When purchasing or building a home, there are no shortages of choices that must be made. From type of home and features needed to financial matters, literally hundreds of choices must be made. Though some decisions may not have a direct impact on your prepping (the color of the countertop will not matter in a SHTF scenario) many will have a direct impact on the sustainability of your home, your financial well being and thus, your ability to prep. This article’s purpose to introduce the new homeowner-to-be some of these choices and to give you some background on each so that you may further investigate those that interest you. It is not intended to be a how to build a house guide!

As the host of The Homeowner’s Friend Podcast, I have explained many of the items I will cover in this article in greater detail. Like with any choice having to do with finances or big-ticket items, you need to research these items yourself carefully. Though I believe my information to be true, it is ultimately up to you to make the best decision depending on your particular circumstances. I make no warranties, expressed or implied.

I have worked on and have toured many homes under construction and found most to be of the generic cookie-cutter variety - perfectly suitable to the "grasshopper" lifestyle. Long on features like Jacuzzis, fancy kitchens and large spaces but short on practicality, strength and sustainability. Any home built or purchased by a prepper must be, above anything else IMO, sustainable to the greatest extent possible.
By sustainable, I am not trying to save the planet (though that is a definite by-product), I am trying to make your home require the least amount of external inputs necessary to keep it functioning. This has everyday advantages and is even more valuable in a SHTF scenario. In normal times, it saves you money and/or effort. An efficient home simply costs less to operate, leaving more money for “bullets and Band-Aids”. In a SHTF crisis, it is easier to maintain comfort in the home and will save precious resources, hopefully allowing the few you have or can obtain to get you through till things get put back together.
In this article, we will look at the major systems of your home, which consist of the water system, both fresh and waste, Heating, Ventilation and Air Conditioning (HVAC), electrical, construction, and security issues. Most have at least some effect on the others and must all be properly integrated to obtain the most sustainable design. For example, HVAC and insulation are related as is the water system and your gutters. Both can be designed to compliment or help each other.

I will not look at home styles in this article as that could be one of its own. However, I will mention that as Americans, most of us desire to live in a larger home than we currently occupy, but actually need less home than we have now! We need a home that is comfortable and safe. We all desire a nice home, but a definite balance needs to be struck as the larger and fancier the home, the more resources (including money) it will require to operate, maintain and defend if necessary. When the gas is flowing, its easy to heat 5,000 square feet - but nearly impossible when the gas stops flowing! Remember most families (with 4-5 kids no less) survived in 800 square foot ranch houses in the 1970s just fine! Today, most home are two to three times that size - and are occupied by smaller families.

I am also going to focus on the most common type of home, the above ground standard framed home. Certainly, many interesting types of homes exist, such as subterranean, Earthship, straw bale, dome, yurt, etc., but again, I am not intending to write a book! Many of the systems, however, are common amongst all types so much of the discussion will be valid, whatever your choice.

Also, I will not cover locations. I have several podcasts on this topic, as it is an in depth topic in itself. From choosing a community to a specific lot, many considerations have to be made. Please though, investigate the area and lot carefully. Are there water problems, bad soil conditions, bad neighbors, high taxes, bad schools, a declining tax base or increased foreclosures? Is it a twenty mile commute to get to a job or store? As I mentioned in the podcasts, sometimes the cheapest land may prove to be the most expensive after you take into account all the variables!

Fresh Water

Water basically comes from two sources, wells and city mains. City water is supplied from wells or reservoirs, is filtered and treated, and pumped into the system. Extra water flows into the high water tanks to provide static pressure for the Town ([roughly]1 PSI for each feet of height (or "head") when the pumps are not needed or in time of high demand. Typically the tanks hold a day or so worth of water, so even in a power outage with no generator backup at the water plant, water will continue to flow for a day or so unless people hoard it. A very reliable system in normal times, but vulnerable in a SHTF scenario. I prefer my own water system, as I can control it - but currently we are on city water, with some backup stored and more unfiltered available locally.

Wells are perhaps the best for the prepper as this option allows you to basically operate your own water company. Two main types exist, dug and drilled. Dug wells are often 3 or so feet wide and several feet deep, often made of stone or a large pipe. These are installed over an active spring and can provide ample quantities of great water (or not). They are vulnerable to surface water contamination and as they rely on surface water bubbling out of the ground, as the surface water levels drop in dry times of the year, yields can suffer. In some areas, these can not be used as a water supply for a new home because of the risks involved.
Drilled wells are drilled into the earth using (usually) heavy well drilling equipment. These go down hundreds of feet (300-to-500 feet is common) into deep ground water sources typically found in cracks between the layers of rock. The top section, which goes from the surface through the soil and loose rock down to the solid bed-rock is lined with a steel pipe, called a well casing, that is cemented into the bedrock. This isolates the vulnerable surface water from the cleaner deep ground water. Ground water levels are also more stable, providing a more reliable water source for the homeowner.

In most cases, except in springs that are above the level of the house, a pump system is required to push or pull the water out of the well and into the home. Jet pumps are the most simple and pull the water from the well. These work well, but are best for more shallow wells. Submersible pumps located in the well under the water level, are clearly superior as it is easier to push than to pull water and are self priming (something you will appreciate if you sometimes run out of water). They are also more expensive and difficult to install, however. Storage (pressure) tanks are used to allow the pump to cycle at reasonable intervals. Rapidly cycling wells (more than once per minute with a moderate flow or so) indicate either a bad or undersized storage tank. Both types of pump have foot valves at the input to keep the home water (which is under pressure) from running back into the well. Occasionally, you are lucky enough to find an artesian well, which is basically a drilled well that is naturally under pressure. In this case, just pipe it to the home and you may not need a pump!

Using a simple generator or solar-powered pump, one can have water without the use of a grid. Be advised, many standard pumps are 220 Volt AC (VAC), so small inverters and generators will not work. A water storage tank can also be installed at the highest part of the home or land and used to supply water pressure between generator or sun fueled pumping sessions. Since well water is generally safe to drink without filtration or treatment, even during most SHTF scenarios, it makes the most important life sustaining item easy to provide.

Inside [city limits on metered] city water supplies, however, it may not be practical (or legal) to install a well just for emergency use. As an alternative, one can store potable water in an installed tank (approved for storage of drinking water) in the basement or yard and use a pump to supply it to the home. 12 Volt RV pumps (preferably the kind with the attached storage tank) are ideal for this coupled with a generator or solar recharged battery. Simply pump from the tank into the drain at your city water hookup or other cold water hose fitting, with the city water turned off to keep from also supplying your neighbors! Using just a few 55 gallon tanks and a pump like this, you can go a few days if you conserve - utilizing your normal household faucets. You could even take a quick shower, if needed. If you have a gas water heater with a pilot lamp, you can even have hot water.

Refill the water tanks with portable tanks hauled in a vehicle or behind a bike in a trailer. Fill the storage tanks by hand or with another pump and battery at local streams or other water bodies. Filter the water as you pump it with a simple RV filter and add some bleach to eliminate most water born bacteria or other contaminants. The EPA recommends to add 1/8 teaspoon (or 8 drops) of regular, unscented, liquid household bleach for each gallon of water, stir it well and let it stand for 30 minutes before you use it. Many books and Internet sources cover the finer points of water filtration, so I will not dwell on it here. You can also take advantage of roof water using a cistern buried in the yard or a pool to provide non-potable water for watering plants or flushing toilets. Be creative!

Waste Water Systems

If you are on city water, you are likely also on a city sewage system as well. If your on a hill, this may work even in a SHTF scenario (but understand it will exit somewhere downhill from your house - perhaps in another house..) but if you are not that high, it may back up as the pumps that keep the stuff flowing to the treatment plants shut down. Worst yet, it may back up into your home if you are lower in the system. Remember what flows down hill. This is why I never recommend having a gravity drained basement toilet or shower below grade (in a basement), as this is a prime release point in a backup - even a clog in your own drain pipe to the street can cause extensive damage. If you want to install a fixture below grade, use a sewage basin and ejector pump to raise the waste water to a higher pipe, a pipe that will only overflow from fixtures on the first floor - something that is much less likely to happen as they are higher than the ground level. It is also a good idea to install some sort of valve on your sewer hookup in the basement where it enters the house to stop any backups from entering your home. Some of these are even automatic.

If the city system is backed up, you will not be able to get rid of waste water without installing a basic septic system yourself. This may be something you do so quietly if you know what I mean. Just a “T” on the outlet from the house with some valves where you can temporarily pipe the waste into a couple of buried 55 gallon drums buried outside to settle out the solids and into some stone to drain the water will be better than nothing. And remember, gray water from sinks and showers can be used to water your garden or other plants, if you use biodegradable soaps. If you are building your home, installing this “T” will be easy as will separating your drains to take advantage of the gray water availability. Again, to meet codes you may want to plan for, but not execute, this till needed.

Of course, those homes with septic systems will not have these problems, unless you have a pump chamber as part of your system. Because of elevation issues, sometimes a pump is required to push the water that flows out of the house into the septic tank or even from the septic tank to the leach field. These tanks (especially those after the septic tank) are usually large and can accommodate some usage without power, but will eventually fill. As you run your generator, make sure these can run as well to keep things flowing.

Heating and Cooling

As for heating and cooling, choose the most efficient system that is practical for your area. There is a limit to this, though it may be hard to understand. In Florida, it makes sense to spend more on a super-efficient air conditioner because you will use it all year and the electricity saved, at today's rates, will offset the initial added expense before the system is obsolete. In northern climates though, where air conditioning is only used for 2-3 months in a year, you may never save enough to make it worth the added expense. In a heating system, the reverse will be true. However, I recommend pushing the limits of the practical savings limits a step or two as fuel will only get more expensive (and it may skyrocket soon..) and in a SHTF scenario, fuel will be nearly impossible to get. Our installer indicated most folks go with a 12-14 SEER air conditioning in our area. For a couple hundred bucks more, I went with the [moore efficient] 16 SEER - 2 stage unit to account for future fuel price increases - putting me just above the norm.

Air conditioning systems are quite straight forward, and are powered overwhelmingly by electricity, save the few by natural gas, so I will not talk to much here about them, except to push the efficiency ratings as mentioned above. Remember that central air conditioning is a big load for a generator to handle (more on that later) but a portable window unit, strategically placed, will provide relief while on generator power if needed. Buy one (they are cheap these days) for this purpose ahead of time and store it, even if you have central, if extreme heat is a life/death situation in your area.

Heating is much more complicated. With having to choose both a fuel source and system type, the options are many. Let’s first briefly cover fuel choices. This is a choice dominated by both personal opinions and local availability. Natural Gas, for example, may be the best option - except if it is not in front of you house! Also, regional differences in costs may also effect your decision. You must also understand the cost of the fuel and its relationship to BTU output (or heating power) per unit of fuel and the common efficiency ratings of appliances. For example, oil has about 140,000 btus per gallon, whereas propane only has 91,600 and natural gas, about half of that. Gas and propane burners can easily hit 95% efficiency while oil units generally peak out in the 86% range. Also take into consideration costs of maintenance. Oil units need regular cleaning (which can cost $100 or more, depending on the dealer, location, equipment, etc.) whereas gas and propane ones really need minimal maintenance (but should be inspected for safety regularly).
A comparison chart is generally useful to try to compare each effectively by comparing an expected BTU use per year, the quantity of fuel needed for each category and its costs, including installation and maintenance costs over the life expectancy of the equipment. Some web based resources are available to help with this, try this calculator.

Propane is my favorite, from a prepper’s standpoint. Propane can be stored essentially forever, as it does not go bad. Large underground tanks can be installed to supply your needs for a full year, or more. This also allows the home owner to take advantage of off-season purchases, which may save quite a bit of money each year. One warning: leased, rented, or company owned tanks are often a rip-off. With them, you are typically required to buy the gas from only the tank owner and they know it! Buy your tank if at all financially possible, then you can shop for the best deal on propane.

Propane is the most versatile fuel, from heating, hot water, cooking, grills, drying clothes, fireplace logs and gas stoves, it can be used in many areas of the home in normal times. Some of these appliances, such as stoves, water heaters, and some space heaters even operate without any electricity - check for availability. When the power goes out, you will be glad you can still use these appliances as usual.
Oil would be my second choice, but it is hard to store in large quantities. Buried tanks are basically too expensive due to regulatory requirements and insurance companies hate them. Having more than two tanks of fuel (500 gallons) in your basement takes up significant space and again invites insurance headaches. You cannot cook with it, so you still need an electric range or a separate gas system and stove. I am also not aware of an oil burner that can operate without power. One nice feature, is you can burn diesel or kerosene in a pinch, which can be bought or bartered for locally and hauled in 5 gallon buckets and dumped in your tank - try that with propane! Learn how to prime your equipment though, as this is necessary when you run dry. Oil is also pretty safe, compared to propane - leaks are less of a problem.

Natural gas is my favorite, except that you cannot store it and availability is limited geographically - it is mainly in the cities and suburbs where lots of customers live. Also, if the gas mains are shut down for some reason - you are out of business. Being underground, disruption is infrequent - but definitely possible, especially if we have transportation or grid failures or terrorist attacks. It has all the other advantages of propane, however, so it is still a good fuel. It is also mainly domestically sourced, which is also an advantage.

Wood is ideal if you have access it and if everyone in your home who will have to use it is healthy enough to cut, split, and move it - remember the strongest person may not be able to do these things in a SHTF scenario if they are hurt or worst. [JWR Adds: As I've mentioned in my writings before, cutting firewood with a chainsaw in the midst of societal collapse presents a security dilemma. A gas chainsaw can be heard for miles, and it leaves the ear muff-wearing operator vulnerable to attack. To be safe, any wood-cutting party will need an accompanying security detail.] You can easily heat with wood and some (including me) argue it is the best heat. You are also able to cook with it on most standard stoves and certainly on wood fired kitchen stoves. If you have trees on site - it can be next to free, save for some and gas for the saw and splitter. Expect to get around 1 sustainable cord per acre per year in a good forest lot. You can stack an ample quantity in the back yard and can always get more. It is not always as easy to regulate as some other fuels, but if the cost is low, who cares?

A simple wood stove will likely heat your home quite well. If you are in a northern climate and are looking at wood to provide your main source of heat and hot water, I recommend using an indoor boiler, such as those made by HS Tarm which I have no relationship with. They are real efficient, can be used with storage tanks to allow a clean hot burn - while saving that excess heat you are not using for times when the stove is out. They can easily provide enough heat to keep the house warm (in a controlled, efficient manner), heat hot water, and even heat outbuildings. They have marginal power requirements though, so plan for that. Outdoor furnaces and boilers are great too, but they are less efficient typically and if not run hot, can really smoke up the yard. Many places have outlawed them. However, please make sure your wood burning appliance is installed correctly. Many homes burn each year, sometimes killing family members, because of improperly installed wood stoves. Follow the manufacturers instructions, use quality materials, and get a permit for the stove and inspection after it is installed, if applicable in your area. Some fire departments will also do a courtesy inspection as well, call to inquire. Should a fire start, these inspections / permits will protect you from the wrath of the insurance company!

I will not even mention electric heating, though it would work in some warmer climates, I guess. It is just too expensive and vulnerable to power failures to make my list, sorry! Heating plants themselves come in two flavors powered by your choice of fuel, hot water (hydronic) and hot air (furnaces). Hydronic systems utilize boilers to make the hot water used to heat the building. Boilers are more expensive to install, especially counting the plumbing required to distribute the heat, but can be better regulated with the ease of having multiple zones powering various types of heaters. For example, you can use baseboard heaters, antique steam radiators, forced air heaters (such as Modine units which are popular in basements and garages), and even the newer popular in-floor radiant heating systems or any of these in any combination. The boiler can also make your hot water either by using a coil within the boiler itself, or in a separate tank heated by a separate zone of the boiler (most efficient).

Furnaces heat air, which is blown though the home. These systems are typically more simple and less expensive to install than boilers and are easily adapted to also provide air flow for air conditioning as well. Installing the air ducts is relatively simple, once designed, especially with today's flex-duct. Using electrically operated valves, the units can be zoned as well or in larger installations, multiple units can be installed.
Becoming more popular, are hybrid systems, as I like to call them. These utilize a boiler to make the heat and air handlers with heat-exchangers (radiators) in them and often air conditioning coils as well, installed in the home to provide warm-air heat and air conditioning. In a two floor home, one might be installed in the attic for the second floor and one in the basement for the first. These systems can also use in-floor radiant or baseboard heat as well, as a boiler is utilized. These can be expensive to install, but do provide a nice option for the homeowner with a larger home, especially those with a wood boiler!

Again for the prepper, the choice of how to heat and cool the home must be made with a lot of thought to the future. Higher efficiency means higher complication and more expensive and specialized parts than their simple lower efficiency counterparts. However, I feel it is worth it as the money saved can be significant. Most of today's equipment by reputable manufacturers will work fine for years. I have personally owned Burnham and Buderus boilers and Trane / American Standard (same company) for hot air and air conditioning systems. Others are fine as well, I have just used these and think they are top notch. Again, I have no relationship with these companies.

Hot Water Heaters

Water can be heated with electricity, gas or oil. Stand-alone tank heaters come in all three flavors, and work well. Any boiler can be adapted to heat water with either an internal coil or external tank as previously mentioned. The best option, in my opinion, is the tankless heater powered by propane or natural gas. I have a Rinnai and love it. These units provide hot water when you need it and shut down when you do not. They save gas by not cycling to maintain water temperatures as do normal tank heaters. Since most people sleep 8 hours and are at work for at least another 10 with commute times, hot water is only used a maximum of 6 hours per day - why heat the water the other 18? From a cold start, my Rinnai puts out hot water in about 3-4 seconds and will do so until either the water runs dry or the gas tank empties! It puts out enough hot water to run the dishwasher, and two showers (I have tried this). The flame level varies according to the flow rate and selected temperature - its quite high-tech actually! The slight lag in hot water generation is noticeable, but just barely and sometimes a brief shot of cool water comes out as the hot water in the pipes flushes out, then revealing the 2-3 second warm up period, but again, it is not a big deal at all. The other downside, is that they require electricity. Just a little bit, but when it disappears, the water goes cold instantly. I was told a small computer UPS will both protect the electronics and keep a tankless hot water heating going for quite some time after the power drops - a good idea. The savings are more than worth these minor inconveniences.

Electricity

Nearly every home has commercial electric service and we have become reliant on it in nearly every aspect of our lives. From our alarm clock, lights, razor and coffee pot to our heat and air conditioning, entertainment, security and communications, we use it in ways that we do not even realize! Electricity is not only a convenience though, it is also a life saving necessity in many cases. Having some sort of back up power is vital for the prepper - especially where young and old persons are present.

A generator is the ideal solution for short to medium term use. I will categorize them into two groups for our discussion, portable and permanent. Portables are just that, portable. They can be moved from place to place on wheels or via back-grunts and can usually produce 1,000-10,000 watts or so. Trailer mounted ones are available and can certainly run much more, but their costs are beyond what most of us can afford and they are larger than necessary. Permanent generators are installed outside or in a specific room and are powered by a fixed fuel source. These are generally larger, from around 10,000 watts and up. Though these are nice, I feel they are more than most people need and the portability of the smaller units is nice, quite frankly. However, both certainly will do the job. Remember that generators are a mechanical device and can break. If you have the funds, it would be best to have two - perhaps a larger primary unit and a smaller backup.

