Winter weather in the South this weekend!

[Naturescapes_Rocco]

I would like to experience beautiful powder snow falling while it’s sunny and about 68F outside. It would magically vanish before it turns to slush. Any location where that happens?

Lifelong Coloradan here, it happens! In fact, I've had ski days in July where it was fresh snow in the mountains, and over 70F in Denver at the same time. We get 300+ days of sunshine per year. It's a special treat when you have those days where somehow it's warm, sunny AND lightly snowing...

 

[gnatster]

This is getting interesting in Central Ohio. Overnight, the forecast changed from maybe a light dusting to, hey, we're looking at 8-10 inches of snow Saturday into Sunday.

It'll most likely change a few more times before the event.

 

[Pepere]

This is getting interesting in Central Ohio. Overnight, the forecast changed from maybe a light dusting to, hey, we're looking at 8-10 inches of snow Saturday into Sunday.

It'll most likely change a few more times before the event

Earlier this winter I went to sleep with light dusting of snow on the ground and a forecast of 4-6 inches by morning.

I woke up to 16 inches that needed to be cleared…

 

[Lush_Aqua]

Not sure I can use a generator in my living space, but have any of you had experience using an UPS / backup battery power-supply? Trying to look at options online to understand what is enough to run a set of heaters and bubblers for my tanks. Trying to hope for at least 8 hours of battery, but I am not too sure what items at Walmart/BestBuy/HomeDepot are sufficient.

 

[Koan]

backup battery power-supply

Anything by Anker they go from portable / rollaway battery all the way up to whole house power. I have their millisecond automatic failover panel wired in to kick the batteries on when the power goes out

 

[Pepere]

Not sure I can use a generator in my living space, but have any of you had experience using an UPS / backup battery power-supply?

You definitely can not use an internal combustion engine powered generator inside a living space. It needs to be at least 25 feet away from your house outside….

As to powerbank inverter, What sort of money are you looking to spend? Storing power in batteries is an expensive proposition…

I built my own 3 killowatt hour storage power station.

$400.00 for the batteries,, $180.00 for the charger, $200 for the inverter, maybe another $300.00 for cabling, bus bars, fusing, terminal ends….


For 8 hours of use, dont worry about the heaters unless you have very sensitive high temp fish…


I have a few of these $49.00 Ryobi inverters that I put in 6 amp hour Ryobi battery packs in I keep for my portable ryobi tools.

Great for running air pumps… for my Under gravel filters.

One battery packs is sufficient to keep 100 gph flowing through my ugf filters for 24 hours.

 

[Pepere]

Battery back ups for computers have very little battery storage.



It really is not practical to heat an aquarium using battery back up.





1 killowatt hour of battery storage costs close to $200.00 just for the battery.

A 1 kwhr battery power station is around $500.00.



That can provide about 3500 btus at most.



1 btu raises the tempof 1 pound of water 1 degree farenheit.



A gallon of water weighs 8 pounds. So raising a gallon of water 1 degree consumes 8 BTU.



A dual fuel heater like this costs $29.00 roughly at Amazon. A 1 pound Propane cylinder costs about $5.00.



That 1 pound cylinder has about 90,000 btus when it is combusted…



In essence that little bottle of propane holds as much heat energy as 25 car battery sized LiFePO4 batteries that costs about $200.00 each, or 50 lead Acid deep cycle trolling batteries that costs over $100.00 each…



A big enough power bank to keep your aquarium heaters running would be very expensive…

2 liter soda bottles are nice to have.



Fill them with water, pour roughly half into saucepan heat to a boil.



Placethem in your sink and use a funnel to fill back up. This way if you spill while transfering the sink provides your body with protection against severe burns.



The combination of roughly a liter of 70 ish water and a liter of near boiling water will yield roughly 140 degree water in bottle.



Each 2 liter bottle provides roughly 280 btus.



Judge the number of soda bottles you need per tank.



It takes 8 btus to raise a gallon of water 1 degree Farenheit.



