Those of us who have invested in solar plant installations at home feel that we've got it sorted if there is a total grid failure - at least to some extent! WE are happy that we will have power during a sunny day at the very least. 

I have a question for everyone who has a solar installation at home: 
What will you do with your installation if SA suffers a total grid failure, and the power is off for say 2-3 weeks?

For my own purposes, I will be doing the following:

1. Turn off the mains breaker to avoid power surges or low voltages or low frequency power affecting my home when power is eventually restored
2. Carefully manage my electricity consumption to keep a minimum power available in batteries overnight, and cater for cloudy days.
3. I would probably keep on that regime until the main grid has been completely restored nationwide for at least a few days before turning on my mains switch again. 

Anyone else have some suggestions on how they plan to manage if there is a complete grid failure? 

as Baden Powell said " Be Prepared!"

 

 

Baufeng, stocked up. 
Keeping GAS on rotate
Have a 1kW 50L small geyser that I can run on a few solar panels and an AC microinverter and will then switch of the main geyser. 
The rest of the house is on batteries and solar, incl Fridges
Have a water tank (2 x 5 000L)
500L petrol tank

My biggest worry is sewerage, will need to invest in a porta potty or an incinerator toilet running on the solar.

Grid collapse = no communication, no gas refill within 1 day, no fuel within 3 days, no running water, no sewerage within 4 days. 

Food shortage big issue, so stocked up on canned goods if you have chickens it helps.

You have to be "off-grid" self-sufficient which most are not (including myself). 

Let's hope a grid collapse doesn't happen because it will not be fun, it will be a mass event that will put covid to shame.

Bullets are probably worth more than solar if the grid does collapse. 

If the doomsday preppers on Discovery Channel is anything to go by.

Edited May 24, 20233 yr by Chris.P.Bacon

Have my flat panel Geyser conversion which works well enough.
My solar system under normal conditions satisfies all my requirements.
Still have my 5kW generator as a backup. Haven't needed it for the 2 years that I now had solar.
So from that perspective I am sorted.
The essential food supply would be the biggest concern and I really don't want to go down the road of the fearmongering that  preceded the 1994 election where people bought enough canned food to last them a year or more.
My next step is a 2 to 5000 liter water supply to at least overcome the lack of water if the country can't keep the pumps running.

 

Have been stocking up a little in terms of canned foods.

Have an induction plate that runs on the inverter for cooking and boiling water.

Heatpump for geyser. Runs on the inverter.

Have a 60000L pool and the pump does run off my solar so that water can be used for emergencies I guess.

I have a porta potty (I am a Camper) and necessary chemicals.

50L of filtered drinking water on standby 

Solar system and batteries will be able to run home 24 hours per day on sunny to partly cloudy days if I keep things like gaming pcs and Tvs off. Home idles at around 400w at night.

Self defence is sorted.

CCTV and permiter electric fence runs on inverter.

Outside lights are all individually solar powered independent from inverter.

I hope we never have to actually deal with something like this though. But I guess it's better to be prepared just in case.

Edited May 24, 20233 yr by Douw G. Gerber

What ever you do, switch your lights OFF at night, and play possum, or in due course you will have unwelcome visitors.

Use your power carefully, so as not to draw attention to yourself. (No wild disco's and screeching machinery) 😄

As others have said, water and food will be the main focus of yours and others attention. Don't advertise your prepping, but get family and friends close. Help neighbors if possible, but be careful.

If you can afford it, a borehole is a great asset, and will even help with the monthly water bills in "normal times".

 

Lots of subsistence farmers around my area, running herds of livestock through the suburbs to feed. Time to stop getting pissed off at urban agriculture and get with the programme.

3 hours ago, GreenFields said:

Lots of subsistence farmers around my area, running herds of livestock through the suburbs to feed. Time to stop getting pissed off at urban agriculture and get with the programme.

Slaughter one in the street? 😀😀😀

11 hours ago, TimCam said:

What ever you do, switch your lights OFF at night, and play possum, or in due course you will have unwelcome visitors.

This is my biggest fear in SA.

We are probably the only house in our neighborhood with full solar.

We stand out like a Christmas tree and I always wonder when Solar equipment becomes the next target for break ins. 

31 minutes ago, Chris.P.Bacon said:

This is my biggest fear in SA.

We are probably the only house in our neighborhood with full solar.

We stand out like a Christmas tree and I always wonder when Solar equipment becomes the next target for break ins. 

Flat roof - panels are nicely hidden.