Without fuel, generators are useless. So many people I speak with have a great generator ready to go, but I find they have no fuel stored, save for a few gallons for the lawn mower. I tell them that without fuel, they have no generator. When the SHTF, the gas stations will either be closed or will have lines of cars from one to the next. Having an ample amount of fuel on hand is crucial.
Most units run on gasoline, with some running on diesel or propane / natural gas (or some combination of the above). Gasoline ones are cheapest, and are fine for emergency use. Heavy use units are generally diesel, as they are generally more long lasting and are also typically better on fuel. Propane / Natural Gas ones are great because of the low maintenance and, if you have propane or natural gas anyway, the availability of large quantities of fuel may already be available.

My generator is a 4,000 watt unit and it burns .5 to 1 gallon each hour or so, depending on load. Running it 3-4 hours per day, you would need perhaps 2-4 gallons. To make it a week, I should have at least 20 gallons, or 4 - 5 gallon cans full. This should be a minimum to shoot for - a week's supply to keep your unit running for 1-2 hours 2-3 times per day. This allows you to pump water, charge batteries, cool the refrigerator and keep the freezer frozen, and do some other chores. If for medical or other needs it needs to run more, then plan for it.

With any fuel (except propane), rotate, rotate, rotate! I buy fresh gasoline in the spring and fall after dumping the old fuel in my car. Today's gas, with ethanol, can cause problems if you let it sit around too long, from the many reports I have read. With equipment too expensive to ruin, I rotate it every 6 months regularly. To help negate this risk, I add Sta-Bil to keep it fresh. The maker indicates a one year storage time is possible with its use, so being conservative, six months should be no problem at all.

This brings me to my power system sizing discussion. Most feel larger is better, and in some ways they are true. However, larger also is heavier, more expensive, and more demanding on fuel. My home can run on 2,000 watts fine all day (except for the air conditioner). I intend to buy a Honda inverter generator in the 2,000 watt size range. These run at variable speeds, depending on load, and supply clean, computer grade electricity. Because of this, they can run as long as 9.6 hours on 1 gallon of of fuel - something that I feel is so valuable in a SHTF scenario. My 20 gallons will go weeks instead of a days, that is a definite advantage. These are only 110 VAC, though, making them impractical for those on a 220 VAC well pump.

Look at the loads you must power, and understand they don’t all have to run at the same time. Some lights, a refrigerator, a fan, a furnace, and even some non-heating small appliances all added together do not add up to 2,000 watts in most cases. Your big loads include your well pump (220 Volts) and anything with a heating element. Even these can be used, if some of the others are shut down. With careful planning, a huge unit is not always necessary.

One can use extension cords to tie the generator to the loads, but this is both a pain and somewhat dangerous as well. As such, I recommend that any new home be wired for a back up generator at the very least. If you must wait to buy the generator, fine, but at least install the transfer switch while the electrician is installing the service. The best way is to switch the main with a large knife switch made for the purpose. These will have three positions, up (typically) will power the house from the commercial mains, the middle will turn off all power and the bottom will feed the house from the generator. Interlock kits are also available to be able to safely back-feed power into your panel via a regular circuit breaker while preventing you from turning on the back-feed breaker without first shutting of the main breaker. See Interlockkit.com for details. In either case, the mains are disconnected while the generator is feeding the breaker box. This is an absolute necessity for safety’s sake.

A heavy cable will then be run from the panel to a convenient location outside the structure where a jack will be installed. A jumper cable will then be used to connect this jack to the generator itself, completing the path to your panel. Electricity travels easily, so place the plug where it will make your life easy for hook up. Remember also that you will have to protect your generator from theft, so take that into consideration in determining its location. You may even wish to bury the cable out to a “dog house” where the generator can live and operate, if well ventilated with a lift-up roof and opening side panels for example.

Another option to consider, is a battery backup system charged with either the generator or, better yet, a renewable source such as solar, wind, or water. With a modest bank of batteries, an inverter, and a DC power source to charge these batteries (with the necessary charge controller, etc.), this system can provide an amount of electricity basically forever. This power can be piped into the breaker box, just like a generator would. 12 Volt appliances are also available, eliminating the need for the inverter while being more efficient. Many people live off-grid with these kinds of systems and they are truly sustainable, as they will operate for years with no external inputs. Certainly, having some level of non-petroleum based electricity makes tremendous sense in a long-term SHTF scenario. Again, entire books have been written on this subject, so I will leave it at that.

Lastly, for a prepper, it would be good to install emergency lighting in your home. This can be accomplished by either buying commercially available battery back-up emergency lights like you see in every commercial building, or installing a battery bank, several 12 volt lights, and a switch or relay to turn it on when the power fails. In either case, it will provide better lighting for short term emergencies in an automatic way. Definitely an advantage and not very expensive.

Building Structures

My first recommendation, if you build a home (and I strongly recommend this as the option for your permanent home as you can control the variables better), is to consult a competent architect or engineer (or at least a real knowledgeable carpenter) and ask them for the details on how to build a home that will survive the calamities that are common in your area. In the Southeast, that may be hurricanes - in California, earthquakes and fires. No home can hold up to everything, but, for example, you will be surprised how much stronger a roof system can be made with some simple wooden braces or metal strapping! The building codes often require these things, but many times you can improve upon the codes yourself - going above and beyond the required elements. These kinds of improvements may mean you still have a home after a storm instead of a pile of rubble.

Secondly, insulation is your friend. This amount needed varies by location (more insulation is needed in Northern climates than the in South, for example) but is necessary everywhere. The “R” value is the measurement of insulation that is used in the industry. A higher “R” value resists the transfer of heat more than a lower one does. This is not the only factor to consider, however. Air transfer is also very important.

The most popular insulation, fiberglass batting, has great “R” values but allows air to flow through it basically unimpeded. With a house wrap (like Tyvek) this is minimized, but hard to stop completely. It is also hard to install perfectly. Look in an un-sheet-rocked attached garage at the back side of a typical house wall insulation job in any subdivision and you will see gaps in the bats around the wires, pipes and even along the sides of some of the studs. These areas are not insulated at all. Though it is easy to install and cheap, it is not always the best choice.

My favorite is sprayed-in foam. This goes on like a spray paint and then almost immediately expands to fill all voids in the wall. It comes in different densities which have different “R” values, but all forms are at least as good as fiberglass. What they excel in is stopping air infiltration and assuring uniform insulation values. By filling all voids and gaps, it stops all air infiltration ensures an evenly insulated wall system.

The effective insulation value of foam can be double that of common fiberglass - and as a bonus, the foam adds greater rigidity to the home (especially the higher density versions) - adding to its strength. It is, however, messy and needs to be applied by an expert and costs 2-3 times as much as fiberglass insulation.

Is it worth it? In my opinion it is. My current home uses 500 gallons of propane to heat it annually whereas my last home (smaller) used 700-to-800 gallons of oil to heat it. Being that oil has more BTUs per gallon than propane, our new home with its foam insulation is performing twice as well from my calculations. This saves us substantial money each year and allows us to eliminate debt, save for the future and live a better life, as Jack Spirko would say. If things go bad, I know my home will be the easiest to heat in my entire neighborhood! A small wood stove, run intermittently, will keep us comfortable with little effort.

The most popular framing material is wood. It is inexpensive and easy to work with and is quite versatile, especially with today’s engineered options. With common carpentry know-how, anyone can build with wood. Metal framing including I-beam structural members and lightweight metal wall framing options exist and are great where wood eating bugs are plentiful or high-winds are likely. They also allow for longer open spans as well, but often require the help of an engineer to build. Some homes are built using stone or block and insulated concrete forms (ICFs) are a great option as well. I don’ have the room to investigate each, but they each have their advantages depending on your skill set and location. I cover these to some extent in my podcast.

Choose siding and roofing materials for your area and home design. Concrete board siding (Hardy Plank for example) is gaining popularity but is expensive. Vinyl is final, cheap and easy to install. In a fire prone area though, you may kiss the concrete siding after a wildfire! Roofing choices include metal or tin, fiberglass, wood and other more exotic materials such as concrete, plastic or slate. Each have their advantages, but it is hard to beat fiberglass shingles for ease of installation and lasting value. However, metal is the ideal choice in areas with high snow loads or fire danger. On flat roofs, a membrane is hard to beat as they will not leak if properly installed. Again, simplicity will save money and allow for easier maintenance for the homeowner so choose wisely depending on your location and needs.

Lastly, design your home smartly with ample room for your needs, but not in excess. Allow room to store your supplies - a basement is a great option if feasible. Don’t skimp on the structure of the home - these things are very hard to change out. Skimp, if you must, on interior treatments such as flooring, cabinetry, and lighting. These things can be upgraded as your budget does the same.

Security Concerns

Lastly, build to defend if this is a priority of you. A home that is smaller and perhaps two floors is easier to defend than a rambling ranch. Fewer points of entry and a second floor definitely are advantages. Storm rated windows are harder to break and heavy metal or wood doors are harder to penetrate - look at the options. Storm shutters are also a great option as are metal grates, if you think they are necessary. Sometimes, a row of thorny briars, a fence / gate and a big dog will make a criminal think twice. Remember though, if they want to get in, they will. And if they are mad enough, they can just burn you out - this is hard to prevent. Remember that your best offense is to just look like every other house, or one that has nothing to offer. Don’t pick a style that will make your house stand out on the street.

Alarm systems and or video monitoring / recording systems are also a big plus. A security system can alert you to danger from either a bad two-legged creature or fire, smoke, high water, low temp or any number of other perils. This information can be reported to a central station by the alarm or even to cell phones on some systems. This can, and has, saved many properties from fire. Personally, I installed a system that saved a home from a kitchen fire. Minor smoke damage and some charred wood was the result, whereas the whole house would have gone up without the early call by the system to the fire department. Also, early warning to occupants is very important. If your sleeping, a warning of a break in can buy you the time to prepare to handle the threat, rather than having the threat wake you up by opening your bedroom door.
In conclusion, read books, listen to podcasts like the Homeowner’s Friend Podcast (HofPodcast), and talk to friends who have build. Get their recommendations and by all means, try to do the project (or at least parts of it) yourself. I never went to carpenter’s school - I hung around with my father and brothers and did things myself - there is no better institute of higher learning than the school of hard nocks! Build a chicken coop, dog house or storage shed first, to get the basics down. Once you have these skills, they can not be taken away and will make your life better till the day you leave this earth. Good luck! - S.S. of the HofPodcast.

I believe that in a severe crisis, most of the problems are going to have to be solved at the local level. State and federal government are too big and dependent on technology to survive a severe crisis once the grid drops and all services start to erode. Local governments, too, are ill prepared to assume this crushing responsibility, but they are much more resilient because their scope of control is smaller. Most of them have never even considered what they would do.

This article is a discussion piece to stimulate thought on the subject of small community recovery after TEOTWAWKI. I hope it will also be useful as a rough blueprint or checklist for local community leaders, or at least a starting point for a comprehensive plan. I wrote it from the perspective of a fictional town mayor. Most of the issues I mention apply to many levels of local government and law enforcement. I realize that A mayor never acts alone or has absolute power. They have a lot of people helping and advising them. I am hoping you will help yours make and implement the right decisions and that this paper will help in some small way.

Before I start spouting off about what I think will occur, I need to tell you who I am. I am a retired Army Electronic Warfare and Signals Intelligence Warrant Officer. I spent over a decade working on Army planning staffs at various levels, and was a professional action officer on the USAREUR DCSINT planning staff for more than four years. I got the rare opportunity to see many failed states and regional crisis and how people, communities and economies react. But I have never held any office in local government. Also, unfortunately, I am not a wizard who can see into the future. The following are my own conclusions and suggestions drawn from my own experiences. I may be wildly wrong, or overlooking factors that seem obvious to you, especially if you have a lot of experience in local government. So, take this for what it's worth. Hopefully, it will provide a basis for discussion and planning and generate a dialog. I am hoping to hear corrections and other ideas. I am never insulted by disagreement, so if you see things differently, I would be very happy to hear it.

First, we need to define what kind of crisis I am talking about. I am talking about a large scale disaster of some kind that effects a huge geographical region and forces local communities to solve their own problems and precludes getting help from outside. I am talking about an event that would cause a complete failure of basic services such as finance (banking) or the electrical grid and prevent the Government from repairing it quickly enough to prevent a general cascading breakdown of other services. I will use a major EMP event as my example because that would be just about a worst case event. Some of what I say will be applicable to regional or short term events, but some of it won't.

I believe that most communities are doomed. Many American and European communities are artificial constructs entirely dependent on modern society to keep them running. You can tell if your town cannot survive by looking at the population density, arable land, water supplies and other resources. If your community is in a desert and trucks in all their water, you can't possibly survive long term. If your whole population is suburban or urban and you have no working farms or farmable land, then you are doomed. Sorry. If you live in a doomed community, I don't know what to tell you. For this article, I am assuming a smallish town with a good water supply and a lot of working farms that don't require electric irrigation. Even a perfectly situated town will have huge problems and may not survive a major EMP event. Anything less than perfection is going to require superhuman effort, no mistakes and a large touch of luck.

Somebody has to take charge quickly:
Anarchy is the dirtiest word in the English language and should be avoided at all costs. Whenever I see some teenager wearing a T-shirt espousing anarchy, I get a strong urge to show him a little anarchy by beating him up and ripping it off his back..and then ask him if he still thinks Anarchy is "cool". I have seen chaos and virtual anarchy up close and I was frankly astonished at the depravity of mankind. Without law and order of some kind, the strong will take from the weak. The cruel will torture and kill wantonly. Rule of law is essential to any progress or recovery. I am writing this in the firm belief that when our society crashes, some communities will maintain order and some vestige of humanity. That's going to require a delicate balancing act because the two concepts are not mutually reinforcing and can be at odds with each other. Communities are going to have to make some very hard choices if they are to maintain order and survive. Lets hope they can maintain their humanity and Christian values while they are doing this.

Let's imagine that you are the mayor of a small town when this horrible event occurs. The lights go out, most cars don't work, and personal battery powered electronics malfunction. How quickly would most small town mayors realize it was EMP? I am guessing that most of them will figure it out within minutes or hours. There are enough smart folks around to advise them even if they are not knowledgeable. So what are your actions going to be?

What are your resources? The town owns some land and some buildings, some vehicles and maybe some utility equipment. But by far, your biggest asset is a limited amount of capital in the form of authority and good will. You represent a body of voters, which gives you more legal legitimacy than anyone else. You have a police force of some kind and the authority to spend money on behalf of the government...sort of. Your authority is real, but it's based on some fairly fragile cornerstones. Some of them may not exist anymore. The monetary system may be completely wrecked. You may not be able to pay anyone for anything. The Federal and State Governments are both out of communications and may not exist anymore. Any indecision or misstep on your part could destroy your authority, leaving nothing in it's place.

What, exactly is your authority? Where does it overlap with county or other governments? What gives you the authority to maintain order? Impose martial law? Appoint armed deputies, Set up roadblocks? Commandeer fuel and food stocks? The Army NCO academy teaches that there are five types of power that an individual can wield. You will need to use all of them.

a. Legal: You have limited direct "Command authority" in a military sense. Unless you have a body of laws to back you up, you can't lean on your command authority too much. Check on this, but your town is unlikely to have bylaws giving you much power in an emergency. Instead, you have to assume that you possess Delegated authority. You are the representative of both State and Federal government and have to assume their roles and responsibilities until you can re-establish a chain of command. In the absence of orders or directives, you are free to "assume" responsibility and authority. At least that's a good legal theory and may be enough. If this were ever tested in court, it might not be upheld, but by that time, the crisis will be over, right? Everything you do is "Legal" until you are overruled by a court...or ousted by a mob of your constituents. Your real authority is your mandate from the people. It rests on your ability to make sound decisions and convince others that you are doing all the right things. That buys you more authority in a crisis than all the documents ever printed.

b. Coercive: Unfortunately, brute force is always a factor. As long as you maintain control over the police force or sheriff's department, you have authority. You must gain firm control of your police and public employees first, before you try to do anything else. Without them, your authority can be dissolved by a few hot-heads with weapons. You are going to be forced to make some very unpopular decisions and part of your community is going to be extremely angry with you. Get your troops in place first or you won't keep your authority long. You must also be very careful not to abuse this authority or let your troops abuse it. A good way to do this is to immediately beef up your police force with out of work, solid citizens. You can take on a fairly large number of deputies from the community. That gives the community a sense of ownership in the police and helps prevent excesses.

c. Reward: You will initially have almost no ability to reward anyone. If the finance system is gone, you have nothing to trade for goods and services. You will need to change this immediately by setting up some kind of economy for your town. (This topic is covered below). If you don't lick this problem immediately, your police and city employees are going to stop showing up for work very quickly. They have to feed and protect their families somehow.

d. Charisma: Unfortunately, (or fortunately perhaps) personal charisma and magnetism are much more important than we like to admit. If you can sway a crowd or argue persuasively, it doesn't matter if you are right or wrong. This sword cuts both ways, of course. You are going to have to face very charismatic personalities around town and persuade them to go along with you, or at least stay neutral. You need to gain the immediate support of community and church leaders. Figure out who can cause you political trouble and approach them to get them on your side or otherwise neutralize them, or you will be facing a "minority party" that will eventually oust you.

A good tool for dealing with dissension is to trap your opponents into stating a preferred way to resolve some problem and then enlist them to oversee it. There are a lot of ways to "skin a cat". Let them try their way if it can work. Pull them into your administration. Remember, you are all on the same team at some level. Find that level and stay on it. I believe that in a crisis, everyone has a tendency to follow anyone with a firm voice and the appearance of a plan. Just be sure you have a good plan and you will keep dissension to a minimum.

e. Expert: Knowledge is power. Anyone with unique and useful knowledge has value and power. It's much easier to sway an audience if you have a degree in the topic or an acknowledged expert in your corner. You should surround yourself with experts. When a new problem arises and an expert or two are identified, pull them into your circle of advisers. Doing this not only makes you a better leader with better decisions, it gives all of your followers the sense that you are open to suggestions and good ideas from any quarter.

So, you take charge quickly and start issuing orders. What are those orders?You have a lot of things to worry about, and all of them are urgent and critically important. The following is my list of issues that you need to address immediately and some suggestions on how to address them. Local conditions, laws, resources and public opinions are variables that effect how you must react. Think it out in the context of your local conditions and try to at least have a tentative plan to put forward immediately. The venue for putting forth your agenda should be as transparent as possible, either a public meeting or a written decree or order. That way, everyone not only knows your decisions, they know the reasoning behind them. If you can get consensus from a town meeting before you put out an emergency decree, you will have less trouble,but some of these issues require immediate action.

1. Communications:
Without communications, you are powerless. You must be able to communicate with your police department and other public service folks, the people of the town, the county seat, the State, and lots of others. Unfortunately, a big EMP event will wipe out electronic communications in a blink and leave you isolated, just when you need to be at the center of activity. There are a couple of things you can do to mitigate this if you plan ahead, but you are still going to have to somehow establish some kind of communications with your neighboring towns and other polities...and hopefully higher echelons of government.

Mitigation:
If you can store some short range radio equipment and maybe some old-school TA-312 or TA-1 type telephones in a Faraday cage, they will be worth their weight in gold. Even a few old telephones (and wire) can enable you to keep in touch with the town down the road, or your own guard posts. Another thing to add to your Faraday cage is a couple of battery-powered shortwave receivers. These will allow you to catch long range HF broadcasts from working stations possibly overseas. Shortwave may be your most reliable source of news. A ham radio rig, if it survives, might be very useful too.

