How do you prepare your tank for bad weather?

[Art]

So Florida is normally a nice place to live but we do get the occasional weather issue. This is what we are waiting for later this weekend.

Although it doesn't look like a direct hit for me, I will be getting bad weather all weekend long. Of course, that can include power outages.

Weather is in the upper 90sF / 36C.

Any things I should be doing at this point just in case?

 

[*Ci*]

I keep a portable Honda 2000w generator and fresh gas in working order. The 2000 will run all of my pond pumps and tank filters and heaters, as well as some household appliances (hydroponic vegetable garden, for one). Having the correct length extension cords already sorted out and organized helps.
It would probably run the refrigerator , too, but I’ve never had an outage last long enough to try it. Knock on wood.

 

[Pepere]

Here, inland 30 miles in Maine, hurricanes are few and usually are worn out by the time they hit…

But, snow and ice storms can cause outages…

I have some Ryobi inverters that run off my battery packs dor my power tools. They come in handy when the outage is not widespread to keep the canister going.



They only make financial sense if you already have the battery packs for other uses…

I also have 3 inverter generators to keep various buildings warm in extended outages…. They operate the oil fired boilers and pumps, but plenty of power to spare for my tanks.

Why 3? Well, I own 2 multi family housing buildings and a house. Each building can have 1 running….

And rule of thumb with preparedness, redundancy is good…. If one dies, I have two to ferry around keeping things going…

My most recent one I purchased was a Sportsman model 800 watt inverter generator available at Tractor Supply for 169.00.

Any Fishkeeper who would like a generator for backup for their fish but didnt want to spend a lot of money to get one should take a look at this.

As a side benefit it has 1000 watt starting watt capacity so is enough to start up most refrigerators…. You could keep your fridge cold with it and unplug the fridge and run the tanks for a bit….

https://www.tractorsupply.com/tsc/product/sportsman-1000w-inverter-portable-gasoline-generator-gen1000i

 

[Art]

So thanks you two. I'm familiar with generators as I had some in the past. Unfortunately, I'm in an apartment now so sold mine.

I probably should know this but what's the difference between an inverter and a generator?

 

[Pepere]

Well, I have inverters that convert battery power to 120 volt alternating current.

And all of my generators are inverter based generators that produce pure sine waveform allowing the generator to ramp up, ramp down engine speed in response to demand. Allows much quieter operation at partial load…

In an apartment, an inverter with a fair sized battery and a charger could serve a tank for an extended time period…, if nothing else to keep the canister filter going…. A 10 watt canister filter would require around 250 watt hours a day. A 100 amp hr lithium iron Phosphate battery could run that for about 4 days before needing to be recharged…

There are all in one units out there with multiple recharge options. Folding solar panels, plug in to a vehicle charging station, plug in to grid electrical standard outlet…. Convenient and versatile, but pricey little units. Delta Ecoflow Pro gives you 3.6 killowatt hours of energy storage for $2,500.00….

Conversely Li Fe pho4 100 ah battery gives you a bit over a killowatt hour of power storage for under $250.00. Just add an inverter, wires a big fuse with good AIC rating and an inverter…

 

[Pepere]

So Art, what sort of “Bad Weather” problems did you end up getting? Did you lose power for any appreciable amount of time?

 

[Art]

Conversely Li Fe pho4 100 ah battery gives you a bit over a killowatt hour of power storage for under $250.00. Just add an inverter, wires a big fuse with good AIC rating and an inverter…

Going to have to research this. Thank you!

So Art, what sort of “Bad Weather” problems did you end up getting? Did you lose power for any appreciable amount of time?

Nothing but a little rain, thankfully. I believe Georgia and South Carolina have gotten much worse.

 

[Pepere]

Power outage plan just implemented….

Ryobi 1 plus 18 volt, 4 ah battery pack 150 watt inverter running 3 fluval 07 series canister filter and an airpump to Brine shrimp hatchery…


Estimated restoration of power is 2 hours per utility….

 

[Art]

Was this Debby related, @Pepere? Hope you're back up and running.

However, this again highlights the importance of all of us having a plan for power outages.