If you are trying to raise tank temp from 70 to 76 degrees you need 48 btus per gallon.



Ballpark you will need one 2 liter bottler for every 6 gallons of water…



You dont need to do them all at once though.. 10 bottles in a 75 gallon would be pretty full…. I would probably put in 4 and then replace as temp of bottle gets down.

 

[Lush_Aqua]

You definitely can not use an internal combustion engine powered generator inside a living space. It needs to be at least 25 feet away from your house outside….

As to powerbank inverter, What sort of money are you looking to spend? Storing power in batteries is an expensive proposition…

I built my own 3 killowatt hour storage power station.

$400.00 for the batteries,, $180.00 for the charger, $200 for the inverter, maybe another $300.00 for cabling, bus bars, fusing, terminal ends….


For 8 hours of use, dont worry about the heaters unless you have very sensitive high temp fish…

View attachment 13547
I have a few of these $49.00 Ryobi inverters that I put in 6 amp hour Ryobi battery packs in I keep for my portable ryobi tools.

Great for running air pumps… for my Under gravel filters.

One battery packs is sufficient to keep 100 gph flowing through my ugf filters for 24 hours.

So with further research, I'm seeing how this is getting expensive. UPS was not the right way to power this tank for several hours, so I see how that cost spiked. I can skip out on powering the heaters. I didn't realize that may not be needed.

I'm afraid I'm getting a bit tangled with all the materials needed to run this. I was under the impression that I could just charge up some sort of battery powered generator and plug a few bubblers into it for 8 hours.

Maybe something like this seemed like a simple system that I could operate indoors. According to the specs, it estimated that it could power a fridge for 6 hours, so I assume I'd get a lot more hours for just some bubblers.

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[Pepere]

Maybe something like this seemed like a simple system that I could operate indoors. According to the specs, it estimated that it could power a fridge for 6 hours, so I assume I'd get a lot more hours for just some bubblers.

296 watt hours of power.

Look underneath your air pumps. Printed on it should list how many watts it consumes. Typically 2-6 watts for standalone units…

My 75 gallon has 2 airpumps to feed the undergravel filters. They consume 2 watts each, so 4 watts to power both of them.

296 watt hours divided by 4 watts gives you 74 hour run time.

 

[Koan]

If you are trying to raise tank temp from 70 to 76 degrees you need 48 btus per gallon.

Curious, why would you want to do this during a power outage?

If the concern is keeping the tanks warm, mylar thermal blankets are $1.30 a piece and will passively retain heat for a quite a while.

Anything you're doing to keep your house warm will slow the loss of heat from the tanks as well, anything from a propane Mr Buddy to a gas generator or portable battery set up to run the blower on your furnace.

Running bubblers is a great idea if you have fish or shrimp, there are a number of inexpensive ones that run on D batteries, as well as rechargeable lithium. Or you can certainly plug them into a battery backup

In a long power outage, the loss of oxygen to your canister filter will kill off your biofilter, so it's not a bad idea to unplug the canisters, take the tops off and put a bubbler in there as well

 

[Pepere]

Curious, why would you want to do this during a power outage?

If the concern is keeping the tanks warm, mylar thermal blankets are $1.30 a piece and will passively retain heat for a quite a while.

I agree that in the short term, adding blankets to a tank is the better option.

Just outlining a much cheaper alternative to boosting tank temp than battery backup to run heaters fir people who generators are not a practical option who might have an extended outage.

That little gas burner is awfully nice to cook on as well. I also have a stainless steel Moka pot to make all important coffee without electricity…

Here in Maine in the town I live in (population 37,000) loss of power seldom exceeds 8 hours, but on occasion I have seen 24 hours. In surrounding towns that have under 3,000 residents they routinely see at least 1 or 2 outages a year of at least 3 days time. The state has low population density but is the most heavily forested state in the nation. Those trees along the roads fall down on the powerlines…

Having UGF in all my tanks is part of my power outage strategy.