Actions:
If you don't have working radios, think back to a time when radio and even telephone didn't exist. Our founding fathers didn't have those luxuries and still managed. The solution is a central, easy to find headquarters, official written communications, and messengers. You will need plenty of paper, (with your office letterhead if possible), envelopes and some kind of official seal you can use. You might even consider a wax seal, like they used in the 18th century, but a notary seal (or something similar) with your signature over the top will look a lot more official than a blank paper. You will also need carbon paper or a working copier, but probably won't have them.

Small communities in the past used church bells, beacon lights, gongs, bugles, whistles, sirens and flags to communicate locally. These methods require some planning, but they still work.

Public notice boards were a major tool of government in the days before electricity. Designate a board outside city hall or somewhere convenient and section it off into five sections (or more if you wish). Post public policies and directives in one section and "good advice" such as water purification procedures in another. A third section of the notice board should contain a calendar or event log to keep people advised on upcoming events. (Also, you should somehow let people know what day it is). A fourth section of the board can contain news items picked up on the shortwave or from other communities.

The fifth [and very large] section should be made open to the public. Remember, they have no reliable communications means and may need to link up with missing relatives or communicate privately with other community members. A board is a good way to do this and can substitute for a public mail service. Set up a drop box for personal messages (controlled by someone at city hall or at the post office or whatever) and maintain a list of people with "refugee mail" on the public notice board. That way, if someone wants to send a letter or something to anyone else, they drop an envelope in the drop box and write the addressee's name (and a date) on the public board. When the addressee picks up his mail, he crosses his name off the list. Any person traveling to a nearby town can carry mail to that town.

You may need to regulate your public notice board by requiring people to date their notices and limit the time something can remain posted. Otherwise, the public board will quickly get out of hand, no matter how big it is. Try not to get too draconian. Allow people to post anything they want (subject to whatever constraints make sense to the town). Your board may be the best and only information service most people have.

You should also expect to do a lot of face to face meetings with crowds and individuals. Consider setting up a weekly town meeting where you can put out orders and public service information in person and invite discussion. Town meetings used to be a great source of entertainment and gave everyone a chance to blow off some steam about things that bothered them. When electronics fail,You will need to be able to do a lot of business face-to-face. If you move your headquarters to an easily accessible area, like downtown main-street, or near a marketplace, everything may be easier. Unfortunately, messengers and face to face conversations require working transportation of some kind (as discussed below).

2. Building an emergency economy
You are going to have to set up some kind of economy to replace the crashed finance system. You are not going to be able to rebuild the crashed economy, but will have to build an entirely new system, almost from scratch. If you get this one wrong, everything else will fall apart very quickly. This is a huge undertaking, but it must be done quickly. You simply cannot use the existing financial system or hope to rebuild it. About 4/5ths of your town will need food and most of the town's food will be owned by a very few individuals or controlled by a store manager in the case of a corporate chain store. If you allow the market to "work itself out", these few store managers or individuals will suddenly control all the wealth and be able to charge people anything they see fit...or withhold critical resources as the whim takes them. Some people will have nothing of value in the new economy [except their labor]. How will these people buy what they need? "Money" is not the fiat currency we are used to dealing with. It is something of value exchanged for something else of value. Any finance system has to be able to allow people to exchange what they need for what they have or it will fail. In this example, the likely results might be a riot and immediate looting.

Mitigation: None possible? I don't know how you can prepare your town for a total financial crash. If anyone has a suggestion, I would love to hear it.

Actions:
We might as well deal with this topic right away. Are you going to try to have a strictly capitalist system? If so, a lot of people who don't currently have exactly what they need, or anything that happens to be valued in your new economy, are going to die. (More likely, they are going to revolt and try to take the resources they need.) A free market is a wonderful thing, but it requires time, security and communication to form. You won't have any of these. People who don't have food won't wait long enough for you to form a fully functional free market system, which could take months or years. Without perceived equitable distribution of "wealth" in the form of whatever your community members need, you will have violence and mayhem very quickly. A free market capitalist trade system will never get a chance to form without a precursor system to hold it up until it gets established.

In my humble opinion (after seeing many different monetary systems over the years) there is no alternative to adding a very large socialist component to a post-collapse emergency economy. If you don't strictly regulate critical resources, they will not be distributed equitably and many people will needlessly suffer and perhaps die. Even if that's okay with you, consider what you would do in their shoes. Would you watch your family starve while there was food on the shelves down at the Wal-Mart? Not very likely. You might decide to gather some like-minded folks up and storm the Wal-Mart. If the police try to stop you, what will you do? You will fight to the death because there is no valid alternative. For that matter, the police force may be leading the charge. What are you planning to pay them with? Patriotism? Whoever controls the food and other scarce resources controls the reins of power. It simply cannot be left in the hands of random individuals.

To avoid total anarchy in a societal collapse, you will need to form a centrally controlled economy in the short term, designed to equitably re-distribute and manage critical resources. You will need to slowly build a free market as you are able, but trying to do it immediately will undermine everything you must accomplish during the crisis.

In order to form a centralized economy or even pay for the services the town is going to desperately need, you need to gain control of most of the "publicly available" critical shortage resources and use them as your basis of wealth. Scarce resources are the basis for a currency system. At a very basic level, Food is cash. Once you have a warehouse of food under your tight control, you can pay for labor and other commodities and resources with that food. A better system might be to pay for labor and services with "ration cards". That ration card entitles them to eat a single meal at a community soup kitchen, or entitles them to a set amount of grain or other commodity on demand from the town warehouse. In essence anyone needing community resources "works for the community" and gets to eat at the mess hall...and earns a little surplus to use for other necessities. This arrangement will also give you a huge manpower pool to work with almost immediately. You may find that you will need most of them.

Avoid giving "handouts" to anyone. You need everyone to work as hard as they can. You need them to use their incentive. Handouts that compete with the local economy are counterproductive and destroy human dignity.

Without machinery, manpower is your biggest resource. Cherish each unemployed citizen. Make them work for their pay and use them to build capital for the future (see below), food production, military duties, messenger services, trash collection or anything else that needs doing. Remember, these are not freeloaders, they are solid citizens who want to work and feel like they are part of a larger effort. Don't worry about having so many people on "welfare". Most of them will get to be self sufficient as fast as they are able. Pay them a slight surplus and they will feel that they are working toward something and not living hand to mouth. You may find that they invest the surplus and build your free market economy for you.

If you let private citizens keep their food and fuel and other scarce resources and only confiscate and control corporate or "large retail or wholesale stocks" (explained below), any citizen with resources can also hire help at roughly the same rates you are paying, which helps the whole community and drives down demand for public stockpiles. (You have established a minimum wage of 1 ration card per hour). Everything else could be bartered using food or the town ration cards as currency. If you establish a set value for your ration cards and a safe marketplace in town (perhaps even a market day, where other communities can join in the trading), you have the beginnings of a free market with as little pain as possible and almost no stink of socialism. Since food is established as the gold standard, you also add incentive to immediately start farming, hunting, and otherwise adding to the public larder.

So where do you get the resources you are going to control? I am not talking about collecting up everyone's food and gasoline. That would be an economic disaster in the long term. People need to feel secure in their property rights or they won't be willing to invest in the future. And you need a lot of private investment to get your community through the crisis. You will need to collect taxes later, but not until there is a harvest or something to collect.

You have to be careful which resources you initially confiscate and only gather large retail or wholesale stocks meant for re-sale. Anything owned by an individual for his own use is his property and must not be touched. Any critical and scarce commodity owned strictly for resale should be confiscated for the common good and held by the community. Make sure you provide a receipt to any owners you can locate or at least keep records of what is taken. This will allow much easier accounting if someone ever tries to rebuild the old
economy.

Our free enterprise system has provided the opportunity for some families and even individuals to amass huge fortunes. It also allowed groups of individuals to "incorporate" to form legal entities that own vast resources. In normal times, this is an overall goodness that generates wealth and (at least in theory) raises everyone's standard of living. In normal times, an individual is free to own thousands of acres of land and all the minerals under it. He is allowed to farm it, bulldoze it, burn it, deny it's use to others or use it pretty much any way he wants. It's almost certain that critical resources in your community are "owned" by a corporation or private investor. In theory, a single individual can legally "own" all the arable land in a community and prevent anyone from farming it, even if they are starving.

In an emergency, I feel that this cannot and must not be allowed. Moral imperatives and common sense must prevail over law in some rare cases and this is one of those cases. Private property for use by the individual is morally different from corporate property or privately owned property that is held for the "wealth" it generates. If someone "owns" something and has no intention of ever using it himself (or even seeing it), he cannot morally control it in an emergency. I believe that corporations are legal fictions that have exactly as much validity as the rest of our complex finance system. When the dollar crashes and all the banks close, (IMHO) they cease to exist in a moral sense.

Any corporate or investment property belongs to the state in an emergency. Did that sentence scare you? It does me. But I believe it will come to pass. The state has the ultimate responsibility to answer to the people and has legal power over all corporate entities. The government's charter (by constitution and a huge jurisprudence system) is to provide for the common defense and promote the general welfare. In normal times, this is best accomplished by jealously guarding a clearly documented body of property rights for individuals and corporations. But this is not a universal law of nature. If corporate interests collide with public welfare needs, the government has the right and the responsibility to negate corporate or individual rights for the common good.

As mayor of a community, you are going to have to make some hard choices and convince others that you are right. One of these choices might be to confiscate corporate property and redistribute it as needed for the common good. That specifically includes local merchants who hold stockpiles of needed resources meant for resale, such as gas station and grocery store owners. The whole retail system with it's complex accounting and "ownership" laws are part of a finance system that no longer exists after a severe EMP event. You (and your community) need to sit down and determine a whole new set of ownership rules. I urge you to think hard about this and perhaps appoint someone wise and respected to arbitrate individual cases. Farmable land owned by a absentee landlord is easy; he's not there and owns it only as an investment, therefore it now belongs to the community. Large corporate holdings, like the stock of a chain department store are easy matters. That corporation is dead and gone and the goods now belong to the community. A large Agra-business hog farm is easy, confiscate the hogs and their feed. But what about a silo of corn owned by a Co-op of local farmers? What about a local farmer with 1,000 acres of standing corn clearly meant for commercial sale? What about a rancher with 100 head of cattle? You really have to be careful where you draw the line between private ownership and "retail goods", but draw it you must. Your new government is going to need a lot of capital to survive the tribulations coming.

3. Transportation and fuel
Your police and city vehicles may not work after an EMP event. In my opinion, the testing of EMP effects on vehicles outlined in the congressional EMP report "2008 Critical National Infrastructures Report" was flawed. Their simulator was only capable of generating 50kv EMP and only generated a E1 event, not the (perhaps) more damaging E3 wave. The cars were tested only until they exhibited a fault of some kind and then the testing was halted. Many of the vehicles showed some kind of failure or "faults" at lower voltages, but were never subjected to high voltage EMP, yet the conclusion includes these cars as having survived with no permanent damage.

Also, there is no reason to assume that 50kv is the upper limit in a real world HEMP event, it was simply the limit of the test gear available. I believe the test gear used was strongly influenced by the Master's degree thesis by Louis W. Seiler, Jr., "A Calculational Model for High Altitude EMP, report ADA009208". That thesis, while brilliant, computes E1 gamma burst for the peak EMP at ground zero for a burst above the magnetic equator, where the Earth's magnetic field is far weaker than it is at high latitudes (nearer the poles). Further North or South, the magnetic field lines converge (increasing the magnetic field strength). It's generally accepted that the peak EMP is almost directly proportional to the power of the Earth's magnetic field. That means that real world voltages in real world equipment may easily exceed 50kv. In fact we have some evidence of this. The Soviet above-ground warhead test #184 produced ground zero EMP intensity estimated by Soviet scientists at 350 kV. Also, remember that the cars used in the commission's testing were older cars build between 1986 and 2002. Have cars gotten more EMP resistant since then? No. My conclusion is simple. A lot of cars may not survive a real world event.

If a lot of vehicles survive, fuel stocks may be depleted almost immediately unless you take steps to protect them. I know this sounds draconian, but the police force and emergency vehicles should have priority for fuel and the only way to assure this is to implement some kind of rationing plan immediately. Fuel stocks are a public resource owned by private citizens. Once they are gone, your community may never get any more. This is a case where you are going to have to exercise some emergency powers and appropriate property from private citizens. If possible, you should "pay" for the fuel immediately. If you cannot, at least make sure you give the rightful owner a receipt so you can pay him back later if someone manages to re-build the economy.

Mitigation
Keep your town's vehicles in good shape and look into storing them inside a shielded garage when off duty. Being indoors may prevent some of the damage. If you are able to afford it, buy a reserve fuel supply for the police department. I don't know how much this would cost for a specific town, or how much fuel it should hold, but if you could somehow talk the town into the merits of a municipal reserve to last even a few weeks, it might someday prove very useful. If you bought two tanks, sized to last the police department a month or less, you wouldn't have any extra expense for fuel additives. You could rotate your fuel.

Actions
As distasteful as this is to Americans, I can't see any alternative likely to work. You need to seize and ration all bulk stocks of gasoline, Diesel, propane, fuel oil, coal and other fuels used or held by the town. The town will desperately need these fuels for heating, emergency services and agriculture. You may also be forced to confiscate privately owned vehicles if yours are damaged or you need specialty vehicles (like fuel tankers, for instance). You need to work out a method of doing this without stealing. Any time you confiscate resources from any private citizen, you need to somehow reimburse them as fairly as possible. A better approach may be to exclusively hire them as the driver and let them retain ownership.

Your town may also have a stream of refugees pouring through or past it from a nearby city. This is a very bad situation that has to be dealt with immediately. If they have access to your town's fuel stocks, they will drain every drop in a day or two. This may need to be your first order in an emergency. Every hour you delay may be critical. (Refugees are discussed below).

Another distasteful, yet lucrative opportunity you may have is to confiscate fuel (and other resources) from passing highway traffic. Whether you call this piracy or taxation, If trucks are still moving on the big highways, they may contain resources your town really needs to survive. I am not suggesting that this is a moral or desirable option, but someone in your community is bound to bring it up. Think out your position in advance and be ready to argue your point. Personally, I believe that any interference in long range commerce or transportation is detrimental to all of society and also undermines the very laws that prop up your own authority. No matter what you call it, the act of a government stealing is a slippery slope.

4. Water and sewage

Modern towns are very wasteful of water, but can't survive without it for more than a few days. Most people have never thought about how to purify water or deal with waste. If you don't do something quickly, a lot of your citizens are going to start defecating outdoors and many of your citizens are going to drink unsafe water. The results will be catastrophic in terms of public health.

Your town may be in good shape, but probably not. You will want to get some expert advice on this immediately. Many towns rely on pumped water, often from towers in or near the town. If so, you have a few days until the tanks run dry. You will need to figure out a way to keep this system going if you can. You still need to add chlorine and get the water high enough to maintain water pressure. If the machinery for doing this is broken, you need to set a crew working on water immediately.

Some towns won't be able to keep their water flowing and will have to use extreme measures to provide water for their people and deal with wastes. You may have to haul water to a central point and purify it manually, or even set up public latrines and wash points. Without ready supplies of water, most private residences are going to be uninhabitable in the long run. The folks with homes you cannot supply may need to move closer to your water point.

Mitigation
Talk to your water providers now and get them thinking about it so they can come up with options for you. Ask them to do a formal assessment of your town's situation and resources and suggest mitigation strategies for emergencies. What do they need to manually run their system during a power outage? If they can't run manually, you might consider buying a backup generator to run pumps and machinery. (Make sure you budget for a good Faraday cage to protect this generator and keep it disconnected and keep all cables inside the cage until needed). You may need to stockpile fuel or extra chemicals or buy extra equipment that can be run manually. If your town can't afford any of this, You may need to buy some mobile water tanks for the town. Any of these preparations could be very useful during a whole range of situations and natural disasters.

Actions
These will depend on your town's system. But you need to keep your eye on the ball. You need to provide at least a gallon of water per resident every day, just to keep them alive. You will need much more than that to keep them healthy in the long run. You also need to tell the community how to get pure water and warn them against drinking or using tainted water. Is your area dependent on irrigation agriculture? You will need to figure out how to supply that water too.

5. Solid waste disposal and burial of dead.
Without fuel, trash collection and burial can be very laborious. These problems would be a lot simpler if everyone lived within easy walking distance of town, but unfortunately this is almost never the case in the US. You may need to solve this by distributing simple instructions on how to do it using old-school techniques. Old homesteaders had an outhouse to deal with sewage, a compost pile to deal with organic waste and a burn barrel (or fireplace) to get rid of burnables. Anything else, they threw in the "trash pile" out back. (The solid trash pile for non-rotting, non-burnable trash was often a used outhouse cesspool, which was then covered over with dirt). On the bright side, municipal rubbish volumes are going to diminish and be replaced mostly with compost-able plant waste. Anything that can be recycled and reused, like old cardboard boxes will be treasured and kept. Our throw-away society will be over.

Burial and funeral services used to be handled very locally at the neighborhood church or even on your own property. Embalming and cremation are modern innovations that will be too expensive to maintain. [JWR Adds: The only exceptions will be in heavily-timbered regions or in coastal communities that are in driftwood deposition zones. There, perhaps there will be plentiful firewood for use in outdoor cremation pyres.] You will need your medical people to oversee and recommend procedures for burial. Make sure they consult the church leaders or you may make problems for yourself.

Actions: Check with a local doctor and have him recommend procedures for waste disposal. Find a way to distribute them and encourage people to follow the procedures by explaining why.

6. Food. (Short term provisioning)
This is going to be a real problem. You need to provide some minimum of calories and nutrition for all your citizens until the community can grow (and the free market can distribute) all the food needed by the community. This is going to be a tall order. Most people don't store a substantial amount of food in their homes and will quickly be dependent on town stocks. Most of the food in most communities is owned by very few people or corporations.

The only way you are going to save a substantial percentage of your population over the short term is to gain control of and ration most of the food centrally. You are going to have to locate and safeguard as much food as possible. you will need to establish a warehouse of some sort and guard it well. Pre-historic villages and other primitive cultures always locate their food stocks in the center of their living space to ensure it is guarded. This might be a wise choice. You may be able to use a church, school or other public building close to the town center for this purpose. If that building also has a substantial kitchen and cafeteria that you can get working again, it will save a lot of transportation problems.

Don't be shocked if your town is forced to fight some other town to keep the food you stockpile. Historically, when food gets scarce, communities fight and take what they need. Be ready for this behavior. I would station my police force inside my granary, in the center of town if possible.

