kit and instructions on hand.
If there was some warning I'd top off food supplies with 25 lbs. of rice and another 25 of flour and fifty to a hundred of potatoes etc.
Life would become dealing with it and helping neighbors and relatives deal. I'd spend quite a bit of time hunting and fishing regardless of the season.

[Outcast_Searcher]

This is really more a matter of poor constituent attitudes, re spending for having a much more durable and less vulnerable grid, than anything else.

There are not nearly enough backup transformers, etc. To have them available and ready to go for a big solar event, etc. that fried a lot of them, would require storing them in massive warehouses, lined with some kind of Faraday cage to protect them from big surges.

This might cost an additional 5% to 10% premium over time on your electric bill. How many customers would want to pay for that?

The whole damn grid and anything that controls it should NOT be directly assessible on the internet, or any national network, IMO. How much would it add to your electric bill if that were strictly verboten, and only small local control via small networks were allowed? 20% or so? How many would want to pay for that?

Much of the grid consists of old power lines, which aren't really maintained, but replaced when they fail. Most of the grid is exposed to weather and should be buried. How much would burying everything and then maintaining it properly cost?

We're our own worst enemy (as a society in the US), re having durable, well maintained critical infrastructure.

....

When there is a big event and power is down for, say, months, how likely do you think hungry people, perhaps represented by the government (cops, the army reserves, etc) won't coming banging on your door, demanding your "fair share" of your food/supplies to make things "fair" for the "common good"?

Do you hard core survivalists think you can hold them off with your AK-47, etc for long?

But you insist they'd never come for your property? Hell, if you make a good living, they come for roughly 50% of your earnings in total (all mandatory fees which aren't called taxes included) every year, and the vast majority of folks consider that normal and even good, using words similar to the words I used in the confiscation scenario above.

Planning is good. Common sense is good. I keep a good supply of bottled water and canned food and healthy food like dried fruit, nuts, beans, etc. I have a whole house natural gas generator and keep it maintained, so I'd need to lose both electricity and NG for days to be in real trouble. Not perfect -- but far more "practical prep" than most.

For the last 6+ years, I've experienced a number of 30ish second power outages, until the generator kicked on. My neighborhood / city has experienced 2 big events with outages for days, and many minor events with outages for hours (all weather related), so it's already been worth it.

Oh yes, and seeing Pop's post below, once it is cheaper and commonplace, I'd like rooftop solar and battery backup as the next step, re handling power outages. That provides more redundancy. I don't see it saving much money, as my electrical bill is typically only averaging perhaps $60 a month, and over time, it seems like economizing drives it down more than rate increases drive it up. So it's far more about having more ways to ensure the lights stay on (at least the ones I really need) in a future with more storms and AGW risks.

[Pops]

I'd like to have solar too. Up here (on the Columbia in WA currently) it is dark and gray a whole lot in the winter. Not sure how well it would work. OTOH, my main need is for keeping the margaritas cold in the summertime when the sun does come out—well, margaritas and the insulin, LOL.

Seriously, the weather here is pretty good for insulin, which is happiest between 35º & 45ºF. It degrades within weeks at room temperature but within minutes when freezing. The warmest the basement sump gets in September is 55º and freezing temps in the winter are seldom and light.

The house we bought here had a 20kw Generac and a full 500Gal propane tank that I talked the seller into throwing in. I sold the gen for $2k and bought a Honda 2200 and tri-fuel propane conversion. I'd had a larger off-brand tri-fuel gen in the past but auctioned it. I also bought a NOCO 25a battery charger. With this set-up I can charge my 100ah batteries (to run a small DC fridge), my AAs and run a small ice maker (backup Coolth) at the same time with the gen at half capacity. 2 hours every other day with 400gals propane is quite a bit longer than my 2 year insulin supply. (specs say .3gal/hr unleaded @ full power)

This gen is super quiet but would still be a siren when the phones go dead. Likewise the propane tank is a big neon sign to anyone cruising our tidy alleyway—it gets a little fencing as "landscaping" this year FWIW. I've a buttload of rechargeable AAs and 20v Dewalts in addition to the cheap deep cycles. The gen would not come out for at least 2 weeks and hopefully more, in fact I'd likely run all the gas out of the car using the inverter or the 12v AA charger before starting the generator even in stealth mode (lots of plywood baffles and mineralwool).

I think our big infrastructure problem here short term is the relatively low elevation above the river. No power means no sanitary or stormwater sewage pumps, resulting in a rather unpleasant experience when descending into the bunker. We might be forced to camp out in the garage though that wouldn't be so bad.

Longer term, we are in town. The pop is only 35k, but we only know a handful of those good folks and them only in passing. It is hard to know what someone you've known your entire life might do in extremis, but it isn't hard at all to guess what they will do to strangers who have something attractive. I try to make contact with neighbors but I've met fewer people here in 18 months than in the first weeks in the Ozarks when the nearest neighbors were miles away. We'd keep a low profile as long as possible.
.