 

[Pepere]

We had remnants of the system here and it was raining, but it was more of a gentle steady rain with minimal wind but definitely tropical air mass with dew points of 76. 2,000 customer accounts were down for about an hour and a half…

I have no idea what the outage was due by. Here in Maine without wind, it often enough is caused by squirrels bridging a voltage potential or a car accident.

In the age of the internet now, here in Maine, when the power is interupted we can go online to see an outage list and see the extent…

Usually the first thingnI do after an outage is turn on my LED lantern that is in photo above. On low setting that thing will run for the better part of a week non stop on a fresh set of batteries…. Then after I have lighting I hop on the outage list with my cell phone to see how extensive current outages are. Usually I have some sense as to how intense whether system we are facing… This one while significant amount at 2,000 customer accounts in a single outage accounted for only about 5% of the town I live in and surrounding towns and counties had minimal outages…

Given that scenario I plugged the three canister filters and single air pump to brine hatchery into Ryobi inverter. I expected outage of less than three hours….

Earlier in the spring we had a significant spring storm that was expected to wreck havoc and it did… 75% of accounts in my town and surrounding towns were out of power when I logged in.

In that scenario, I filled a bucket with dechlorinated water and removed the media from all my canister filters and placed them in the bucket with 2 airstones in and ran an air pump on the Ryobi 1+…. In that storm we were without power for 36 hours..

A couple of my tanks have UGF plates that those air pumps were also being run by this little 150 watt inverter. The inverter puts out 150 watts and with a 4 amp hr 18 volt battery has about 60 watt hours of capacity after accounting for conversion losses. This means a single battery can run 3 canister filters for about 2 hours, but it is also able to keep 4 air pumps alone running for about 5 hours all by itself.

I have several battery packs that I charge up fully before any significant storm is forecast to hit…

These little inverters are great for minimal outages, and also handy for intermittent periods during longer ones. I also have three Inverter based gas generators that are brought in to play to keep various buildings heated and supplied with hot water, keep the fridges and freezers cold, and can be used to recharge battery packs and to give the tanks some heat and run the lighting to maintain plants as needed if it would run into a significantly extended outage. Where we live in a reasonably sized town of about 40,000, outage ever so rarely extend beyond 5-6 hours….

My son however lives in an adjacent small town. He routinely sees outages of 3-5 days. Sparsely populated along long heavily forested areas adjacent to the roads…

Maine is the most heavily wooded state in the country, and our legislature about 15 years ago heavily restricted the utilities right to trim trees along their right of way. They used to take out dead limbs and trees within falling distance of the primaries, but now are not allowed to touch anything not within 20 feet of the primaries. When this change was enacted the utilities complained and said it would lead to more frequent and lengthy outages within 10-15 years… and it has… and that increases our utility rates too as trimming is cheaper than repairing damage.

Politicians today are more in tune with blaming the utilities for mismanagement being the cause of longer, more frequent outages and higher costs and not helping to remove the rope tying one arm from behind their backs….

 

[Art]

Glad to hear it was only a short one. I appreciate the detailed response as that gives us an understanding of your thought process which is helpful.

Interesting you remember the bacteria in the filters. They need to be kept alive too!

 

[Pepere]

Honestly, it is all about preserving the bacteria… I am fine not having a filter running all day for the fish in the tank… but after an hr or so in a closed canister filter the bacteria are going to have used up available oxygen…

 

[BryceM]

When we built the house we wired it for a standby backup generator. It comes on automatically and has somewhere around a 2 week supply of fuel. We're out in the boonies, and everything in the home runs on electricity - hot water, washer/dryer, the well, home sump pump, heat, air conditioning..... everything. All of the fish tanks are set up on the system, of course.

I realize that's not a viable solution for everyone, but it gives us enormous peace of mind in the event of a prolonged power outage, especially in the winter. We have a supply of firewood and an efficient fireplace to hopefully keep the house livable for a few weeks too. I dunno if it would all work out OK in a worst-case situation, but it's a better bet than anything that runs on batteries.

 

[Pepere]

dunno if it would all work out OK in a worst-case situation, but it's a better bet than anything that runs on batteries.

I think there are different solutions for different scenarios. Battery back up and capacity is expensive energy storage with limited capacity, but an apartment dweller has limited choices and fossil fueled electricity generation simply is not feasible for many.