Sources of food you can confiscate or otherwise control:

a. Department stores and food stores: Large food stores are the most obvious place to look for food. They will not last long whether you confiscate the food or not. People are going to either buy or loot everything in a matter of days or even hours. Unfortunately retail stores don't maintain much stock these days. If it's not on the shelves, it's probably not in the back room either. With modern stocking practices, nobody maintains a well-stocked warehouse on site anymore. The non-refrigerated foods should all be salvageable, but if you hurry, you might be able to make use of much of the frozen foods and fresh produce or even salt some away using other preservation techniques before it goes bad.

b. Co-ops and large commercial farms: These may have livestock and large amounts of feed grain and other dried foods on hand. Whoever manages these establishments are also probably experts at food preservation, storage and a whole range of agricultural issues. Seek them out and get their input and help to secure their food. You want to avoid spoilage and loss as much as possible and these people can help. Hire them. You may need to keep the grain right where it's at (and guard it) or provide power (if possible) to dry out the grain or you may need to provide manpower to manually harvest crops. Listen to your experts.

c. Feed stores: Most animals in your community are going to have to be slaughtered during the first year. Save as much edible feed as possible for human consumption. Most feed mixes are good for humans to eat. Even the big bags of dog food should be preserved. You will probably need them. They are mostly grain and if ground into flour and thoroughly cooked, all of them are safe to eat. Alfalfa pellets and other "non-human-food" products may be used to feed livestock.

d. Pet stores. Bird seed is nothing but grain and oil seeds. Most pet foods are edible and should be saved for human consumption. The issue of what to do with pets is going to be a hard one, but logic dictates that the community refrain from using up useful food stocks on animals unless they add substantially to the local economy. However, keep in mind that people get very emotional about their pets. If you try to get people to give up their animals, they may lynch you. (Your commissary should sell the pet foods, just like they do people food. If the pet owners work hard enough to support their animals, you should not try to get heavy handed. Any other approach will put you at odds with part of your population.)

e. Regional distribution centers: If you are fortunate enough to have one or more of these in your reach, you should act immediately to secure them. These centers typically have very substantial stocks of food on hand. Unfortunately, much of this food requires refrigeration and will go bad very quickly. The centers with dried and canned goods will be in big demand very quickly, so you need to dispatch work parties (with lots of trucks) as quickly as you can organize them.

f. Standing commercial crops: Depending on the season, one of the first tasks you need to tackle may be to help farmers with their harvest or planting or other tasks. Modern farms are only manageable with the aid of heavy machinery. Without this machinery, even routine tasks are not possible. Without combines, farmers couldn't possibly complete their own harvests. Without security of some kind, their crops may never make it to maturity. Refugees would strip them bare without your help. You can strike a deal with farmers to bring in their crops and help in return for some kind of payment in kind or a cut of their crop and others in the area. (Remember, most farmers are mono-crop farmers with little use for 60 tons of corn with no market). They may be more interested in what you can provide in the form of machinery, power or labor. Talk to them, explain your situation and strike a deal that benefits both of you.

g. Lakes and rivers: Fishing resources are very limited, but important sources of food in many areas if you can protect them. You need to prevent poachers from destroying their production capacity by over-fishing (maybe with dynamite) or polluting water resources.

h. Bakeries and food processing plants: Processing plants usually have very limited stocks of food on hand, but may have quite a lot depending on what they are making. They may also have usable machinery that can be converted to use.

i. Colleges, Libraries and bookstores. These don't contain food, but they contain knowledge about foraging for wild plants. You may be able to extend your resources by sending out forage parties to collect locally growing wild resources. If you get lucky, you might be able to gather a large harvest of acorns or maple seed or some other highly prolific food species. Appoint someone (maybe a survivalist or old hippie) as "wild food forager" and cross your fingers.

Things to watch for are large grain mills and industrial cooking equipment. You may also find water pumps, power generation equipment, specialized vehicles, lathes, mills, presses and other industrial tools. If you can repair the EMP damage, power them and get them working, they can speed the recovery of your community and really enhance your economy.

Actions: Appoint a good commissary officer. Someone is going to have to oversee collection, storage and disbursement of not only food supplies but fuel, tools, fertilizers, seeds and other resources. Your commissary officer needs to be a very smart, honest person and he or she will need a fairly large staff. They are going to have broad powers, so find somebody that is morally good. Whoever you appoint needs excellent people skills and the meticulous attention to detail of a banker. This same person is really in charge of your whole economy and will probably be in charge of printing currency if you use it. A bank manager might be a good choice. If you have political opposition in the community, this is an excellent place to put them if they are up to the job. Once they are "holding the baby" they will be on your side and won't be able to accuse you of any misbehavior.

7. Heat and shelter:
When winter hits, you may be faced with a grave heating fuel shortage. People staying in private homes may not have access to heating fuel at all. The town council is probably going to have some number of refugees to care for and they require heat too. Your community may use oil, gas, wood or something else for heating and each of them pose their own problems. You will need to think this issue out in the context of your own community situation and come up with some kind of solution. The most efficient solution, of course is to co-locate everyone in a few larger buildings and heat them at 65-68 degrees. Setting up a shelter has it's own problems, but it's easier than trying to heat 500 single family shelters. The public shelter model of setting up in a big gymnasium can work, but it provides a very efficient vector for respiratory and other diseases. If you can provide each family (or multiple families) with a classroom or office room of their own, they will be much more comfortable and resistant to diseases.

Providing a warm place to sleep may be all you can manage. Some homes are going to be difficult or impossible to heat once the power grid goes down and the oil trucks stop delivery. You should make every effort to conserve liquid fuels that will be needed for spring planting and emergency machinery.

Mitigation: Location specific. You may be able to encourage your citizens to switch over to an alternate fuel source (like wood, if your community has a lot of forests nearby). Stockpiling fuel for the town may be a good idea if you can afford it, but this is a temporary solution. Look around your town for some suitable shelter buildings and food storage facilities and check out their heating and ventilation equipment. You may be able to improve your chosen buildings or buy alternate heating systems for them within your budget constraints. Laying in a large supply of cots and blankets is a good idea.

Actions: You should immediately set up a shelter and cafeteria of some kind after the emergency. Schools are probably your best choice for this. You will probably have homeless almost from the start, so you need to get this done quickly. Home fires are bound to be more common and some people who live too far from town will need to move closer to the cafeteria. The more people you can get to move into your shelter, the easier it will be to heat. (Each human radiates roughly the same heat as a 100 watt light bulb. It adds up fast.) Make things easy on yourself and appoint someone competent (a school principal for instance) to administer your lodging and cafeteria. The principal already has a staff dependent on the city payroll. You will probably have to feed your teachers and school staff anyway, so hire them to administer your shelters. Administration of a shelter is a big, frustrating job, so make sure you appoint someone level headed to oversee this effort.

8. Security and public order:
Whatever your town's current situation, you will probably need to greatly expand your security forces. In fact you will probably need an Army. During normal times, your town doesn't have it's own foreign policy or the need to defend itself. With a general society collapse, that changes. Your town will need the ability to fight off raiders or even other communities.

a. Some of your own civilian population is going to get unruly. Even a small percentage acting up can overwhelm your current police force. You need some way to punish them and bring them in line. Jails are inefficient and expensive and not very effective at curbing bad behavior. I suggest a simpler system of corporal punishment (whipping or caning) and for serious infractions or repeat offenders, expulsion from the community. Find a judge or other competent person to set up a simple system of justice that fits your circumstances, take a vote at a town meeting to get public buy-in and then appoint someone to run it. Your police force should be distanced from both judgment and punishment. Judgment and punishment should be accomplished by a different group, perhaps a randomly selected jury or something equally simple and fair.

b. You are going to have additional requirements for officers (or someone) to act as "messengers" to put out policies and community information. Without electronic communications, much more of your business has to be done in person.

c. You are almost certain to have extensive guard duty requirements. You will need to provide point security for foodstocks, livestock, roadblocks and critical resources like fuel, power generation, etc. Your uniformed police force is too valuable to bog down with these security positions. You need to hire out of work locals to augment them with a reliable guard force. (I recommend handing this responsibility over to your military...see below).

d. You may need to put a 24 hour presence at roadblocks or traffic control points to divert refugees away from your town. (see below for a discussion of refugees).

e. You may face a threat from outside polities. If so, you will need an Army or you will be destroyed. You may have to mobilize the entire population to fend off other communities. (see below for a discussion of inter-community politics.)

Your security forces are your "face" to the community. They will represent the town and embody your decisions and authority. You need to keep a tight reign on your police forces or some of them are going to be tempted to take unwarranted liberties and abuse their authority.

One of your first actions should probably be to call your security forces and emergency responders together and reaffirm your covenant with them. You need to reassure them that they are still going to be paid and their families taken care of. You need to get buy-in from them and make them feel they are part of something important and bigger than mere survival. Let them know your plans and your thoughts as clearly as possible so they can represent you well. You should also let them know that you will tolerate no misbehavior. They are your knights and have to act the part.

You should also set up some kind of "military" arm to deal with extraordinary requirements. Call it a militia or a town guard or whatever you want. In essence it's an army. If you have any doubts about the loyalty of your police chief or sheriff, the military arm should report directly to you or one of your representatives rather than falling under the police. All of your authority rests on the shoulders of your security forces, so you can't tolerate any dissension in the ranks or misbehavior. Choose someone loyal and skilled with a military background and good people skills to head up your military. Hopefully you have a retired officer or senior NCO available. Whoever it is will have to be able to effectively give orders to perhaps hundreds of people in an emergency, so choose someone charismatic and smart. He will also need an excellent grasp of tactics and the ability to plan for small scale military operations. Let your military commander hire his own personnel, arm and train them and instruct your commissary and police force to assist him in anyway possible.

Your military commander's first task will be to do some kind of terrain analysis and COA products to determine how to defend the community and try to predict future issues. His second task will be to build an effective military force. It should probably be a small offensive force backed up by a larger irregular militia comprising most of the town. He will need to set up some kind of training program and be able to pay people to participate. Military training is hard work, so don't expect anyone to take it seriously or work at it if you are not paying them. You can put your military commander in charge of all the guard duty requirements to assist the police as well as messenger duties.

9. Foreign relations and refugees:
Every community is going to face the same challenges you have. I expect most of them will fail and fragment. I also expect a huge outpouring of refugees from every city in the USA. City based communities have huge challenges that small towns won't. They have limited options and maintaining order will be desperately hard, perhaps impossible. Every community and group of people are going to face terrible, unsolvable provisioning problems. The ugly truth is, most citizens of the USA are going to starve to death after a society crash. It's simple arithmetic. There will not be enough food for everyone to live. Even if most of them last through a whole season until the first harvest, there is no chance that the first [post-collapse] harvest is going to be bountiful enough to sustain everyone.

The following is going to read like science fiction [a la Alas, Babylon by Pat Frank], but I call em like I see 'em. If anyone can find a flaw in my analysis, then please tell me about it. I believe you can expect large polities to attempt to take resources from smaller ones. If you are the mayor of a city with 100,000 or more people, you have no other choice. During normal times, the countryside (agrarian areas) produce all the food consumed by cities. Once the provisions stop arriving, your city is going to starve very quickly unless you can procure more. Your normal sources of supply are perhaps a thousand miles distant and might as well be on the moon. Your actual chances of sustaining your population long term are zero. If you are a smart leader, you will attempt to save most of your people by sending them to other communities that have more food and water. If you are not so smart, you will attempt to take what you need to keep going from the surrounding countryside and small nearby communities. The best a small community can hope for is that all the large polities (cities) nearby will fail and fragment quickly. If they don't the small communities may be forced to take in refugees or surrender food stocks to support the cities. Either way, the city people are mostly doomed, but if this occurs, so are the small communities.

A medium sized city could potentially muster an enormous army. I am not saying every city is going to manage the level of cohesion, organization and discipline needed to do this, but it's at least a possibility in some cases, especially for cities that have a military base nearby. You also need to consider smaller polities like boroughs or neighborhoods or even church congregations making demands on your community. How will you react when the mayor of a nearby town or city asks you for provisions?

Another probable development I expect to see is the "professional army". Groups may attempt to provision themselves by threatening small communities and extorting "protection" from them. This is another layer of taxation you probably can't afford, but if you choose not to pay, you must be prepared to fight. Think about it and make sure you discuss your concerns with your security leadership so they can form plans.

You can also expect to see a large stream of refugees pouring out of heavily populated areas. If they have vehicles, they will move outward from the cities along major roadways until they can't get more fuel and then stop. If the finance systems are still working, this refugee stream may burn up most of the available liquid fuel in the USA in a few days. If your community lies on a major line of drift, you can expect to have many thousands of thirsty, hungry refugees knocking at your door hoping for a handout. These are going to be US citizens, mothers and fathers, sons, daughters, and grandparents who are desperate and begging. If begging stops working, they will get hostile and dangerous. Maybe very dangerous.

I know this is a very disagreeable topic, but almost every refugee is doomed and you are powerless to change that fact. Think it out carefully and you will see that you simply cannot feed everyone. You are going to have to prevent refugees from consuming your community resources or you will perish with them. You need to stop the stream of refugees from entering your community. Once they are inside your community, they will exponentially harder to deal with. Effectively killing someone by evicting them from your town while looking them in the eye and listening to them beg is going to be hard to do. If you get soft hearted and let too many stay, you will be condemning your community to slow death by starvation. Discuss this topic with your community leaders, especially your security leadership and make them see that there are no alternatives to a strict quarantine. You need to have a plan and execute it immediately or you may be overwhelmed within hours.

One final note on turning back refugees: Do it as far from town as you can. The refugees are going to be truly pitiful and seeing this level of misery will cause your community a lot of pain and distention. You need very hard men to man your line and you need to be careful to leave the refugees another place to go. Don't block a major road. Instead, block a turn-off. It's okay to be as humane as possible and provide water at the roadblock, but you simply cannot afford to give away food or medical supplies. The only people you can let into your town are town residents. All others will have to continue down the road. The men on your roadblock are going to crack up fast, so rotate them often and watch them. This will be the most traumatic thing they have ever had to do.

10. Long term provisioning:
You need to appoint someone to oversee food production. This should probably be completely separate from your commissary department. You need someone with expertise in farming and more specifically, small scale gardening. They need to organize and assist everyone in the community with planting their own gardens and teaching such basic topics as drying, pickling and canning produce. They will also have to oversee a lot of coordination to grow and harvest grain crops and figure out the most efficient ways to store surplus.

Mitigation: Heirloom seeds and fertilizers are going to be in very short supply. If you can somehow trick (or talk) your town into stocking up on these, perhaps as part of a 4-H or school project, your town will be much better off. If you have any say in public plantings for parks or landscapes, try to plant as many food bearing plants as possible. An apple tree is just as attractive as a pine or elm and produces fruit every year.

Actions: Every piece of arable land in the community needs to be planted with something edible ASAP. Without power machinery, this is going to be a real challenge. Every lawn and every empty lot should be dug up and worked in order to build soils, even if it's not planting time. Working leaf litter and plant materials into the plots needs to begin almost immediately. The "Garden Czar" will probably take up the lion's share of the spare manpower in the town just planting city owned lots. He will need to procure hand tools by the hundreds and garden seed, both of which may be in short supply. The tools can be loaned or rented to citizens as needed for their own plots and the seed will need to be rationed out carefully until a stock of good seed can be built up.

The town's citizens may have no horticultural knowledge or gardening skills and will likely not be conditioned for long hours of manual labor. The sooner they start getting their hands dirty the better. Try to hire some skilled gardeners to assist and advise your citizens with their own plots. Building a surplus and a working economy depends directly on their success at working small private gardens.

You may need to pass some resolutions about gardening to prevent land from sitting idle. You can't afford a scrap of idle land as long as you have any seeds left to put in the ground.

11. Building a manufacturing capacity. At some point, equipment and tools will begin to break down. Before that time, you need to establish a manufacturing base that can support your community.

You will eventually need a machine shop capable of founding, forging and machining metal parts and tools. You may need this immediately to repair critical equipment for pumping water or grinding grain et cetera A simple blacksmith shop will be needed to create plows and simple hand tools like hoes and scythes that you are likely to need. You may also need a small foundry and machine shop to create replacement parts for critical machinery. Keep a lookout for likely skilled individuals and hire them to build the town a metal working capability. [JWR Adds: As science fiction writer S.M. Stirling aptly pointed out in his Dies the Fire novel series, leaf springs from abandoned cars and trucks make ideal steel stock that can be used to re-forge into crossbows, plows, small hand tools, knives, and even swords. Leaf springs should be very plentiful for at least one or two generations in a truly post-collapse society.]

You should have someone begin building hand plows and other animal and human powered agricultural tools ASAP. You will need as many as your metal shop can manufacture and I guarantee you will be able to trade surplus plows to other towns within a few months.

You will eventually need to replace or repair clothing. You will have a long grace period while you go through existing stocks from department stores, but within a few years, you will need new fabrics. Appoint someone to worry about fabric production. How do you build a loom? In less than four years, you are going to need a source of fiber and a fabric production capability, especially in cold climates.

Other manufacturing capabilities may be needed as you go along. You may wish to set up a pottery shop or produce adobe brick for building materials or set up a sawmill for lumber and firewood. Brainstorm this with your staff or at a town meeting.

12. Preserving:
A lot of irreplaceable things are going to be destroyed or lost if you don't make some kind of effort to preserve them.

a. Animals: A lot of people are going to be very hungry. Most of them are going to die. I expect most species of large animals in the USA and Europe, including livestock, to be slaughtered for food until they are scarce or even extinct. Think ahead. You are going to need draft animals desperately in a few months. You simply must preserve as many animals capable of filling this role as possible. Dogs are peerless burglar alarms. Cats keep vermin numbers down. Once all the chickens are gone, where are you going to get eggs and poultry? Saving even a small breeding stock of all the useful animals in your community is going to be hard when people are literally starving to death all around you.

Actions: You are going to have to put livestock under guard or they won't last long. Someone will poach them. Any private farmer trying to keep livestock is going to find out just how sneaky hungry humans can be. Someone also needs to start training your working animals immediately. It takes time to produce a working plow team out of average untrained cows or horses.

b. Knowledge: If you don't take steps to prevent it, people will burn most of the books in your town for fuel. I recommend keeping your library open for business. Your town or local school libraries may turn out to be very important for both entertainment and reference.

c. Records: You need to secure public and as many private records as possible. Without them, repairing our current culture will be much more difficult. Birth records, tax records, bank records etc. All of these may have
tremendous value in the future.

d. Art and historical treasures: If your town has any, you should safeguard national treasures for future generations. The very fact that you are making this effort will send a powerful message to your citizens.

13. Medical:
Your existing health-care facilities and drug supplies need to be safeguarded quickly. You will have a very limited stockpile of opiates and other painkillers and mind altering drugs that will be very attractive to some
criminal (or simply addicted) elements of society. Every pharmacy and clinic in town should be carefully confiscated and put under guard. Don't forget the pet hospitals and veterinarian clinics. Appoint a doctor or pharmacist to oversee this effort and support them with whatever resources they require (if you can). Some drugs require refrigeration and may not be salvageable if they are ever warmed.

Hire as many doctors and nurses as possible and set up a public health clinic near the town center. Have them take charge of public health and start an outreach program for self help and public sanitation. If your town has vaccines available, you will probably want to use them up quickly before they go bad. Your community may be able to avoid a lot of misery and casualties if you organize your health care.

Have someone in your manufacturing base or commissary department work with them to replace or recycle medical supplies. Something as simple as a building wood-fired autoclave might be beyond the capability of your health care folks but easy for your artisans.

Also, hire as many pharmacists, chemists and any other scientists you can find. You probably won't have too many of these once they are all accounted for. If you have a few, don't be afraid of tasking them to do some very difficult tasks for you. They are very intelligent folks and can perform miracles if you challenge them. Challenge them to set up a lab and try to synthesize antibiotics, or opiates. Or challenge them to figure out how to improve agriculture in your town or synthesize liquid fuel for your vehicles, or explosives. They may surprise you with spectacular results. These folks are valuable property, so try not to use them as unskilled farm hands or guards. The same goes for engineers. Give them challenging work and have them tackle real problems.

Conclusion:
I recognize that most of us are not mayors. We are probably not the ones who will be called on to shoulder the numbing responsibilities of command during a crisis. I really wouldn't care for that job, even in peacetime. When the balloon goes up, it will be hardest on the leaders. Your mayor and police chief will need help. As a prepper, you are in a position to provide that help. How many of the jobs that I mentioned above could you competently fill? I implore you to help them. Having you available as adviser (and commissary officer or military leader, experienced gardener, metal smith etc) could literally make the difference between life and death. Your efforts could make a huge difference to a lot of people.