[Pops]

Planning is good. Common sense is good. I keep a good supply of bottled water and canned food and healthy food like dried fruit, nuts, beans, etc. I have a whole house natural gas generator and keep it maintained, so I'd need to lose both electricity and NG for days to be in real trouble. Not perfect -- but far more "practical prep" than most.

For the last 6+ years, I've experienced a number of 30ish second power outages, until the generator kicked on. My neighborhood / city has experienced 2 big events with outages for days, and many minor events with outages for hours (all weather related), so it's already been worth it.

This part of your post is welcome.
Take the rest elsewhere.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Planning is good. Common sense is good. I keep a good supply of bottled water and canned food and healthy food like dried fruit, nuts, beans, etc. I have a whole house natural gas generator and keep it maintained, so I'd need to lose both electricity and NG for days to be in real trouble. Not perfect -- but far more "practical prep" than most.

For the last 6+ years, I've experienced a number of 30ish second power outages, until the generator kicked on. My neighborhood / city has experienced 2 big events with outages for days, and many minor events with outages for hours (all weather related), so it's already been worth it.

This part of your post is welcome.
Take the rest elsewhere.

Based on what?

[Outcast_Searcher]

Planning is good. Common sense is good. I keep a good supply of bottled water and canned food and healthy food like dried fruit, nuts, beans, etc. I have a whole house natural gas generator and keep it maintained, so I'd need to lose both electricity and NG for days to be in real trouble. Not perfect -- but far more "practical prep" than most.

For the last 6+ years, I've experienced a number of 30ish second power outages, until the generator kicked on. My neighborhood / city has experienced 2 big events with outages for days, and many minor events with outages for hours (all weather related), so it's already been worth it.

This part of your post is welcome.
Take the rest elsewhere.

Based on what? Suggesting the society ALL prep re the grid and pay for it as a way to deal with a fragile grid is "bad", for example? I don't get it.

[Pops]

Based on what?

Based on the thread topic.
If you want to advocate NOT Surviving a Catastrophic Power Outage, start a thread. Don't muck this one up, we've heard all the arguments that nothing bad can happen ad nauseum.

[Outcast_Searcher]

Based on what?

Based on the thread topic.
If you want to advocate NOT Surviving a Catastrophic Power Outage, start a thread. Don't muck this one up, we've heard all the arguments that nothing bad can happen ad nauseum.

You're thread, you win. But to construe that I'm advocating NOT surviving a Catastrophic power outage based on what I've said seems to me to be like delusion on the scale of the SL and pstarr types. Same thing for me claiming nothing bad can happen.

You're usually pretty reasonable. Get a grip, man.

[Pops]

Thanks. I'm an optimist, I'd like to talk about the nuts and bolts of what is possible, doable, done—rather than the typical "we're dead and you can't do anything about it." After all none of us gets out alive in the end.

[KaiserJeep]

From the perspective of an EE specializing for 35+ years in computers: the power grid is growing more resilient and harder to hack every day. Digital controls do not have to be vulnerable. Even the CIA and NSA gave up on "air gapped" security years ago. Everything is connected to a hardenned and secure network within the network, which grows more resistent to intrusion as time passes.

As for stability independant of security concerns, that too is improving. The US power grid is aging but the most critical parts are renewed and maintained very well. Grid stability - popular press speculation to the contrary - is still increasing, thanks mainly to digital simulations of grid behavior from an HP system called PEREGRINE in the NREL's (National Renewable Energy Laboratory) HPC (High Performance Computing center).

To me, the priorities with the grid are further renewals, especiallyy the upgrading of lossy high tension AC systems to high voltage and much higher capacity DC transmission.

Personal survival and comfort depends mainly on having a plan. One thing EVERYBODY EVERYWHERE needs to plan for is a future where energy is more expensive. If you do not want your living spaces to experience a temperature swing from 45 degrees to 85 degrees F every season, best improve insulation, humidity and ventilation systems, and install high performance windows and doors. Reducing energy consumption is job #1 for everyone. Redundant HVAC systems are important, with more than one type of fuel, unless that one is electricity - then you need redundant and independant power for two weeks, and preferably forever (i.e. "off grid").

Yes it is possible to live in a home that experiences that 45-85 degree temperature swing, it's just not comfortable, especially for old folks. My idea of comfort is not huddling under a comforter in a cold house, or sweltering in front of a small fan.

Nor should wood play any role in your heating or cooking plan, unless you own a woodlot that can meet 100% of your needs for years. The experience of the Greeks was that first all the public forests disapppeared, then private landscaping, and even now, some are guarding 100+ year old olive groves every night with firearms. So many people have wood as a backup plan here in the USA that "peak firewood" is constantly only about two months away, from coast to coast. The price of firewood will do a 10X within one month, IMHO.

[Pops]

A wood stove and couple cords of wood is a prime prep in my book and totally achievable for many folks. It would suck big time to have a nice little wood stove or even a metal, "zero clearance" "fireplace" and wind up trying to burn the Ikea heirlooms. Besides being just really enjoyable in the day to day, a wood stove gives emergency light, heat, cooking, hot water... what's not to like?