Even as a homeowner with generators I do find battery storage capacity a useful adjunct as a short term bridge and allowing me to not have the generators running constantly. I can opt to run portable generator for large loads and also recharge batteries and still handlesmaller constant loads when the generator is shut down..

Alternatively, a few portable solar panels can allow for recharging of battery cells as well..

I am a fan of multiple redundancies and options.. In germs of preparedness, the concept is if you have 2, that is good because you will still have 1 if 1 fails…. If you have 1, what is your plan if suddenly you have none?

I lived through a major Ice Storm in 1998 that was so severe that large metal towers on transmission lines collapsed under the weight of the ice. We experienced 3 days of freezing rain… There was an inch and a half of ice coating all of the tree branches. The town I live in is adjacent to another town and combined population is around 70,000. At one point there were three gas stations still open and able to pump gas and there was a line a mile and a half long to buy gas…. Upon the order of the governor grocery stores were ordered to open with portable lighting and battery calculators to ring up customers…. I walked in to the grocery store. All of the refrigerated food had been thrown out for safety. All of the instant food you could pop open a can to eat was sold out, The crackers, cookies cereal aisle were empty. Just bare shelves. Canned vegetables and juices were gone…. Soda gone…. There was plenty of rice flour and beans if you had a way to cook them….there was no bottled water left on the shelves, not a single battery,not a single candle, or charcoal or propane cylinders…. I ended up walking out without buying anything.

Large swathes of the population had their electricity restored after a week, but large areas took up to 3 weeks…. I think it was almost 6 weeks before all damage was restored. It changed my perspective on how I prepare. A storm of the century does not mean it will be a hundred years before you experience similar again.. it means every year there is a 1 percent chance of one occurring. We managed our way through, but we are much better prepared now than we were then…

 

[Art]

an apartment dweller has limited choices

At the moment, this is me. I'm in an apartment now and the building doesn't have a backup generator, not even for elevators... Don't get me started...

I do think this is something each of us needs to think through to be prepared given our different situations. For example, I live in an area where I don't have to worry about the cold. However, a bullseye with a hurricane can (and has) knock out power for 4 - 6 weeks. I need to be prepared for smaller outages but have a strategy to manage a longer one as well.

For me, @Pepere's suggestions make sense because I can easily manage the shorter outages with the inverter and batteries. The longer ones will be more work but I'm working on it. It will entail taking batteries to charge out of the affected region and returning every few days to swap them out.

The moral of the story is to think about what you're going to do now. Everything in your aquarium care is depending on you.

 

[Pepere]

The longer ones will be more work but I'm working on it. It will entail taking batteries to charge out of the affected region and returning every few days to swap them out.

Consideration can be given to having a battery to swap out and possibly solar panels to recharge without travelling…. It doesnt make sense for everyone, but is worth mulling.

I come from a marine perspective having been an ABYC certified Marine electrician. The inboard engines on most Sailboats see most of their use as very expensive battery chargers… that are occasionally used for propulsion…

I will grant that solar panels make the most sense when they are being regularly used, but they also have an appeal in a widespread natural disaster where fuel and supplies might be limited and streets and transportation can be affected as well.. Time to travel can be considerable and reducing that need has its appeal…

 

[Art]

Actually, I never thought about solar panels for recharging and think it is a viable idea for me. That would save me having to go hunting for electricity up the state like I do for gas.

I looked at smaller solar panels back in the day when I had a boat and wanted to have something topping off my batteries. Maybe I can figure out a setup to charge batteries from my apartment. I'm in Florida after all. Plenty of sun once the hurricane passes.

 

[Pepere]

Actually, I never thought about solar panels for recharging and think it is a viable idea for me

There are folding panels out there. For a small system you could have 2, 100 amp hour LiFePO4 batteries each giving a bit overa killowatt of storage. 1 battery could be recharged while the other one continues to power tanks. A 200 watt solar panel should recharge a 100 amp our battery in a sunny day. Factoring at least 5 hours of good sunlight. If you had a balcony with good sunlight exposure this could be a good option as once set up it can be left unattended.

If one had to stand by to prevent theft, it of course has less utility…

 

[Pepere]

So @Art, another hurricane bearing down on Florida…

Have you taken steps to better weather the weather?

 

[Mr.Shenanagins]

It’s probably somewhere in this range of the planning process