If your community has any chance at all to survive, those odds will increase exponentially if your leaders have a well thought out plan and make good decisions. Community leaders will need to make timely decisions on a host of issues they have never considered and have the conviction to act ruthlessly. You, as a prepper, have the advantage of thinking about it ahead of time and working out all the details in your mind. That and the skills you have learned can allow you to make a real difference. Will you step up to the plate and try to save your whole community? It seems like a superhuman job and daunting for a mere human. But if anyone can do it, maybe it's you.

Win or go down swinging, - J.I.R.

Hi Jim and Readers,
Some of our TEOTWAWKI preparations tend to lean toward running electronic equipment off charged DC battery sources. I work in electronics, and have built several radio stations for ministries around the world, I have found that DC to AC inverters especially the cheaper models are very inefficient to run higher powered equipment. I have gone another direction when powering equipment off of 12 or 24 volt DC power systems. Many people will purchase a DC to AC inverter to run a laptop through the supplied AC to DC converter. The newer switching supplies are very compact and efficient, but when you convert from DC to AC the efficiency goes down. So why not convert once, from DC to DC?

I have found a company that sells high end DC to DC converters. The Avel Lindberg Company makes very good shielded and moisture resistant units. Their primary market is the military, I have bought units used for certain weapons systems, that are fairly well hardened for EMI / EMP. I have used them up to 300 watts and they work very well with no maintenance for long periods of time. I also have converted equipment like some of the small microphone and media mixers from the AC to DC converters that are supplied with the equipment to straight 12 Volts DC by removing the plus minus supply internally and the AC to DC converters and installing DC to DC converters directly inside the units. The devices can be purchased from Internet/catalog electronic parts dealers like Mouser, Allied Electronics, and Newark. All of the above companies can be found with a search engine to get access to their on-line catalogs.

The first thing to remember when converting something from one source to the other is to check the supplied power cube for the output voltage and current rating. Then order the correct DC to DC converter for the voltage and current rating needed for your electronic equipment.

What I usually do is obtain Anderson Power Pole connectors before cutting the power cable be sure to check with a digital volt meter or older volt ohm meter, the polarity of the power plug of the supplied power cube. I then remove the cube from the AC electrical source. Unplug it. Then cut the cable about a foot or two from the units connector. Install the Power Pole connectors on both ends of the cut cable that are left, insuring you set up the red positive, and black negative connectors correctly.

Now take your DC to DC converter and install the appropriate red positive and black negative connectors on it. Connecting the DC to DC Converter to the appropriate 12 or 24 volt DC power source and check your output when the pigtail connector with the power pole with your meter again insure the voltage required and polarity are correct. If it checks out correctly then plug it into your electronic device and energize the device. The input source voltage to many DC to DC converter will accept from 8 to 30 volts DC so it will be more versatile than the original power cube.

Two of the benefits of making conversions like this will cut out the AC inverters from the equation and the other is reducing the current drain a little bit on your battery capacity.
I realize there are many people who would feel deliberately cutting a wire would be fool hardy if they are not competent in electronics, or electrical devices . This can be overwhelming to someone, so if you feel performing this kind of modification is beyond your competency level please seek out someone who is competent. Performing a modification like this is simple to some, but don't do it if you feel it is beyond your capability. Blessings to all, - Dave with Martronics

Introductory biographical note: The author is 64 years old, father of nine children, BSAE Aeronautical Engineering, Ex-Army Infantry Training Officer (1970-1974), former Gym Trainer (1996-1997), Firefighter and EMT training and certification (2009-2010), Real Estate Broker/Owner

Phase I
I began realizing my vulnerability in 1998-1999, when Y2K-induced turmoil was a potential real possibility. I began, in all haste to find and prepare for the possible disaster that might come when the clock struck 12:00 midnight and 2000 would ring in. My first step was to find enough land that would be secure enough for my family and to design a place we could live and that would handle any disaster, whether it was of nature, man-made or God directed. My requirements were simple. It needed to have relatively high elevation (1,500ft+ above sea level), close enough to a populated city , but rural enough to not easily be found, basically within a 1 hour drive. Secluded, but not to isolated, and not to far removed from all civilization, but yet be sparsely populated and hard to find. It had to have access to running water and have soil to grow crops. 
I found a piece of property that was nearly 50 acres on the top of a ridge line, that was part of a 1,000 acre tract, with only 15 other property owners, with tracts ranging from 15 acres to 200 acres. The 1,000 acres was gated with one main, electrically operated secured gate leading in and a permanently locked gate leading out for emergencies only. The community had two 400 ft wells, with creeks running through the 1,000 acres and touching my tract. One of the wells was at the bottom of my property and had a 5 h.p. pump. The well was on a timer and delivered water to multiple tanks at different locations on the three highest elevations. Gravity feed then brought the water to the 15 property owners. I purchased an 8kw mobile generator, for standby power, to run the pump, if we were to loose electricity for any long period of time. The owner of the 200 acre tract reserved his for hunting and kept it seeded, to attract deer, rabbit, bear & turkey. The developer of the 1,000 acres paved the main road coming up to about 1,500 feet and then graveled from there to all the tracts ranging from 500 ft to 2,500 ft. My parcel sits at about 2,200 ft. ASL. All of the tracts are heavily wooded with hardwoods as well as evergreens.

My next step was to design and start construction of an impregnable home (fortress) that would withstand any disaster within the constraints of my budget. My plan was to dig into the mountain such that only one side would be open and dirt would surround the other three sides up to 12’. Because time was a factor, I knew I could only get the basement part completed before the New Year would ring in. This meant my roof would be the floor of the home that I would need to finish someday in the future, if the world was still around after Y2K.

I sent my floor plans to the engineering department of a nearby university and asked for help.
The dimensions I gave them were to be 37’X 52’ split lengthwise by a 12’ separation wall 12” thick of poured reinforced concrete surrounded by 12’ walls of the same. To handle the load of a semi-truck driving over my roof, they told me I needed  8” of poured concrete, reinforced with rebar, 10” on center and 6 by 6 [heavy] wire mesh. I added an 8’ wide X 5’ high fireplace on the open side of the basement with large racks for grilling my kill. The basement floor was 4” poured concrete that I ran one inch polyurethane tubing 4’ apart throughout the basement floor, which ran into a plenum in the base of the fireplace and back to a recirculating pump and holding tank. In addition, valving was added to reroute the heated water into the hot water system of the house. A small, electric hot water heater was added to the system capable of running from standard 120 VAC as second water heater capable running at 12VDC from solar panels via deep cycle storage batteries I purchased (4) 2’X 6‘ solar panels with frame, and a windmill.
 
Prior to having the roof poured I dropped in a 500 gal urethane water tank built into a frame that raised the tank from 6’ to the roof. This would allow me for gravity feed system in the basement.. I constructed two fiberglass shower stalls for two bathrooms, a work/mechanical room, two bedrooms and a kitchen on one side of the divided wall. Two metal framed doors secured this area from the large living room that is between the divided wall and the outside open wall. There are two metal doors exiting the basement. One is through a stairwell to the roof (future floor of the main house) and the other through the open side.
I also decided to add one additional piece for security, as well as escape. At the back of the basement going into the mountain I put in a 30’ X 10’ cleaned out metal fuel tank (25,000 gal to be exact). This is what I called my Survival Tank. I found the tank at a scrap metal yard out in the boonies and had a local welder cut one end out and put in a double hinged door secured by 1” X 1” sliding bars that were lockable with the largest master locks I could find. On the top of one end of the tank I had him cut out a 3’ X 3’ square and ran 4 walls, 6’ up with a latchable top, secured from the inside, as well as a metal ladder to go from the floor to the top of the latch. I then had a floor frame put in that was 30” from the bottom of the tank and added 2’ x 6” wood removable flooring. This is where I store all of the 5 gal urethane storage buckets.  From the 2”x 6” floor I built metal shelving with 2”x 6” wood shelves to the roof of the tank. That left me with about an 8’ walkway front to rear down the center of the tank. The hard part was getting the tank up the last 500’ vertical 30 degree incline to the homesite. For this I had to find the largest wrecker in the state. We had to winch the tank up the 500’ and then drop it in the ground before we poured the 12” back wall around it, leaving the welded doors as the entry from the basement to the tank. The tank was now about 4’ underground, with the escape hatch protruding above the surface. A few years later, after Y2K became a no- event, I enlarged my floor plan above the basement and added an additional 1,000sq ft and poured concrete over the entire area where the tank was buried. With all this, an oversized septic system and drain field needed to be designed. I have since changed the design of the house to have a castle look that is an additional 26’ above the basement, using split face block that is reinforced with rebar and filled with concrete. Other things that have been done are the purchase and installation of an inverter system, solar array and windmill. I have a 600 gal gas tank and 1,000 gal propane tank. I have an extra 5kva generator which has been converted to be a dual-fuel system, i.e. gas/propane. After nine years I have the walls up from the basement roof and hope to have a metal/concrete roof put on before 2012, for what I hope is also a non-event.

Phase II
This is really a continuation of Phase I, but it is the process of preparing the list of lists and then accumulating the items necessary to insure a plan A, B & C and in some areas a plan D.

1. CACHES- I keep most of my equipment& supplies that I cannot easily replace or want to safeguard the most, in the Survival Tank. But I have also build special caches for firearms and ammo that I can bury in different locations, if for any reason any of my residences become compromised. I did this by taking 8” X 5’ sections of PVC pipe and capping each end. They are waterproof, can hold two rifles, hand guns and ammo each and can easily be buried and retrieved.
2. EMERGENCY LIGHTING- Purchased wall-mounted LED kits that can easily be mounted above telephone jacks, thus utilizing the 2nd pair of phone wires on a 12VDC circuit wired to a single automobile battery with a small solar panel for emergency lighting.
3. EXERCISE/MILLING/12VDC GENERATOR- I purchased a Country Living Mill and then found an exercise bike. I also mounted both the mill and a 12VDC automobile generator, pre-1975, to a board with a 12 VDC battery. I can generate 12 VDC power for my emergency lighting  or charge up the car battery or grind wheat into flour, while getting in our daily exercise.
4. TRANSPORTATION- Purchased a customized  ’71 & ’74 4WD Chevy Blazers on the internet. The ’71 was customized for brush firefighting and the ’74 was customized as a dual fuel
5. GARDENING- I have just applied for a subsidy grant, and received it, from a program launched in December 2009 by the Department of Agriculture, whereby I will be reimbursed up to $3,300 for materials to construct up to 2,175 sf of high tunnels for growing crops. A high tunnel or hoop house are miniature greenhouses without all the fancy bells and whistles The grants are being awarded to 38 states for the purpose of extending the growing seasons of food crops and most families can qualify if they have a small tract of land to put them on. Last month I had a bob-cat grade out about a half acre and will start planting in the fall for a early spring harvest.
6. FOOD- Thousands of  rations of  MREs. Freeze-dried , dehydrated and raw wheat, rice, sugar, honey etc.

Mistakes I have made:

            Construction

1. I put 2-8’x10’ sectioned windows on the open side of the basement. Twice I have had ATV renegades break in, through the windows, even through the metal-doored tank, cutting the locks and thereby taking my guns and ammo and trying to hot wire my dirt bike.  I have since then boarded up the windows and put larger Master locks on the doors. I have found that there is almost nowhere safe from a dirt bike or ATV. A security system is my next step. Booby traps are illegal in most jurisdictions.
2. Metal tanks, underground, will sweat, making large pools of water in the bottom of the tank. It is difficult to control the temperature, but since I installed dehumidifiers, everything stays dry and cool. Dampness accelerates the deterioration of metal cans making them rust from both inside and outside the can.  Mold or mildew starts to take over everything from bedding, to books to any type of paper products and boxes will fall apart over time Dampness also invites rodents you do not want, as well as insects, so use plenty of rat bait and seal up all possible points of entry. I also fog the place every time I leave.
3. If you are going to build an oversize fireplace make sure you find someone who knows how to calculate the ratio of the flu and damper.
4. When building a basement underground, be sure you study up on removing water from the walls created by hydrostatic pressure and have a good wall and below floor drainage system.

Foods

1. Rotation of Food- MREs do last more than 10 years [at temperatures under 60 degrees], with a few exceptions such as high oil content foods which begin to deteriorate. Fruits break down and start to ferment or just go bad.

Hygiene

1. I'm not yet sure how to handle long term supply of female monthly needs or what to substitute when supplies run out. [JWR Adds: I've had several readers enthusiastically recommend washable fabric sanitary pads. Patterns for making your own are available on-line. Or if you'd rather have someone else do the repetitive sewing work, then I recommend a small, family-owned business called Naturally Cozy. From all reports, their pads are very comfortable and made to last.]

Don’t run out of money, because your eyes are bigger than your wallet or borrowing power is.

My Belief System

For those who believe, have repented and have chosen to follow in his teachings, he has promised eternal life. Although all things are in God’s hand, and it has been ordained as to the end and how and when it will happen, as Christians, we have a responsibility to God, our families, our church and our fellow man to be prepared both spiritually and materially. We may choose that “God will provide”, “ What is meant to be, will be” or “God helps those who help themselves” attitude. Through out the Bible, God gave direction, through his word, directly and indirectly to be prepared at all times.

Most agree on at least the distinction that we live in an unprecedented time in History. Before us, cities, kingdoms and nations have been destroyed by God or God has removed his hand and blessings and they have been destroyed or have destroyed themselves. God has, through his mercy, given guidance and direction for us to be prepared for his second coming. He has warned us of upcoming famine, destruction and the wrath that will be unleashed upon the earth before Jesus Christ returns. [We've also been warned of] the possibility, if not the absolute certainty, of some form of collapse in our system, as we know it. This may come in a variety of forms - flu pandemic, economic depression, or an EMP attack, all of which are likely scenarios. Regardless of the form, the result will be very similar and our concerns are as well: How do we protect ourselves and our families and provide a living? While stocking up on beans, bullets, and band-aids is the initial response, further preparation encourages us to find a defensible, as well as productive retreat. But then what? So you have your retreat (or not), you’ve stocked up on seeds and a food mill, and “the event” actually comes. Are you prepared to provide for yourself when the food runs out or if society never returns to “normal”?

Although it may be difficult to learn and find the time for, the ability to provide for yourself provides incredible rewards. If we should need to return to a less technologically “advanced” society, many people will not have the knowledge, skills, and determination to do so. A few forward-thinkers will. Which do you want to be?

Preparing for the end of the world as we know it is an understandably daunting task, especially for a beginning prepper. The path to securing yourself and your family should ultimately end in a self-sufficient rural retreat, but there are many steps down that path. It is easy in the beginning stages of your preparation to feel discouraged by the shear size of the task in front of you. The amount of information to be taken in, the sudden awareness s of your vulnerable present condition, the list of tools you never knew you needed, and the anticipated financial and sweat equity costs are enough to shock some beginners into abandoning the task all together. Understanding preparation in a more easily digestible form is a key toward creating a successful preparedness plan. This article will discuss the proper mindset as well as the initial steps necessary for the beginning prepper.

The social, political, and psychological themes encountered in TEOTWAWKI strike a chord with many individuals in a society which has become so technologically dependent, so economically interconnected, and so highly specialized. For the average suburbanite who can't fix his own car, doesn't grow his own food, and has never experience “hunger” greater than skipping lunch during a hectic day at the office the breakdown of civil society is hard to conceptualize in anything more than an abstract way. I've always been interested in end of the world scenarios, whether in movies, television, books or video games. However, like so many Americans actually moving toward self sufficiency was not a chief concern. After getting married and settling in to law school I started go give more serious thought to my own preparedness for a disaster situation. Maybe it was just a symptom of “growing up” or perhaps being married focused me more intently on the need to provided for and to defend my family, but in either case I began to take stock of my readiness level and make a plan for improving it. I went to web site after web site and read as many survival books as I could get my hands on. It became quickly apparent that my level of readiness was pathetic.

I had the food in my kitchen cabinets, a .22 rifle and a .22 pistol (each with only a box or so of ammunition), a hatchet that I used for yard work, an extra five gallon can of gasoline which was of course only half full, some flashlights, and some old boots. This was all the stood between my family's safety and disaster if a TEOTWAWKI scenario unfolded. Comparing my own pathetic state to the level of preparedness described in many of the books I read, I was even more discouraged. I couldn't help but feel like I needed to go from average guy to hardcore survivalist over night. I felt like I needed to do so many things to get ready, things that seemed impossible: move my family to a wilderness retreat, learn a lifetime of survival skills, buy thousands of dollars of new equipment. After the initial panic I marshaled myself and began to analyze the situation more clearly. Like any major effort, becoming prepared would be a process with both long term and short term goals. Rather than buying piece meal the items I needed to survive a long term disaster, it made more sense to me to start with a hierarchy of disaster scenarios and prepare for each in order.

First on my list was a break in or home invasion scenario. This seemed the most probable both because of the area in which I live, a few miles from a large city, the current economic climate, and the possibility of this scenario even outside any systemic breakdown. I began by inspecting and performing routine maintenance on the locks of both my doors and windows. My home has an alarm system, so I called the provided and ran a series of tests t o insure it was functioning properly. I also check into how the system actually functioned. Like most alarm systems it simply sends a signal along the phone line, making it easy enough for a burglar to either cut the phone line or knock out power and enter more easily. I decided to create a second level of low tech security. I purchased several sets of large sleigh bells at an after Christmas sale, these not hang from interior doorknobs to provide extra noise when doors are opened and close. I also purchase small wedge alarms that activate a battery operated siren when the door makes contact with them. These are also placed behind each door, acting not only as a door stop but an added alarm. I finished off my low tech system with some standard door bars; they rest underneath the door knob and prevent the door from being pushed open. I also added security lights on both sides and the back of my home. The lights are controlled from a panel in my bedroom for easy activation when something goes bump in the night. While the system isn't foolproof it is much more secure than it was before I started and all with relatively minimal effort.

In addition to preparing my house for the break-in or home invasion scenario I recognized the need to prepare myself. I purchased a new 9mm handgun and a shotgun. While I had been advised by many to get a .45 for stopping power, the Walther P99 I purchased fit well into my hand and for me was both easy and comfortable to shoot. The gun was placed in my dresser drawer and the shotgun in a closet opposite the bed. Given the layout of my bedroom it made sense to retreat into the closet if necessary and this made the shotgun placement seem sensible. I also purchased 500 rounds of ammunition for each of my guns, a sufficient stockpile which allowed me to go to the shooting range when I had free time while still keeping good quantity on hand in between replenishments.

I also recognized that having guns didn't mean I knew how to use them, and so I enrolled myself in an urban environment shooting class. I had basic guns skill, but the class taught me about moving and shooting, shooting indoors including tactical movement, and shooting from common positions like the driver's position in a vehicle. The cost of the course was a few hundred dollars, but provided me with a wealth of confidence in my ability to react to the break-in or home invasion scenario. With one scenario off the list I could already sleep better at night, and despite the distance still to go on my road to preparedness, the first step was done.