In event of an outage the first thing I do is hop online via iphone to check the outage list for local area and counties to determine how widespread the outage is. In event of significant widespread outage, media is removed from canisters and kept in a bucket with an airstone running. My worst case scenario if I wasnt home to deal with it would be to simply take all the media out of the canisters and give them all a good cleaning and just restart them when the power came back on. In the meantime the ugfs would have a great store of beneficial bacteria until the canisters re establish. In event of extended outage I would reheat the tanks with a generator powering the heaters.

 

[ElleDee]

Ugh, the forecast here is less snow and more ice now, so an extended power outage looks very possible.

My whole family is going to hole up in the family room where my tanks are, but I have no idea how cold it's going to get in there even with a space heater. My 20-long is being thrown to the wolves - it's just a few shrimp and plants. My 22 gallon is getting an airstone and an insulted blanket, but I think the livestock will be able to handle fairly low temps and I'm not too worried. My big tank will have intermittent filtration, constant heating, and an insulated blanket, but I have no idea how effective all that will be and for how long I can maintain it. I am most concerned about my diamond tetras and apistos, but I'll just have to see how it plays out.

If I do lose power, I plan to keep a record of what happens for future planning. I think if I have major losses I may go back to all fish that can handle occasional low temps, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

 

[Kwyet]

Ugh, the forecast here is less snow and more ice now, so an extended power outage looks very possible.

My whole family is going to hole up in the family room where my tanks are, but I have no idea how cold it's going to get in there even with a space heater. My 20-long is being thrown to the wolves - it's just a few shrimp and plants. My 22 gallon is getting an airstone and an insulted blanket, but I think the livestock will be able to handle fairly low temps and I'm not too worried. My big tank will have intermittent filtration, constant heating, and an insulated blanket, but I have no idea how effective all that will be and for how long I can maintain it. I am most concerned about my diamond tetras and apistos, but I'll just have to see how it plays out.

If I do lose power, I plan to keep a record of what happens for future planning. I think if I have major losses I may go back to all fish that can handle occasional low temps, but I'm getting ahead of myself.

I hope it goes well!

 

[Pepere]

My whole family is going to hole up in the family room where my tanks are

Human beings generate about 300 btu per hour when sitting and not doing much.

The heat loss for a 12 x 12 room is maybe 4-5000 btu per hour when it is zero degrees outside. If it is 30 degrees outside maybe around 2-2500 btu per hour.

 

[JuJuFish]

We are expecting ice even in north Louisiana and that usually comes with power outages. Like @ElleDee I’m trying to get prepared. I cut some pieces of pink foam insulation to put around one tank. I have a 10 gallon with Aspidoras fry that is by itself in a back room. I guess I can move that to our one room with a gas fireplace if necessary. And I bought two Delta Ecoflows last year so they may get their first workout. Hopefully they will keep the rest of the tanks warm and aerated.

 

[Pepere]

I have no idea how cold it's going to get in there even with a space heater

Are you planning on running a generator to keep an electric space heater running?

Do you have extra gasoline cans filled with Gasoline?

In 1998 iirc, a major ice Storm hit New England amd Canada. Lasted for days. Trees and power lines had 1 1/2 inch of ice on them. Very widespread outages. In the town I live in metro area of around 50,000. We were without power for about a week, Surrounding towns were without forup to a month.

One day During the storm I was ferrying our generator between apartments we own to keep them warm and heat up the hot water. I drove by a gas station that had a line over a mile long…. There were only 3 gas stations in town able to pump gas…

I went out and fot every gas can I had and got in line to fill up.

A gas generator is just a heavy lump of metal if you dont have gas.

There were no businesses open until Day 3 when the governor ordered grocery store to open to public with calculators and portable lights….

I stopped in. As imagined all the frozen food and meat had been thrown in the dumpster as it was unsafe..

All batteries, matches, candles, sold out. As well as all canned foods, granola bars, poptarts, ie anything you could open and eat…. Fresh fruits gone…

Plenty of flour and grains.

