2/23/21 Working On A Back-up Energy Source?

     I am trying to stay focused on some of the goals we talked about while we were dancing on the edge of losing power last week.  My easiest but most expensive solution is to just buy a whole house generator, which I see for sale at Lowe's for around $15-$20,000.  Although the solution sounds great, there is the problem of having access to fuel to run it.  Generators, as I have seen, can either run on gas or they can run on propane.  If I was thinking we just need to be ready to lose power for an afternoon, I wouldn't hesitate to just having a couple containers of gas in the garage, or siphoning from the cars, but some of the people were without power for as long as four days, and this starts being a logistics problem to either keep gas in the garage, which can be dangerous, or investing in a propane tank and bury it in the yard.

    I made some calls today after asking on our neighborhood Facebook page if anyone had gas plumbed to their house.  I found out a couple people do have gas from the street and buried underground, but for the most part, people just get a propane tank and bury it in the yard.  I called Texas Gas, which one of the ladies said was the gas provider, but they do not come over to this side of the community.  The lady on the phone asked if there was a creek or river and I guess that prohibits from having a gas line buried nearby.  i am not so sure about that, but either way, she said I could not get natural gas this way.  She said my best bet would be to use propane.  I tried calling Amerigas, but after waiting on hold for 20 minutes, I hung up, figuring I'll try again some other day.

    My brother is scaring me a bit that once you get the big power source, you put a target on your head and someone else might try to bring harm to us to gain access to that power.  He does make some sense, so I am also looking at smaller generators which can be more silent and maybe if we keep it in the backyard, nobody will see what we are up to.  I also like the generators that are basically big batteries which can then be used as portable generators to power smaller devices, like keeping a light on and charging your phones.  Ultimately, I would opt for 1 of each, like I said, you can't have too many power sources.  These batteries playing at being generators also have the option of having solar panels or windmills to provide power to the power source.