Next on my list was a natural disaster scenario with short term (one to two weeks) power loss. Having grown up in southern West Virginia, I recognize that in rural areas even a bad storm could knock out power for a couple weeks, suburban areas of large cities might get a faster response, but if the disaster were of sufficient size the delay in repairs could well drag into weeks just like it would in the hollers back home. My first step was to secure a one month supply of food and water for myself, my wife, and our puppy. These items constituted the beginning of our larder and were simple items purchase in bulk from Sam's Club. I dedicated a closet in the spare bedroom to the storage of these items. I felt the basement was too prone to dampness and the attic to prone to high temperatures. I started with flour, rice, pinto beans, canned tuna, sugar, salt, cooking oil, and powdered milk. Our water supply consisted of a large stockpile of liter water bottles. We also purchased extra food for our puppy and stored it in the same area. My wife and I made a decision to augment this one month supply with new items at each trip to the grocery store. Some of our first acquisitions included a stockpile of feminine products, toilet paper, and paper plates an d napkins. These items all promised to make sanitation easier in a disaster crunch. The purchase of a couple boxes of extra large contractor trash bags rounded out this effort.

Next I started on items which would be needed in the natural disaster scenario, I purchased a good radio. I wanted the most power options possible including a hand crank, solar, batteries, and DC power. I also wanted the radio to cover the greatest spectrum of bands including the weather alert band. After the radio I procured some extra flashlights and batteries. Following the advice of a one book I got some brightly colored duct tape and wrapped the handle of each flashlight for easy location. I also set aside an emergency stock of candles in a small bin with some lighters, matches, and empty coffee cans (to be used as candle holders). My next concern was for heat and fuel. I stocked up on gasoline in safety containers and stored this in the area of my basement at the farthest end from the bedrooms and away from any possible ignition sources. I also bought extra propane for my grill and extra oil for my Tiki Torch type lamps. We have a fire pit, and so I ordered two extra loads of wood and created tarp covered storage bins in my back yard to hold the stockpile. When acquiring new items I tired to focus on things that my family would use regardless of a disaster scenario. Stocking up just meant having extra on hand for when we needed it.

In finishing off my natural disaster efforts, I turned back to making my home secure. While my alarm system had carbon monoxide and smoke detectors built in, this wouldn' t do me any good with the power down. I obtained stand alone units. I also purchased several more fire extinguishers and place them at strategic locations. My intention was to be able to manage a fire on my own should emergency services be tied up with a large scale disaster situation. While there is certainly a lot more that could be done, with food, water, lighting, and heating secured I felt okay about my chances in a short to natural disaster scenario.

I was feeling a lot better about the security and sustainability of my home in a short term disaster scenario, but now I needed to make sure my wife and I could get back to the house in an emergency. I was ready to take on the task of creating bug out bags to keep in our cars and at work. The bags were surplus swat responder bags with plenty of extra pockets and heavy duty zippers. The initial contents included changes of clothes and boots as my wife and I both have to wear dress clothe s to work. I also got heavy duty leather gloves and a set of protective goggles for each back. Next came water and food, 4 liters of water and 8-10 protein bars. I then added items for fire creation, including standard matches and lighters and a magnesium strip sparker. I purchased a gas mask for each bag. While the gas masks might violate the normal rule for things my family will use anyway, it seemed like a better to be safe than sorry type item. Flashlight and extra batteries, a multi-tool, and a first aid kits were also included. Each kit also contained a tarp for shelter as well as parachute cord and tarp clips.

The final items considered the possibility of a shelter in place scenario with biological components to the threat. I got several layers of plastic sheeting, duct tape, and bright orange spray paint. The tape and plastic to block air flow in a shelter area and the spray paint to make the position on an office or car window to get emergency personnel's attention. These were the first version bug out bags we created, and they have since been augmented with items like extra ammo (we both got our concealed carry permits) and a small hatchet. We also make a concerted effort to keep the gas tanks for the car full, and this combined with the bag contents increases our changes of making it home if things go bad.

I am currently working on the next phase of preparedness, getting the home ready for a longer term survival situation. My wife and I have stocked up on seeds and have planted gardens for the la st two summers. We are increasing our food and water supplies to deepen our larder as it were. I purchased items necessary to seal off the house including plastic sheeting, plywood, nails and the like. Our next big purchase will hopefully be a water filter .

Many readers will probably look at our current level of preparedness and feel it is inadequate, I agree. Other might questions the preparedness decisions I have made or the order in which I put my priorities above, that's probably fair as well. The main point I hope to get across is not necessarily the specific plan for preparing, but the more general attitude necessary for a new prepper. With each new phase of preparation I am increasing my odds of survival and making my family safer. It's obviously a long road, and even seasoned veterans still have to maintain their training a preparation. My hope is that readers who are just getting into prepping or who have considered the scenarios but haven't taken action can appreciate this approach and implement it with success to overcome their initial anxiety. Good luck to you all and God bless in your efforts!

James:
The guys over at TSLRF just mentioned: " There is a free service on Off-grid.net called LandBuddy that connects you with people who are looking to live off grid, people who are currently living off grid and people who want to help others live off grid." That sounds useful, for J.S.L.'s situation. Here is a link to the full post. - Hector R.

J.S.L.,
I'm here in your home of Pennsylvania, and wish you well. Although I wish I had some Arizona property as well, I do not. I have some property away from my home location that gives me some hope, should things become unsuitable for normal living.

I also am involved in alternative energy for a living, and would recommend that you do a full calculation of getting a standard hookup before putting any money down on the alternatives. We have not become fully de-regulated here yet, but if you follow Maryland's de-reg, you will understand the 100% jump that may occur. At the current time, the payback is still 20 years on the equipment, based on my kwh costs and extrapolating the cost expansion. As this develops, I'm looking at the same alternatives as you.

If I were in your situation, I would be looking at all non required costs, for example television, phone, heat (if you have firewood), cooling, etc.
As always, any spousal input is sometimes a holdback on putting the tv (dish) on the not required list. I'm quite familiar with this situation.

On the garden, keep the chin up, read as much as possible online, and pray for rain. We had about two months of no rain up here, but had public water backup to keep the garden alive. The last week has drowned us in make-up rain. (I'm not overly religious, but I did pray for some rain to bring us back from the bad situation, and it appears to be provided.)

If things get too frail, come back to Pennsylvania, and give it another try. We are making it here, even with the Associated Press's daily bad news. Take care, - W.H.

Sir,
Unless you have money to burn, one should not expect to set up an off the grid home and have all the conveniences of a on the grid home.

First off, for one person a 300 to 500 square foot structure is more than adequate. 2,100 square foot home is too big for even a six person family. For initial cost savings, use a generator for surge electricity needs, otherwise use a small solar system to supply power for LED lighting and solid state electronics. Also use natural lighting (skylights) and oil lamps to keep set up costs down. You can always expand the solar and wind system as funds are available. Use a solar clothes dryer (clothes line) and a manuals washing machine (tub and ringer) and dishwasher (sink, scrub brush and hands).

I think starting off with an old motor home is a good idea and I would suggest reading Thoreau’s book “Walden; or, Life in the Woods” to get a perspective on a personal declaration of independence, simple living in natural surroundings and for self reliance.

Mr.. Rawles:
J.S.L. should be able to sell his house to other preppers stuck in New York City and its’ suburbs. His site is a lot less populated than ours. I would love a piece of property in Pennsylvania. It is all about perspective. His grass is a lot greener than our concrete jungle. He needs to place an ad in New York City area Craigslist or something similar. Also the people with money in this area have plenty to burn. Hard to believe but true. Although his home may not be an ideal site it is still a better bug out site for someone living in an apartment in New York City. Peace, - Celia

I have endeavored to set my own off-grid plan into place. This is easier said than done. A machinist by trade, unemployed by government design, it is becoming more difficult to find the capital to go off-grid. Since late 2007 the job market in my area has collapsed. The only way to find employment is through a "temp" agency and the two jobs I have been lucky enough to get only lasted a few months each. What is worse is the fact that many employers are now engaging in discrimination against those of us that are unemployed, i.e. “unemployed need not apply”.

 As of May 2010 I am embarrassed to admit that I must now use food stamps in order to be able to continue paying the mortgage. As a single 45-yea- old owner of a home that I can’t sell now due to the housing market collapse, almost all of my finances go to trying to simply hold on to my home. Unfortunately this  trend is not sustainable for much longer since my unemployment has completely dried up. The time is upon me to exercise a motto from my childhood, “be prepared”. I never hunted before, but as of 2009 I have started to learn hunting as both a survival skill and a sustainable off-grid skill in both archery and rifle. Having had success in my first deer season I have gained some confidence that I can feed myself when the grocery stores disappear.  I have also begun gardening with non-GMO seeds. I have been very fortunate to put back a few months of storable food from Ready Reserve and e-Foods direct. I have also found some inexpensive tree covered property (5 acres) that is remote, about 23 miles to the nearest town (in Arizona) which is about 2,100 miles away from my home in Pennsylvania. Access to water will be a major issue (about $10,000 to drill a well with no guarantee of hitting water, or put a storage tank on the property and either haul or delivery.)
 
T here is also the issue of a permanent shelter. The best option I found in my research would be an insulated steel building kit. These kits can be assembled over a week-end with simple hand tools, but they are about $4,000 for one 20 x 30 x 12 kit from American Outback Buildings. This kit is the most complete of all I have researched. With four of these kits and a 25 x 25 gazebo you end up with about 2,100 sq. ft. cross shaped, open floor plan structure. After all that you still need to think about the interior--partitioning rooms, the inside plumbing, septic system, wiring for electric and a power source.

I feel a combination of wind, solar and a back-up propane generator would be the best system. Solar is expensive though, $6,000 to $12,000 for a strong system that would include a hybrid inverter (pure sine wave is not cheap) that will accommodate both solar and wind. Wind turbines are a bit easier on the wallet. From my research the turbine price tag will be around $3,000. Don’t forget that both systems will require batteries,. This brings into focus the voltage and total amp hours you will need. Alternative power systems are typically built with 12 volt, 24 volt, 36 volt, or 48 volt battery banks. I feel a 24v system would work out fine for my needs as long as I use propane for the stove. As you can see none of these steps are cheap, (you get what you pay for) but in order to be truly off the grid you must continue to move forward every chance you get.
 
Baby steps are all I can muster at present so I have also picked up an old, (1981) cheap motor home (code name “plan B”). Just in case my plan doesn’t reach completion before my home in Pennsylvania is taken away from me. Although I continue to hope for the best  (a new job at the hourly rate to thrive) I must be prepared for the worst (foreclosure), but the more baby steps taken now makes “the worst” less of an impact and easier to accumulate to further down the road.
 
I realize this off-grid topic is scary for anyone that seriously considers escape, but “we the people” have been under constant assault since 9-11. Now there is something new almost daily designed to instill fear into the populace of America such as 2012, extremists, Russian spies, the Gulf oil spill, Iran, North Korea, the list is endless. The question before each citizen is “how much are you willing to take before you act?" Remember… the level of tyranny you will live under is exactly the amount you are willing to accept.

I believe that getting off-grid, though scary can be achieved as long as you take a small piece at a time (baby steps). That has been my philosophy these past three years, I may not have achieved my dream yet, I may never see it complete but I endeavor daily and have reached a plateau. If everything else fails right now and I must vacate I have a piece of property, a way to get there and the survival skills to make a go of it. Not that life would get easier should this scenario transpire. Point of fact, life would get much rougher. I can only hope the world will step back from the brink. This criminal government will relent from killing our “God given” rights, corruption will stop and all the people of this world will join hands and sing “we are the world”. I can hope. I do not believe that to be the case though. It seems the situation is only getting worse and the bottom is nowhere in sight.

Survival preparation seems to be the only prudent move even if all that threatens us dissolves.   This is simply a compilation of my plans. I am sure that curve balls will be thrown that I have not thought of in my wildest dreams. But I am also sure that I will not allow myself to end up in some “tent city”. At an early age I was homeless, I have been that far down that my next meal came from a dumpster, and I carried all my worldly possessions in my backpack. I will not allow a repetition of that at this juncture in my life. I am not an expert in any field, I know a lot about a little, a little about a lot, but I don’t know everything about anything. I have not thought of every obstacle I will encounter, though I have tried to account for every contingency. I am prepared to address new challenges as they present themselves. Put together what you can, while you can.

James,
The article on perennial food sources was both timely and excellent! Kudos. We are already planning to introduce many of the species into our farm.

Next, a question. Since your book "How to Survive the End of the World as We Know It" has caused me to re-think several things -- and after I have spent 20 years being a prepper --I figured I should buy your book "Rawles on Retreats and Relocation". Chapter 14 is of special interest to me right now as we are building a snug little adobe house on the farm we just bought. We don't want to call it a cement bunker do we?

Chapter 14 [of the book] is a good starting point but I was wondering if you have a source of more detailed information. I've researched many different "housing styles" around the world and across time. But turning them into a modern grid independent house.

There is the crux of the matter: I was wondering if in addition to the books you listed there might be others. Or if you know of a good architect you have worked with to create a "green" off grid bunker?

We envision a semi-buried adobe style house that will have a full basement and a bunker off of the basement (for NBC protection) as well as a flat roof. We are in a low rainfall area. This provides a place to mount PV panels, and a flat roof with a solid wall around it gives us a good "high ground" to defend the house from.

But we are open and interested in contacting anybody who might have professional experience building such a retreat house.

JWR Replies: Three of SurvivalBlog's advertisers could assist you:

• Safecastle specializes in combination walk-in vault/fallout shelter/storm shelter rooms, both below grade and above grade.
• Hardened Structures is an engineering and architectural firm that does "start to finish" hardened retreat home design and construction management.
• Ready Made Resources can help you specify and assemble a complete off-grid power setup. They do free consulting on alternative power systems.

I also recommend that you get a copy of the book The Secure Home by Joel Skousen. Also, keep in mind that there are also more than 450 articles in the SurvivalBlog archives that relate to retreat security. There are some real gems there--everything from thorny bush and cacti plantings to ballistic hardening.

Author’s Background
I live in Northeastern Minnesota with my wife and four children ages: four to seven.  I teach and am a sports coach at the local high school in town (population 1,200).  We live two hours away from any type of big city, which in our case is Duluth, Minnesota (population 85,000).  My wife is a stay-at-home mom.  Three years ago, we built a new house four miles outside of town on 15 acres that my parents gave us.  Combined, we make just over $56,000 a year.  In just this past year, my wife and I have started making the transition to a more preparedness-minded lifestyle.  As I have scanned and read hundreds of articles online, I have found a wealth of practical information, but little in the way of practical advice for families.  I hope this article helps young families that are either on a limited budget, may feel overwhelmed in their initial stages of preparation, or both.

My Introduction to Preparedness
I didn’t know it at the time, but my introduction to preparedness came in 1999 when I sat at a large table with about 15 other men in a small town café for our weekly bible study.  A small portion of these men were worried about Y2K and urged others to prepare.  I thought they were “nuts.”  I did respect them as Christian men, however, and prayed for guidance.  Looking back, I was a squared away 24 year-old but was still spiritually immature.  At that time in my life, I felt no urging by the Lord to prepare for Y2K. 

About ten years later in the middle of a bitterly cold 2009 winter night, the power went out in my newly-built home.  My home, at the time, ran completely on electricity with no form of back-up heat.  I was lucky to have in-floor heat on both levels of my home, but the wind was howling that night, as the temperatures outside kept dropping and eventually hit 30 below zero.  With the wind chill effect, it was probably near 60 to 70 below.  My kids didn’t like how dark the house was, even though we had flashlights on hand for each of them.  I put my four children to sleep early and piled on some extra blankets.  At 7:00 p.m. it was 60 in the house and I wasn’t worried as my new home was well-insulated and built tight.  I went to call my parents, who own the 20 acres bordering the western boundary of our place.  Our phones in the house, however, all depended on electricity so I decided that my call could wait until the morning.  When I went to bed at 11:00 p.m. it was now 50 in the house and I just assumed the power company guys were having a hard time in the wind and cold.  I woke up in the early morning and noticed that it was about 40 degrees in the house and still no electricity.  I was now a little uneasy as I didn’t need pipes freezing up on me.  At 7:00 a.m. I bundled up the kids and took them next door where I knew my dad had a gas fireplace.  To my surprise, his electricity was up and running.  To make a long story short, it was just my place without power as the wires from the transformer came loose when my box moved from winter heaving.  I called the power company and they had my box fixed within the hour.  Nothing bad had happened, but it did get me thinking about a few questions:

• What if we were without power for a few days, a week, or even longer?
• What am I going to do to make sure I don’t have to be up all night worrying about my children?

Later, I called up one of the men in my bible study from years back….one of the “nuts.”  We started talking regularly and then I started emailing back and forth with his brother who lives in Alaska.  Both guys are solid Christian men with a heart for being prepared and ready.  They borrowed me the book, One Second After by William Forstchen.  Reading that book gave me a sense of urgency.  In addition, I also teach Economics, Political Science, and Finance and am very weary of today’s economy for numerous reasons.  When I got to the point where I was ready to make a commitment to preparedness for my family, here are the steps we took to get started (these are in no particular order - just how they worked for us):

Step One: Get on the Same Page with your Wife
While my wife and I agree that the man is the spiritual head of the family, it sure makes life easier in all respects when you both agree to commit to something together.  Depending on your circumstances, this may take some time, substantial prayer, and even some tutoring.  This may mean having your spouse read Mr. Rawles' excellent book,"Patriots".  It may mean having them read One Second After.  I have a friend of mine right now that would like to start preparing, but hasn’t had the courage to bring it up to his wife yet.  How is that going to work?  It isn’t.  We need to be on the same page with our wives.

Step Two: Make a Financial Plan
I first thought to myself, “I can’t afford to buy any of these items.  We live paycheck to paycheck with a nice big mortgage payment on the 25th of each month.”  My wife and I then had to decide how serious we really were.  Is this just talk, or are we going to commit to being prepared?  Do I want to watch my kids freeze to death if TEOTWAWKI takes place?  I suggest each family assess their own individual situation and then plan out their finances in two phases if possible:

• Decide if you can make a “down payment” to jumpstart your preparation.
• Then, factor in a monthly stipend for preparation goods and materials.  Think of it like paying a monthly life insurance premium, only this one will save your life.

Step Three: Evaluate Your Situation and Prioritize Your Needs
One thing to mention here:  Just because you have something on your priority list of preparation items, doesn’t mean you can go get it right away.  You have to balance your “priority list” with your checkbook.  My wife and I won’t buy anything we can’t afford.  If we have to use a credit card to get it, we simply don’t!  In our individual situation we created this prioritized list:

• A Wood Stove to heat the house and to cook on in case of an emergency.
• Installation of a hand pump on our current well for water
• Back up food:  Both short-term and long-term
• Learning new skills (Making our own bread from wheat, canning our vegetables from the garden, using non-hybrid seeds, splitting our own wood, etc.)
• Buying some added security (Guns and ammo)

For example, we decided to cash-in a $6,500 investment that I could get without paying a penalty.  We first used some of that money to purchase a new wood stove and a hand pump for our well.  Heat and water were no longer concerns for us.  What was next for us?  Back-up food.  Each time at the grocery store we spend an extra $50 on canned goods, rice, cereal, staples, toilet paper, etc. to build up a rotating pantry that will last our family of six approximately three months.

The next step for us was the hardest: long-term food.  In my humble opinion, once you decide to buy long-term food, you have entered the official prepper stage.  Now you are in.  We took $1000 from my investment and used half of it to buy a Country Living Grain Mill and all of its extra parts.  We then bought 1000 pounds of hard red wheat, 200 pounds of rye berries, and a few other staples like wheat, sugar, etc.

My friend (from the bible study) and his wife then taught us how to make the following: bread from scratch using the mill, corn meal mush from feed corn, and bannock native biscuit-type bread).  We then set up future dates to learn how to make Ezekiel bread over an open fire, as well as many other helpful tutorials we could use around the house.

