So – You live in an Apartment, Condominium, Townhouse or similar structure and you are wanting to plan for a power outage. If you are thinking about a Gasoline or other Fuel-based generator that puts out fumes, then you may want to rethink that. Any type of fuel-based generator is illegal to operate due to hazard concerns from the fumes indoors without proper ventilation. This includes on a porch or balcony where there is insufficient ventilation or where fumes may rise into the ceiling area and drop in another portion of the structure.
You ABSOLUTELY must have ventilation with a recommendation of the generator running no less than 30 feet away from the structure for safety purposes. So – Then, what are your options?
This is an area where your absolute best options will be in the area of Solar/Battery powered solutions that can provide at least some power to get you through the emergency. Remember – During a storm you will need to be fully indoors and a battery-powered generator will provide a safe source of power to keep some lights and systems on during the power outage. But – How much power do you need?
In general, I would recommend between 1500 and 2000-watts minimum of battery power to get easily through a 10-12 hour evening. This will likely drain your battery dead requiring you to recharge it the next morning from some other power source such as a gas generator (Operating outdoors) or when the grid is back up, but it will get you through the night – possibly – depending on how much power you are drawing from it. To determine this, you need to identify what you will be running.
Remember – A 2000-watt battery source providing AC power out through a power inverter is just like a bottle of water – once it runs out it runs out so you need to plan the flow of power that will be running through it. So – Let’s say you have a refrigerator you want to power for 10 hours, and it draws 100-watts each hour. That means that you will draw 1000-watts of power out of the battery source. But – If the battery source inverter has a low efficiency then it may eat up 120-watts of battery power for every 100-watts of AC power it provides, so you may drawing down 1200-watts of power during that 10-hours. This still leaves you with 800-watts for other purposes.
You can then draw power for other purposes, but those need to be planned carefully. Maybe charging your phones, or powering some USB Camping lights. Powering a portable radio or other small devices. But if you draw too much power, then you will have no power until you can recharge.
For apartments or similar types of residences where you are restricted to battery power, you may wish to plan for 4000-watts to 6000-watts of power for a more comfortable window. If your power need is to get through short-duration outages, then 2000-watts may be more than sufficient to keep the Refrigerator cool or medical equipment running.
For more information about proper power planning during a Hurricane or other power-loss events, pick up my book Hurricane Ready: Emergency Backup Power available on Amazon.com at the following link:
https://www.amazon.com/HURRICANE-READY-Emergency-Backup-Solutions/dp/B0BZFRP83C/ref=sr_1_21?crid=A1V0ARV03G8R&keywords=Hurricane+Ready&qid=1681854871&sprefix=hurricane+ready%2Caps%2C99&sr=8-21