1 hour ago, Chris.P.Bacon said:

This is my biggest fear in SA.

We are probably the only house in our neighborhood with full solar.

We stand out like a Christmas tree and I always wonder when Solar equipment becomes the next target for break ins. 

Well, make sure you have some additional lights, those kind that flash, makes a loud bang and is gone until you switch on the next one.

19 hours ago, Chris.P.Bacon said:

This is my biggest fear in SA.

We are probably the only house in our neighborhood with full solar.

We stand out like a Christmas tree and I always wonder when Solar equipment becomes the next target for break ins. 

Solar equipment  is being stolen direct from suppliers in Joburg. 2 incidents last week. Two 8 ton trucks and 8 armed men in Modderfontein on Tuesday then on Friday  30 armed men and R56 million of stock at a logistics company.

It will not hurt to have some cash under the mattress as well. No card machine will work during a blackout. The first few days there might be some garages and food stores open that will operate on generators, until cash buyers run out of cash, or the generators run out of fuel. Cash will be King. 

As stated at work as well. Eskom total blackout, is bad, but once the petro supply lines go down, it is chaos.

As petro is a way of generation and keeping the lights on for the majority of companies.

 

In essence, if eskom dives, we could still function to a lesser extent till the fuel dries up. Then there is nothing, which is why each and every company out there needs a full on solar solution.

Edited May 25, 20233 yr by Eurard

Yip, without fuel (diesel and petrol), all transportation will stop. No shops or businesses will receive stock or produce. People will starve and have no water too.

marauding mobs will scour the cities and suburbs looking for food and water. Things will be dire, and no one will be happy or safe.

Doomsday....   😓

9 hours ago, TimCam said:

People will starve

They will go do shopping with a brick in one hand.

This sounds rather like preparations for the end of the world and a Zombie apocalypse! 

There will be different scenarios if the grid stays off for 2 days when compared to 2 weeks or more. That will be a very different issue! I do not believe that we will have more than a couple of days outage at worst. There will be intermittent outages in various areas, whilst the grid stabilises and that might take some time. 

I think that the biggest problem will be communication. All cell phone towers will stop working after 6-8 hours (battery life expired!). Fibre may remain in areas that the ISP's can keep things running with generators until the fuel supply is exhausted. Radio and television (which we all use via IP networks today) will also be affected! No "Family Meetings" possible................. 
Makes you think! 

I am keeping my cars full of fuel at all, times. When grid crashes I load the wife and cats and run for the nearest border until power is restored 

41 minutes ago, Don said:

They will go do shopping with a brick in one hand.

Food trucks will not even make it to the store, they will be pulled off the road and looted bare unless accompanied by heavily armed guards.

On 2023/05/24 at 6:02 PM, Chris.P.Bacon said:

Bullets are probably worth more than solar if the grid does collapse. 

This thread was never going to stay on electrics.

Basically you will be camping at home. Whatever you need for a one week camping trip in the bush, will probably be fine. But get it now, remember the weird toilet paper non shortage of covid - stuff like that will happen.

 

I remember this was a thing in April 1994, some people still haven't finished all the tins of beans they bought then.

 

 

 

On 2023/05/25 at 11:09 AM, Chris.P.Bacon said:

This is my biggest fear in SA.

We are probably the only house in our neighborhood with full solar.

We stand out like a Christmas tree and I always wonder when Solar equipment becomes the next target for break ins. 

This is also my biggest worry even though my swift defense is 🔥 

The fight will be for food, water, energy and how you are going protect it. For those on chronic medication: do you have spare meds? Basic medicine will become life saving. 

I have enough battery storage to go 18 hours  and enough solar to keep them toped up and an 24/7 366 days spring running through my property so endless electricity and water . Gas stove and water heater and enough gas to last 4 month plus so hot water and cooking is also not an issue for a few month . 

The main concern is not drawing unnecessary attention to the property but that is not an issue as we learnt a long time ago playing load music or showing off your wealth  draws all the bad people to the property and with time we learnt how to keep a low profile and never had an issue since . 

Only issue is food but can food can last some time . So be save and keep a low profile . We hope for the best but plan for the worst 

 

 

8 minutes ago, GMAC said:

spring running through my property so endless electricity and water

Water is number one, then food, then shelter, then protection. The protection is always the difficult part, as how do you protect against a desperate starving mob? 🤔

That's the big question and scary part how do you protect , but best is  NEVER   to not draw attention to your property  and look like part of the angry hungry mob .