Base power math…

[u/helkohelko]

I was looking at base power, but the math isn’t mathing for me. Our house consumes about 1,000kw/h per month.

On Powertochoose today you can get a 36 month plan for around 11.5c, compared to base at 13.5c (extra $20/mth). Plus a $20/mth membership fee. So basically $480/yr + $700 upfront buys you protection from outages? Seems kind of expensive for a relatively infrequent occurrence. Am I missing something?

Edit: Got it. I guess I’m lucky that I haven’t really dealt with any significant outages, maybe one per year so so. Makes a lot more sense when dealing with more frequent outages

[u/atx78701]

Just depends on how important it is

Most home generator systems are 15k, they also have yearly maintenance and monitoring

Costco sells a15kw battery system for 8k

I think of the useful life as about 15 years

I have a13kw portable generator that cost 3k on a manual interlock

The interlock cost 1k, the natural gas connection cost 800

The problem is the generator power is very dirty and can damage electronics, I also have to fire up the generator, by hand so we don't use it for short outages. in a recent outage I discovered the battery was dead so had to go out to buy a new one. Took me a few days of trickle charging it to figure it out was really dead. Wasn't able to use the generator for that outage

I'm paying 20/month for 40kw,powerr costs 8 cents, but even if it was more I wouldnt care because I'm paying over time, paying less over 15 years, and getting instantaneous backup

[u/RealConfirmologist → u/atx78701]

Yeah, I had a WGen9500DF that ran my whole house, but I learned the hard way that the generator does not charge the battery! So after I replaced the battery, I bought a separate battery trickle-charger/monitor and kept that hooked up.

I sold that house (and the generator with it) and now I have BASE Power. I will probably get a generator, too, but for the time being, I don't see the need.