Of course an central, airtight, high mass Russian fireplace, $10k wood cookstove and a sustainable coppice woodlot would be ideal but the perfect can't be the enemy of the good.

Our current home has a chimney set up in the basement for a wood stove, this would be problematic to change to the main level without opening some serious structural worm cans. As mentioned above, in a grid down situation I doubt the basement would be habitable. (Still, if we are marooned here long enough, I will get a little box stove down there.)

[KaiserJeep]

The problem with wood heat is the supply of wood. Here in my HOA, each of the 38 homes has a fireplace. We talked about this last Winter at the HOA meeting when a temperature inversion trapped fireplace smoke in the Valley, and fireplace fires were banned. Of the 38 fireplaces, 18 were used regularly, 20 not even once. However only 4 people had wood ready to burn, while 12 had gas log conversions. For everybody else, a sawdust/wax log from the supermarket when in the mood. I have not had a fire in more than a decade.

Yeah, I know this is California. But there is not enough ready cut firewood to fill each wood-burning fireplace and woodstove in the USA even once. If gas and electricity were not available, the skyrocketing demand for wood would first deplete the supply, then trees and shrubs and unoccupied structures would be burned. 335 million people will not be burning wood for heat. Nor is a plan to have wood as backup heat source viable beyond whatever supply you have on hand, either cut and dried, or standing as trees. Even if you have the woodlot, you don't actually have any wood supply you cannot make secure 24X7.

By contrast, a residence that meets the PassivHaus standard can be heated with 10% of the BTUs of the average residence, and about 30% of the BTUs for a newer structure that meets current "Energy Star" standards. All-electric with no burning anything is practical, and so is a "Net Zero Energy" plan where you go entirely off-grid with solar panels or wind turbines.

If you plan and build to the PassivHaus standard, it will cost 30% more than Energy Star on average. Payback within 10 years. I think it's a no-brainer, especially for colder climates.

One of the masons on Nantucket installs soapstone masonry heaters from Tulikivi:

....these are precut complete kits, proven high efficiency, and soapstone retains heat better than brick. Admittedly, not as traditional looking.

[vtsnowedin]

Well certainly a person living in dense cooky cutter suburban housing wont be able to heat his house with wood if all the neighbors are trying to doing the same thing.
I on the other hand have acres of trees that produce more then I'll ever need and if a calamity happens I'll be able to provide quite a bit of wood to that new market.
On another point put forth above.
I don't think the idea of the government coming in and confiscating the supplies of doomers and other prepared people is a likely outcome.
The amount of fuel needed to surround and defeat an entrenched doomer far exceeds the value of any supplies he might have. Consider that ever real doomer in America has at least one gun and has practiced with it and would consider this a life or death situation. You wouldn't get very far through the doomer community before you ran out of cops or swat teams willing to be the next target.

[KaiserJeep]

"ikea heirlooms"

....missed that little gem the first time.

[Pops]

However only 4 people had wood ready to burn, while 12 had gas log conversions. For everybody else, a sawdust/wax log from the supermarket when in the mood. I have not had a fire in more than a decade.

So on the rare cool night by the bay, when the grid is down, who is gonna be warm, have some hot cocoa and a little light to read the latest marshal law flier handed down by Gavin?
The scenario is a long emergency, 2-4-6-8 months, not armageddon. Building or retrofitting for a net zero house costs somewhat more than a rick or cord of almond wood out behind the garage I'm thinkin.

--
On .gov confiscation... they have an executive order for that but I'm likewise doubtful. If you have a bunch of above ground fuel storage, as in a distributorship, you'll likely have your inventory commandeered. Ditto any large commercial supply of anything. But the average guy is not going to have anything taken, not by .gov anyway. At least not in official capacity. This is where low, low profile would be important, unless the Sheriff's yer father in law.

[Newfie]

For us it’s 85°F in the daytime and 77°F in the night. Every day, every night.
No heat, no AC.

Wind and solar meet our electrical needs. Biggest load is the ice box.

We have a back up hand pumped desalinator that would work for quite a while.

Food would be a problem. I can catch some fish, but one can’t live on fish alone.

Actually the biggest problem would be being attacked by impoverished humans.

[Tanada]

We have a back up hand pumped desalinator that would work for quite a while.

Food would be a problem. I can catch some fish, but one can’t live on fish alone.

Other humans are always the biggest problem, but they can also be a big part of a solution if they are organized and friendly.

I reckon your desalinator is reverse osmosis, which means it is also very effective at eliminating bacteria, germs and most parasites from your water. Thus it can be used on clear 'fresh' water for that purpose as a disease vector remover. Currently it is still much cheaper for cities to dump a bunch of chemicals in fresh water and call it safe to drink, but that will likely change at some point.

As for food, if you catch enough fish to strain your kidneys you are doing a bang up job and can trade the excess with the neighbors for other foods. There are also a vast number of kelp and sea weed species that are healthy to eat and which supply iodine, a vital nutrient to keep your thyroid healthy.