Last, but not least, I used my tax return and bought a DPMS AR-15 and 1,000 rounds of ammo for an added sense of security.  If anyone would have come over to our place in a threatening manner and we had to defend ourselves, before that purchase, I only had the following: a single shot Remington Model 37 Steelbilt 20 gauge shotgun, a Remington 30-06 Model 700 hunting rifle, and my .380 Bersa with just one magazine.  With some remaining money left over, I found two spare magazines for my .380.  I have much more on my wish list that we just can’t afford at this time.  I really don’t want to have to use any of these weapons, but if the time comes where I must protect my wife and kids, I will be ready with the resources that I have.

Don't Be Intimidated By What Others Have!  Everyone’s financial situation and priorities are different.  My wife and I could have easily read what others have in the way of supplies and knowledge and just said, “There’s no way we can do that.”  Instead, we just decided to do what we can with what we have.  We have to give our plan to the Lord and let him provide for us in the ways he sees fit.  Start where you can, and get on the same page with your family.  What are you immediate needs?  Can you get them now?  If not, now you have something to save for.  If yes, that is great.  Now you can move down your list to the next priority.  We are now currently saving up for a case of freeze-dried butter powder and a case of freeze-dried egg powder.  My next big wish is to build an underground root cellar somewhere on our property.

Step Four: Include Your Kids in Everything so They are Prepared
If I tell my kids that we are having a fire drill, they can get out of their beds, crawl on the floor, open the window, take off the screens, and get out of the house in less than one minute.  All four kids also know to meet behind the shed if such a thing were to happen.  Our kids need to be a part of the process.  If TEOTWAWKI happens and our kids are so terrified that they can’t function, surviving will be twice as difficult.  I once did the fire drill while throwing pillows at the kids.  That day we taught them to be focused even if there is chaos all around them.

Our kids also help in the bread-making process, each to their own abilities.  The oldest can now turn the mill; one mixes the flour, etc.  All four of our kids also know where we store our food and they know not to tell anyone.  We tell them, “Lots of people don’t have extra grain.  It is like bragging.  Just tell people that dad’s hunting and fishing gear is in that cabinet.”

As a kid I grew up hunting and fishing with my dad, but my dad always did the “messy” work like gutting the deer and cleaning the fish.  My wife and I are doing our best to teach our kids how to fish, a healthy respect (not fear) for guns, the tips to wood splitting, how to start a fire, etc.  Our kids are too young to do a lot right now, but we always take the time to teach the “how and why” of what we are doing.  Our kids love it and are now starting to ask if they can help.  We never deny them that opportunity.

Even if your kids are young, don’t underestimate what they can do.  Here are some things we have been introducing our four young children to:

• Fishing
• Stacking, hauling, cutting wood
• How to start a fire
• Lighting a candle in the house on their own
• How to identify animal tracks
• A respect for guns – an introduction to shooting with the Red Rider
• How to cook various meals
• A familiarity with our property and our trail system
• How to use walkie-talkies
• Fire Drills and places on the property to meet
• Camping skills and helping put up a tent
• How to use a compass
• How to use a slingshot

Obviously, I am not going to hand my three year old a 12-guage shotgun and let him go in the woods.  All of our boys, however, the four-year old included, can start a fire from scratch in my wood stove or in our fire pit.  As they get older, we challenge them with the next level of preparedness.  Not only are you giving your kids invaluable skills for the future, you are helping them become self-sufficient and not reliant on others.

Step Five: Use Discernment in Finding Like-Minded Friends
My wife and I have been fortunate to find an older couple to mentor us.  We are careful not to open ourselves up to just anyone.  We live in a small town where if one person tells others something, you can assume a large minority of town knows about it.  We have many close friends that have no idea about our level of preparedness.  When we see an opening in a conversation with someone we trust, we will feel them out, and take it from there. 

Step Six: Continue to Research and Don’t Get Discouraged!
I can’t believe how much I have learned in just a year’s time.  SurvivalBlog alone has thousands of outstanding articles written by people who have been preparing for years and years.  Use the internet and any other resources of information you can find.  Like many others, my wife and I have started our own little library of books, articles, etc.  We even learned how to seal up Mylar bags in our five gallon buckets of food storage on YouTube!

In conclusion, if you are a beginning family or have a tight budget, don’t get discouraged!  Even if you just start by putting away $20 a month and save up your funds for a while.  Over time that money will grow and you will have a nice start to your preparedness plan.  Checking out books at the library is free.  Take down the notes you feel are important and then move on to another book.  Before you know it, you and your family will find that preparedness is a way of life.

James:
While DeWalt is a good choice for tools, in order to save at least 30% off your next purchase look into the factory reconditioned web sites of DeWalt or in my case Bosch Tools. I used the Bosch 12 volt DC drill, in a production factory setting 10 hours a day for a year as a test. The battery only needed swapping once a day. The results were that I gave all our corded drills to the employees and purchased seven of their 12 VDC drills for the production floor. Bosch also has the 6 foot drop test on concrete test on their side.

Each unit had two batteries and charger and its built in circuitry it would charge the battery without the battery developing a memory. These drills stood up to many years of factory daily use and they came
with a one year total replacement and a two year repair warranty after that. I purchased for personal use the 18 volt combo set. It came with a coupon for a hand plainer that has come in handy. Each job is different and yes, there is a difference between 12v, 18v and 24v as far as battery life. If weight of the tool is an issue, then the 12 volt tools will take care of most routine jobs and will be lighter to handle. You may
also look into a 12 volt[input voltage] charger that is available for both. I also purchased a table saw, a compound miter saw and a router with table from the Factory Reconditioned site at least a 30% savings. Choose the best tools you can but more important save at least 30 % while doing so. Go to the factory site and look for reconditioned tools. These will have a new factory warranty and you will see the latest offerings.

I found out about Bosch through a open house at a welding supply house. I also was able to acquire a neat ratchet set [made in Taiwan] that eliminates the need for deep socket sets, called the GearRatchet. At these open houses at your local welding [or tool] distributor you will find lots of new items to consider and you will save money during the show on new tools and get some excellent food. In my case I was also able to get an extra 5% off by purchasing as many tools as I could and writing a testimonial letter about my experience with the company's tools when negotiating with the sales rep. I have no financial interest in these companies. I used to own a business and tried to buy the tools that passed the test of abuse and time. When considering your tool purchase talk to those that use the tools daily and when you purchase spending a little more can go a long way. I still have tools that I purchased 40 years ago and used daily at work for 30 years. Regards, - Jeff B.

Dear Mr. Rawles,
I live in Albertville, Alabama.  We were hit by a tornado Saturday night. The things that I witnessed in Albertville were very similar to that of Yazoo City [which was recently described by another SurvivalBlog reader.]

I would like to add to some things for you to consider:

The tornado in our town stayed above the ground for a large part of the destruction.  This means that if you had trees close to your house, more than likely, you are going to have damage. Do not have trees too close or allow them to get too big.           

A house with a hip-style roof will hold-up better than a gabled roof.

Asphalt shingles actually outlasted tin.  Small portions of asphalt were missing in some people’s houses as opposed to large sections of tin. 

In this region, these storms always come from the West.  Have as few windows as possible on the west side.

More people will watch you work than help you work. 

People will come in and try to take your stuff.  We piled junk on the side of the road that was destroyed.  People had the gall to pick through our stuff as we were piling more onto the pile.  They were making a bigger mess than the tornado.  I explained that if they took one thing they were taking it all.  The woman called me an expletive and gave me the finger.  An officer, who I know, witnessed the whole thing and arrested the lady for hindering a government operation.

People will loot food and vice items quickly.  Convenience stores and grocery stores will be the first looted.

Never ever store anything you will need in an emergency situation in a portable out-building.  It will be scattered all over other people’s yards.

Do not park your camper in your front yard.  It will be in someone else’s yard when you find it.

If your area is impacted by a tornado, be prepared to be hassled.  Even if you know every officer in your town, other agencies will send officers to help and they do not know you.

If the stuff you need is away from your house you might not be able to get to it for many days.  My brother lives on the other side of Albertville.  He was not able to get me the tractor he had borrowed until Sunday afternoon.

Join a Reserve Deputy Program if you can.  The badge will help you get back to your home.

Be on a first name basis with an electrician.  When utility poles are snapped, they will get your house's power lines ready to be re-connected.

The bottom line is that my family has been reading this blog for several years.  If it was not for SurvivalBlog, we might be one of the guys looking for help instead of being ready to get to work.

I took the [November, 2009] blog post regarding generator preparation to heart, so my generator was ready to work the next morning after the tornado struck.

Thank you Mr. Rawles and thank you to those who post here. I am a better person for it. - JEH

James,
I have ten of the DeWalt 18 VDC power tools and four of the batteries. This is an excellent product line that has proven much better than some of the older 12 volt and corded tools that they replaced. The impact driver, circular saw, and reciprocating saw have already proven to be very useful. These are excellent survival tools because you can get a lot of work done with them and a good set of 3 or 4 batteries without needing [120 VAC utility] power. DeWalt sells almost all of their 18 VDC power tools as "tool only" kits that have just the tool without the batteries and charger. These offers are usually about 1/2 the cost of the standard package that includes a plastic case, one or two batteries, and a charger. Once you have your first tool or two, you really do not need to pay for more batteries or chargers. For example, my first DeWalt 18 VDC tool was the hammer drill with a charger and two of the Li-Ion batteries. This cost about $325 at Home Depot. The bare tool version of the same tool costs $139.99 at Northern Tool & Equipment. [Use their Search box with the phrase "DeWalt tool only".] They have some of the best prices and offer free shipping on DeWalt power tools. You can also get good prices on refurbished or reconditioned 18 VDC Dewalt "tool only" buys, for even less, including some like the 18 volt nailer that are not otherwise available as bare tools. - Dr. R.

Dear James:
As a builder, I rely on 120 VAC current for everything, including charging the dozen or so cordless tool batteries that we use daily. I recently purchased a DeWalt 12VDC "car charger" and am in the process of streamlining my cordless tool collection. I have a bunch of different tools and batteries from a variety of manufacturers, which I'm liquidating. In going to an all-DeWalt power tool collection, I now have the ability to charge all of my batteries (regardless of voltage) from a PV panel and voltage- regulated jump pack. I'm sure other tool manufacturers offer car chargers for their batteries too. In an extended grid down situation, I'll still have plenty of operational tools, lights, and a radio as well. Thanks for all you do, - AdamElk

JWR Replies: I agree that cordless power tools made by Dewalt using 18 volt batteries are a good choice, especially if you get the ones with their latest "Nano" lithium ion battery technology. (The lithium ion batteries are still bit expensive for now, but I expect those prices to continue to fall, with the economies of scale. )

Today there seems to be any number of reasons for the average American to turn the corner towards preparedness and being self-reliant.  Back in 1993, I would have been able to give you just as many reasons based on my observations through the 1980s.  Not surprisingly there are twice as many reasons for the average man to not start around that corner.  The reasons I have heard the most include the cost factor and objections to living so primitively.  Simply put: today's average American is too poor and soft to endure hardships like camping, physical labor, and no TV.  These were the same objections we had to overcome and did.

My wife and I woke up one day in 1993 and realized that our children (ages 2-10-10-12) were being raised by godless leftists in the government schools and on television.  We muddled through the rest of the school year and tossed out the television.  Instead, Renee quit her job to homeschool all of our boys. This was decided over several weeks and Renee had some doubts as to her ability, but in the end she made the commitment and I committed to supporting her as best I could. We chose to use the A Beka books for most of the curriculum. Having made this decision, it was about a year later that we realized the taxes we were paying went to very few services we used.   This started me down the path of finding a rural home with lower taxes and more opportunity to raise animals and a garden. We had envisioned a log home on a mountainside sloping to a meadow with a river running through. Right about then I lost my job.  It had been our plan to make these changes with the money I had from my income in the building industry but losing the job certainly put a damper on the plans.

Not wanting to continue with the old ways, we pushed forward. As it happened, I lost my job in the spring of 1993. That summer we sold almost everything we owned at the local flea market. Sometimes we were just exchanging things. A lawnmower for a grain mill, a bedroom set for a rifle, but for the most part we saved as much as we could. Selling the house didn't bring any real money to the table and what we did have was soon spent on a used school bus ($1,500) that was going to carry us all west to our promised land.  I rigged a tow bar behind our bus for our Jeep and one day in the fall with four boys, two dogs, and less than $3,000 we headed west.

I could write a chapter on our adventure/nightmare traveling but I’ll save that for another time. With less than $500 left, we ended up in northern Arizona in early January 1994. We had picked up a GP Medium tent with an arctic liner and set it up for the first time during a snow storm at a campsite in the national forest. Seeing a concrete picnic table at one site, it was my thought that we should place the tent over the table so we could have the comfort of the table inside. Seemed like a good idea to me. After directing the boys at holding the tent posts for about an hour we finally had the tent set up. My notion of enjoying the table was soon lost when Renee pointed out that the cold concrete table and benches just sucked the heat right out of us as we sat.  Live and learn.

We learned fast and within a few months, my boys and I could set up a GP Medium with liner and two woodstoves quicker than a company of soldiers. Staying in the national forest (with a 14-day maximum stay) saved us what little money we had left. It also helped that we had more privacy in the forest. It turned out that we always seemed to have a crowd gather around when we set up camp. The GP Medium tent is 16’ x 32’ in size and I guess seeing a man and four boys set it up was worth watching. After the work was done and the stoves were burning we’d often have someone knocking at the door post. Sometimes it was another survivalist living in the forest looking for a home cooked meal and sometimes it was just the curious having never seen a tent that big. 

One day while in the forest at a camp we had just set up. I told Renee that I was headed into the woods to do my business. I found a spot over a small hill and a stand of boulders from the site. It was private enough and there was a nice view of a small canyon just another 20 feet away. I was in the position with my paper and trowel in the ready, just enjoying the beauty of the canyon and forest. As I was there I got the strange feeling I was being watched. It really bothered me to the point I had to start scanning the surrounding area to see who was there.  As I looked across the canyon I saw a large timber wolf standing still and staring right at me.  I quickly jumped up and pulled up my jeans, turning just in time to see the wolf jump off the edge of the canyon and head towards me. Leaving my paper and trowel behind as I leapt over the stand of boulders, I saw the wolf crest my side of the canyon and knew it would be on me in an instant. Not turning back again I ran into our camp yelling, “Wolf! Wolf! Get my gun!”  Renee was at the tent door with my GP100 as I reached her. I grabbed the gun and turned expecting to see the wolf, but there was nothing. Once Renee and the boys stopped laughing at my adventure I vowed not to leave camp again without my sidearm.  Later, a ranger came by our camp to log our stay. I asked him about the wolf and was told he was a regular to that part of the forest and wouldn’t hurt anyone. Right.

Renee was the first to find work and I took up keeping the camp, cooking meals, schooling the boys, and seeking a place to start our home. 
It didn't take long to find affordable land in Arizona. The boys and I hiked for many miles on an old ranch land until we found a 50-acre place in the middle of an old 60,000 acre ranch. It was a bit larger than a ¼ mile square and had several good house sites. Further, it was "for sale by owner" and I was able to negotiate a "delayed settlement", "owner financing", and the "right to occupy".
This allowed us to set up camp on the property and save enough money to make the down payment in four months. Not having to deal with breaking camp every two weeks was a great feeling. The boys got extra freedom to wander and I could put in more permanent fixtures at our camp. We soon sold the bus and bought an old pickup truck along with a trailer for hauling water to our property.
Renee continued working while I kept up with the boys and started planning our house. Once we settled on the property, I started cutting the best looking junipers for the post foundation of our cabin.  I had found a solid outcrop of rock just below a cow path along one of the hillsides near the center of the land.  I dug down only a few inches to expose the rock that would support the cabin. Not having to dig any farther down than that, I placed the chainsaw cut juniper tree posts right down on the rock and started the house. Almost every weekend the boys and I spent searching for materials for the ranch cabin.
For the most part we used what we could off the land in timber and stone and paid cash for the rest. We were lucky to have found a saw mill close by. It was an old mill and the owner knew what he was doing. He sold us all the rough-cut ponderosa pine we could haul at a time.  

Once under roof we began our search for a woodstove. This was one of my biggest concerns. Renee had given me specific details on what was acceptable after many burned fingers and smoking pot holders. The stoves we had been using in the tent were the standard GI issue stoves. When they burned they burned hot, sometimes cherry red.  They were also not an airtight stove that would keep a fire all night unattended. And while they were relatively affordable, the stove we now needed was always expensive.  One day while in the big city 75 miles away from our ranch, I noticed a metal recycling scrap yard. High on a pile of iron was the stove I had been looking for! It was a Timberland Double Door with a large flat top surface suitable for cooking on! This was God looking out for Renee (or me). I was ready to drop a large sum of money on this right there. To my surprise, they only wanted the going rate of scrap iron per pound (less the weight of the fire bricks) for the perfect stove.  We later added a kitchen addition to the cabin with a standing pilot propane oven but the Timberland stayed on as the primary heat source for the home.

While building we used the water trailer as our water storage as well. Once the cabin was finished Renee hinted that she wanted running water in the kitchen sink. Being off grid with no well I had to come up with a workable solution.  We bought a 2,500 gallon water tank at a ranch supply store. Placing this tank on the hill where the bottom was above the height of the kitchen faucet I ran 2” pipe off the tank to the outside wall of the kitchen.  This gave us excellent water pressure to the faucet entirely gravity flow. Hot water for showers and dishes was heated by both the woodstove and the kitchen propane stove. Later, we added a propane instant water heater to the system.

Showers were accomplished in a shower house we built off the cabin. A wood decked walkway off the rear led to a small building with deck floors and a hook at the ceiling. At first we had a canvas military water bag with a large daisy shower head. The heated water was carried out and poured into the bag. We could take as long a shower as two gallons of hot water would allow. 

Being "off-grid" meant that, aside from the chainsaw, the boys and I were using only hand tools to build our home.  We could not afford solar power or generators until much later and for the most part we lived as early Americans did. We worked during the day, slept at night, used oil lamps when needed, heated with a woodstove, and had an outhouse for you know what. The only real luxuries we enjoyed those first years were a propane grill and our portable radio.  For nighttime entertainment as a family we listened to the AM radio shows. The boys enjoyed listening to KFI out of Los Angeles and their Radio Classics like The Shadow and The Jack Benny Show. During the day we hunted, killed rattlesnakes, and searched for arrowheads.

At one point Renee quit working and took up running the ranch while I worked locally where ever I could. Renee started a small garden that kept us in tomatoes and peppers to cook up with the average 18 eggs a day that our 24 chickens gave us. Her 30 goats supplied enough milk for everyone and all the cheese we could eat.

As the money came in we added on and upgraded and eventually got to solar panels and a generator. We even had one of the first satellite uplinks for Internet connection from our off-grid ranch.
It should be said that our sons are all men now. Two of them still live out west after going to local universities and the oldest is now out of the US Army, having gone to West Point. Our choices were not always the right choice but they were ours to own. I am proud of the job my wife did homeschooling our sons and while three of them do not actively live a survivalist’s life, they all know how to.

We are still survivalists. We sold our ranch and moved back east several years ago after staying out west for about 14 years. It became clear to us that water is everything for survival and the west has too many water issues. The ranch sold quickly to a California family looking to get out of their situation and into a better life. The lessons we learned have made us stronger and more ready to take on what's coming. The funds from the sale of our ranch bought us a 100-acre mountain farm sloping to a meadow with a river running through. Renee and our youngest son helped finish a modest cabin with solar power, and as soon as I can I'll be building that log home we had envisioned.