And stores were cash only…

Most people do not have cash anymore…

This storm was an eye opener. Yeah, it was deemed a 100 year event, but that only means each year has a 1 % chance of recurring…

Every year I fill up nine 5 gallon gas cans that has stabil in it and stored at 3 at 3 separate locations for fire safety. I use that gas to run lawnmowers and snowblowers through the year. If An ice storm is in the forecast I top off any empties..

This story might explain why I have 3 generators, multiple back up stoves, oven to sit on stove, backup power bank, portable inverters, kerosene space heaters, kerosene hurricane lamps etc…

 

[JayP]

KC forecast has gradually gone from just frigid temps to now 3" or more of snow, which to many, wouldn't seem like a big deal, but in KC, when there's even mention of 1", It's like Armageddon is around the corner and every grocery store in the city is packed.

 

[Pepere]

This simple but very well built Kerosene Hurricane lantern features vety thick cat glass with lock nobs to hold it securely. The warming plate lets you put a small saucepan on top to reheat canned foods.

The reflector shade allows you to hang the lantern from a cook and casy a puddle of light underneath it with no shadows from lantern body.

For winter emergency use this provides heat and lighting. Sitting near it you have sufficient light to read by.

It puts off about 1,400 btu per hour. It holds enough kerosene to run 27 hours on a fill. Forinside use I reccomend Klean 100% kerosene alternative as it is highly refined with extremely low sulfur.

I have a Carbon monoxide detector that reads as low as 1 ppm. Running it all day in an enclosed room with no windows open it never detected any co. CO2 is another matter. It produces as much co2 as about 4-5 people.

I would leave a window cracked open enough to slip a quarter through the crack. Will keep co2 below 1,500 ppm with 2 people in the room and not lose too much heat.

2 people in a 12x12 room with doors and windows closed can easily get up towards 4,000 ppm co2 in 8 hours time

If the lantern tips on its side, the flame extiguishes under a minute…. If the fuel tank was not overfilled it will stay contained in the tank and not leak out.

Incredibly robust and exceedingly simple tech…

Running a gas generator to run an electric space heater is incredibly wasteful in a crises of very scarce gasoline…

A gallon of gasoline has 114,000 btus in it.

Depending on load, efficiency etc, a gallon of gasoline has will generate between 3-5 killowatt hours of electricity. A killowatt hour of electricity will generate 3,500 btus of heat in an electric space heater.

Best case scenario you only move about 17,000 btus in your living space from the 114,000 btus in the fuel you burned using a gas generator…

A gallon of Kerosene burned in a hurricane lantern will produce close to 130,000 btus…

 

[ElleDee]

@Pepere, yes, we have a little Honda generator and about 3 days of gas, depending on how we ration it. And how we ration will depend on how bad it end up being. I've seen predictions all over the place, but the local news just released a forecast that puts most of the area at 0.5" to 1", which is pretty unprecedented. I hope they are wrong. (There's still a possibility it's mostly rain!)

I've lived through quite a few extreme weather events, split between ice storms and hurricanes. I think we're more prepared than most people, but I can't really imagine being totally cut off for an entire week. We're going to be totally good for 3 or 4 days. After that we'll have to get creative, but we have calories in the pantry and warm clothes. We're not going to die.

I'm thinking once travel is possible we'll be in the clear. I have a lot of family in the area and hopefully someone will have power after a few days and we'll have somewhere to shower and warm up and plug our phones in.

 

[Danbest82]

I am just south of @ElleDee . There is always a line between she and I where they get snow and we get ice. I am hoping we both get the snow this time. I don't want the ice, but that line is near and they never know exactly where it will be.

Bit of random trivia, this famous pic was actually taken just 2-3 miles from where I live in the direction where ElleDee lives. I'm hoping we don't repeat.
View attachment 13511

Stay home and enjoy some beer while hanging out with your fish! That's what I plan to do in NY.