Jim:
The 12 volt DC lead-acid batteries employed in most readers' vehicles, power storage systems and backup supply systems are expensive, have finite life spans and are a critical link in the timely operation of
equipment required to respond to short term and long term grid-down situations. Aged batteries become unreliable, but are difficult to keep in a state of readiness and when deemed "spent" their replacement puts a drain on already limited financial resources.

Most people have battery chargers and the know-how to use them in an effort to keep older - or infrequently used - batteries in a charged state so they can be relied upon when needed. This is, however, time
consuming and the unpredictability of battery depletion, through sulfation and other age-related deterioration, makes it difficult to keep your batteries in a constant state of readiness in a cost-effective manner that is not manpower intensive.

If a battery has reached a truly terminal stage of decay, such as failure of inter-cell connections, lead plate breakage or separations and similar situations that require mechanical reconstruction, then the battery should be recycled - it's beyond repair by ordinary mortals. But if the battery is mechanically viable and just badly aged, there is a very good chance that it can be brought back to a very useful state with a device that is relatively unknown but commercially available. I will not claim that it can be made as good as new, but my own results were very satisfying.

A neighbor of mine - a Ph.D. Chemist - came across, researched and subsequently purchased a device known as the Renaissance Charge Rejuvenator. He has already brought a dozen lead-acid 12V batteries back from near useless states. I borrowed the 'Rejuvenator' unit, and attached it to three different 12V lead-acid batteries of my own over a 4-day period. In each case the battery, which had previously been unable to retain a decent charge, was "brought back to life" and held a good charge making it usable for employment as a car battery, a source of energy in an inverter set-up or other traditional arrangements.

The Rejuvenator works best if you use it repeatedly, drawing down the battery between applications. For my own batteries, I used the unit until it indicated "done" (green light), then I placed a load on the battery and drew it down to about 11V, gave it a rest period of about 8 hours and then ran the unit through another cycle to charge it back up and apply a "second dose" of the unit's proprietary repair process.

The Rejuvenator is not exactly cheap at $200 (delivered) but if you bring two "mostly dead" large capacity car batteries (or just one heavy duty tractor battery) back to useful life you've pretty well paid for the unit and after that everything is free. You might consider splitting the cost with a good neighbor or two.

I submit that readers would be well advised to do some research and consider purchasing one of these units to extend the life of the many batteries they already have in use, in order to avoid the high costs associated with replacement. I was stunned when I counted and realized that I have fourteen 12V lead-acid batteries on my ranch. Just as an aside, I have no vested interest in the company that makes the units, and will receive no compensation if this recommendation should result in sales for the Renaissance-Charge Company, though it couldn't hurt if you mention that "Ted from Careywood" sent you. They may be inclined to give some sort of small discount, though I have no control over that. In any case, the cost/benefit analysis seems to make it a good deal, especially for those who use lots of battery banks to avoid dependence on the electrical grid. Best Regards, - Ted

I always assumed that I would relax when I retired from my life’s vocation. I have now retired from working; however, there is no relaxation. As I absorb the news of the day my other life long avocation, family survival preparedness, continues to plague my mind. The current probability of a societal collapse looms ever closer.

I am sure everyone concerned about their family’s safety understands the problems in America . I have been preparing for over 50 years to self sufficient that my family, including children and grand children, would have the ability to survive hard time and hunger.

However, something has happened the last few years that is going mostly unrecognized by family survivalist and all other patriots for that matter. The game has changed! The rules of preparedness are being radically altered, it is imperative to understand the course change. America has shifted from a legal nation to an empire (check your law dictionary).

It is true that my family has been relatively successful over the years in family survival preparedness. We met or surpassed the survival goals set 40 years ago. Suddenly, in the past few years, the game rules have changed causing a change in thinking and direction of survival planning.

We purchased an 1,100-acre ranch (very inexpensively), located on the high desert of the southwest region of the US in 1978. It has a small stream through it and a several hundred gallon per hour spring on the canyon wall. It was ideal for the purpose of survival. I took a full year off work and relocated the family from the city. It was an exciting time of our lives. We lived in a tent at first, until we had built something more substantial in which to live.

My wife had some funny female idea that the babies should take a bath every day; I can still see, in my mind, my 4 and 5 year old girls carrying their little buckets of water from the stream to heat over an open fire so they could meet Mother’s requirement of cleanliness. In the beginning, we washed clothes in an open washtub with water heated over an open fire.

Slowly, we built up a comfortable home that was self-sustaining; it was an evolutionary process that occupied several years. I first placed several 50-gallon barrels on the canyon wall and by mid afternoon, there was ample very hot water for bathing and washing clothes.

The spring was diverted into a six-inch pipe, by the time it dropped a few hundred feet down the canyon wall, we had 140-psi water pressure. We irrigate an entire acre at one time with a ‘big bird’ sprinkler. Of course, that really made the big house livable, once you get water under pressure it is a whole new world for the family.

There were several years of experimenting with water turbines for electricity, however, the cost of installation and maintenance soon become obvious, and that was abandoned in favor a 5 kilowatt motor generator. That became the standby for washing clothes and charging batteries in the winter. Of course, the most efficient rig is a diesel motor generator but that too is expensive in upfront cost and long-term maintenance. A propane driven generator is great to have also, but the escalating cost of propane has proven the old standby gas motor generator proves the most efficient.

Now, under the new rules of survival the possibility of gas, diesel, and propane disappearing is high, so we must think sideways. If you can get the water under a little pressure you can improvise a ‘home grown’ water turbine generator rigged from a purchase ‘Pelton’ wheel and truck alternators. It works well, but requires a lot of attention and the alternator wears down rapidly. Design the system where you can change that component easily.

Over the years, we built up a large solar system that provides the power for the house. In addition, satellite television has become the rage. That is a real blessing for the family. Then we developed the satellite Internet, which expanded our educational and information horizons tremendously. Out here, on the desert solar power is the best way to go, however, the weak link is the batteries. They are expensive and require a lot of attention.

That leaves wind power. Actually, it was not a hard decision; wind is not a player on the desert. But perhaps you will be in a more advantageous location. Wind is good, but it is also very expensive up front and wind turbines have to be maintained continually.

We have several fruit trees matured and producing. We have built up several acres of garden area.

Without the distractions of the city we immediately began home schooling all the children. It was the best thing that every happened. The children did not have to fight their way to and from public school. There were no drugs or teachers unions demanding more money and less work.

I ran out of money at the end of the first year, as expected, so it was time to go back to work. I encountered instant rebellion; no one wanted to return to the city. We had a house with all the amenities of a city home. The result was that I went back to work in the city alone, the family remained on the desert ranch. That was a wonderful decision.

Analytically speaking it was a good project, even the home schooling went well. One on my younger sons is now almost through medical school. We, of course, would never cater to the AMA doctrines but still we needed a doctor in the family so he is becoming a doctor to get AMA teaching plus natural healing concepts. Another son is about half way through his bachelor’s degree, I expect him to become a computer scientist and follow in his father footsteps.

All the children are successful hard workers, attributable to living and working away from the corruption of the city. As far as education goes, I cannot imagine any parent turning their precious children over to such a corrupt system, one that will most certainly turn them into ‘functional illiterates’.

The children are grown now and I have a bevy of grandchildren wanting to go the ranch. And, that brings us to the immediate problem. We did what we did because of our desire to be free and raise our children outside the non-Christian society of the cities. I always had in the back of my mind the possibility of a survival crisis of some sort, however, I was able to function in society as it stood and stands to this point.

I have always been a student of history and eschatology and, believe me; something has changed in our country and society almost overnight. I will not bore you with details of the analysis but please be assured we are the verge of national crash that is going to rival the Roman Empire crash. It is going to happen! Do not believe me, take the time to study and read, your conclusion will most assuredly be the same as mine.

With that in mind, may I make a few suggestion learned from many years of playing this survival games. I think it will surprise some of you.

This crisis is going to be far too severe and to long to get through on your food storage alone. Whoa, does that shock you? Study and think about it for a few moments. It is true you must have as much food storage as possible, but that will not be enough! You will not be able to store enough food to get through the upcoming holocaust. You must have non-hybrid seeds stored away. They will be worth their weight in gold and you will need them to feed your family. You must have enough hard storage to survive a year or so until you can get a family garden going.

I will go so far as to say this, right now, this year start a family garden. If you live in a home, dig up the yard and learn how to grow a garden. If you do not have dirt immediately available, find a spot. Talk to your neighbors, look to you community for a garden spot. If you are close enough to the country, go find a farmer and cut a garden deal. The important thing is to put some seeds in the ground. Growing food in an acquired education and you are going to need to know how to feed your family when your food supply is gone.

Start educating yourself, stay current on news. The people that intend to destroy this country are becoming very arrogant, they sense victory is near. Turn off your sports television, put down your can of beer and learn to read the news, they are telling us in advance, what they are going to do.

I’m fairly new to SurvivalBlog but now it’s an every day read. I wanted to write and share my own journey of preparedness with you and your readers. After living with three and a half million people for about 22 years, a move to the country was long over due. I made the decision to get out of the city back in 1999, when I starting to take things a bit more seriously with all of the talk about Y2K. I was really hoping that something would have happened back then so I could test my skills at being prepared for it. I fear that those skills will be tested in the not too distant future none-the-less. Like you, I grew up in the age of bomb shelters and the threat of nuclear attack. My father was a member of the Civil Defense and I remember a small book that he gave me that showed how to build a fallout shelter in your basement. I always wished he would have done that but it never happened. What a great little fort that would have made for me and my brother, more on that later.

Anyway, I have wanted to live in the mountains since I was 12 years old so I headed out to the Rockies in search of a good bug out spot. I found just the right spot out in the middle of nowhere, 36 acres off a dirt road with the nearest Wal-Mart on the other side of the mountain range. It took another 5 or 6 years to actually be able to make the move. I was fortunate enough to start dating a like minded gal before the move and the minute we started talking about bug out bags and storing food, I knew I found myself a winner. We sold most of my furniture and put my home up for sale and were finally able to make the big move to our retreat property and start getting things situated.

Since we settled down we have been able to stock up on about two years worth of food, medical supplies, gasoline and diesel etc. To date we’ve put up about a ½ ton of wheat and a ½ a ton of corn, beans and rice. More than enough for us and enough to share with those that haven’t or couldn’t do it on their own. I love making things from scratch, so owning a welding and fabricating business has been a huge blessing as we are able to make most anything right here in the shop. And those things don’t necessarily have to be made from metal. We’ve been able to fabricate everything from a well water retrieval bucket made of pvc to our own colloidal silver generator to our bio diesel processing set-up. We converted an old exercise bike into a pedal powered grain grinder and I’ve made a lead melting pot so we can pour our own ammo and start loading it once we set up a loader. We have made a solar oven, solar air heaters for the roof of the shop and will be putting together a solar hot water heater real soon.

The shop has a small lathe, mill, drill press, cutting torch set up, MIG, TIG, Arc, and Plasma machines with two generators, sheet metal bender, notcher, roller, English Wheel and a ton of various hand tools. The hand tools will be a real important part of the operation when there is no more power from the grid and the gas for the generators runs out. We’ll be putting together a Faraday shielded box for some of our electronics in case of an EMP. In this box we will store a spare computer set up, radios, walkie talkies and anything with a circuit board that we don’t want to do without. Granted, the Internet may become a thing of the past but we have a lot of valuable information stored on hard drives and discs, we’re talking thousands of pages of info, and if we have a working computer, then we can access that info when needed.

Speaking of information, our survival library is currently at over 75 books, so at least some of our information is accessible without a computer. A few of the books and magazines that I would personally recommend would be “Dare To Prepare” by Holly Deyo, "The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live It” by John Seymour, The Foxfire Book Series and The Mother Earth News magazine.

Every library should have books on gardening, first aid, holistic medicines and any skills that you might consider learning. It could be hunting or fishing or re-loading ammo or carpentry, canning, raising livestock or whatever peaks your interest. ‘Never stop learning’ is a good motto to hold on to. We try to learn something new every day. And this blog is a great way to do that.

We’ve been able to put in a huge garden, two greenhouses and I take a deer right off the land each year to put in the freezer. Moving here really has been a dream come true. Many of our friends here in the mountains feel the same way as we do about what the future holds and it amazes us as to how many people are getting ready for what’s to come. And yet we only discuss it with a select few from our church.

We have always felt that this was our bug out retreat since we left the hordes, but lately we’ve been wondering what we would do if we had to bug out of here. So, as soon as the ground thaws this spring, we start the next big project, an underground bunker. Dug into the side of our mountain, it will be made out of cinder blocks with the roof made out of ½” thick channel iron, since we just happen to have a bunch of that laying around. Then the entire thing will be buried under about 2 or 3’ of soil and will have two steel doors and even a periscope that I’ve made out of two 90-degree fittings and a couple of mirrors that we found at the hobby store. That way we will at least have a small view of the outside world if we have to hunker down for an extended period of time. Our biggest problem will be concealing everything with the proper camouflage, the tube that the periscope will be housed in, a solar panel to help keep the battery charged, a wire antenna for a radio and one of the steel doors will all be outside of the shelter. I‘m enjoying the other posts on this site of other shelters and would like to see more folks write in with their ideas. There are some pretty talented folks on this site.

My father has been a Ham for as long as I can remember and before too long I will be getting my Ham radio license and that will be another big asset for this whole effort. We’ll even try to install a transceiver in the shelter so we can keep in touch with the outside world.

I’ve read quite a bit on this site about obtaining skills for when TSHTF and couldn’t agree more. One of the first things I did when we got settled in was to join the local Search & Rescue team and Volunteer fire dept. and not long ago I got involved in a Community Emergency Response Team (CERT). The training that I’ve received from each of these has been invaluable. Skills like wilderness first aid, CPR, rock climbing, rope rescue techniques, evacuation, firefighting, use of radio and much more. It takes a lot of personal time but I urge others to make the commitment and learn as much as they can. Being involved in these organizations might also give us a heads up with some advanced information and that could come in real handy.

Another thing we’ve done here is to load up a number of six gallon buckets with all sorts of items that we might need if we had to evacuate the house for some reason. These buckets hold some emergency supplies like food, bottled water, meds, blankets, tarps, rope, fire starters, gloves, socks, knife, flashlight, spare batteries and a small Sterno stove to heat water with. It’s amazing how much stuff you can cram into a six gallon bucket if you do it right. These buckets are buried strategically throughout the property. We keep the locations handy so we can get to the nearest bucket, dig it up and at least have some supplies to work with. In each bucket taped to the lids are the locations of the other buckets. Chances are pretty slim that anyone would find any of the caches by accident, being that all the buckets are buried on our own property and well camouflaged. All of the containers have a good seal around the lid to prevent moisture from getting in and when we bury them we have a piece of plywood cut in a circle that is an inch or two larger in diameter than the bucket. This helps keep the dirt off the lids when we need to dig them up. Each bucket is buried only a few inches below ground level and we stash a small garden shovel nearby underneath a rock, bush or by a tree trunk to make it easier to get the buckets out in a hurry.

As far as transportation goes, we have a gas powered pick up, a diesel pickup and a 1970s-vintage Jeep that has no [microprocessor] electronics in it that would be affected by an EMP. We burn vegetable oil in the diesel during the summer months, the harsh winters here make it a bit too thick to use, even with the additives we put in to help thin it out. I would also suggest that you get a good bike for each family member, know how to tune it up, know what the most common items are that would break and how to repair them. Have the right tools to carry on the bike and know how to use them. Here in the mountains we are a long way from anything and someday a bicycle might be the fastest way to get there. But in a big pinch there is always foot power. You obviously need to have good packs that fit well and a couple of comfortable pairs of hiking boots. You also need to maintain good physical health if you plan on hoofing a lot.

We try to teach others to be prepared as well. Not necessarily for TEOTWAWKI kind of thing but for the more common ‘what if’ scenarios like bad weather, power outages etc. We feel that if we can get our family members to consider those scenarios then they will be able to use that knowledge in case things really do hit the fan. It’s pretty frustrating knowing that my loved ones will not leave the big city and are pretty clueless as to how to survive when things take a turn for the worse. All we can do is pray for them and hope that they get a clue before it’s too late.

I know some readers will be thinking that we have it made being able to have a retreat, vehicles and a business that allows us to fabricate most of the things we need. Much of the emergency items we have were purchased from yard sales and thrift stores. We also barter for a lot of items and services. No doubt we’ve been blessed but it was not easy in any sense of the word. When we first got here we lived in an old camper with no water, shower or toilet for 14 months. We started out with a bucket for a toilet until we could get a port-a-potty hauled in. That was reason for celebration! It took about a year to get our place built and has been an ongoing struggle the whole time. But it has all been worth it. Being out in the middle of nowhere, we had no idea how we would make a living. It took about two more years to make a name for ourselves in the fabricating business. But word of mouth is the best advertisement in tight knit localities like this. We depended on miracles almost every month (and still do) when we didn’t know where the money was going to come from to pay the mortgage. It was a big leap of faith moving here but that’s what we were led to do. That leads me to one more item to mention before I close and that is faith in God. As many others have stressed, getting yourself right with God is the most important thing you can do. Faith has brought us this far and we continue to build our faith as things start to look darker and darker by the day. Pray for each other for knowledge, provision, wisdom and discernment and that we’re on the other side of the fan when it finally hits!!

Jim,
Thanks for the great blog. I have purchased several items from your sponsors and appreciate your screening them for us.

I live in suburban Detroit and am looking to find a small farm. Values are still declining here. Until I can make a move, I'm stuck living in suburbia. Currently I own a cheap gas generator and am looking to upgrade. Should I go with a diesel or tri-fuel generator? Can you suggest some sources? God Bless, - Bob P.

JWR Replies: That all depends on how many hours you intend to run the genset. Because they run at lower RPM, a diesel is preferable for a genset that will get "high hours."

Another factor is the local ordinances on fuel storage. If you cannot legally have a 2,000 gallon diesel tank, but you can have a 2,000 gallon propane tank, then your choice is clear. If ordinances are very restrictive fuel tanks, then you might consider a "plumbed-in" genset, running on utility-piped natural gas. (The best solution, of course is to move somewhere out in the country, where there are no fuel storage restrictions. But I recognize that family and work obligations might preclude such a move.)

Do comparison pricing via the Internet. Generator sales is a very competitive market, especially in the current recession. And, since shipping costs are substantial, it often pays to find a vendor that is fairly close by.

Dear JWR,
On March 14th at 2 a.m. it is the Daylight Saving Time change time in most of the US. So now is a very good time to check some things that you haven't thought about in a while. I'm sure you heard the Public Service Announcements to change the batteries in your smoke alarm and to test them. That is certainly a good thing to do, but is that the only thing you should do this time of year? Grab a pen and paper and let's look around your home.

Batteries and Battery Powered Equipment
Since you're changing some batteries already, this is also a great time to check the batteries in your flashlights, radios, and other battery powered equipment around your home and cars. Turn them on and see if they still work and if you still know how to use them.

First Aid Kit
Hopefully your first aid kit didn't see much use, but you need to check it for expired food and medications, put what needs replacement on your shopping list. If things have migrated to all parts of your home, bring them all back together into one central location. Update any contact information, medication changes or allergies in your document kit.

How Are Your Vehicles Doing?
You probably use your car every day but have you taken the time to really look at it recently?
Check your tire's pressure and look for signs of wear. Use a penny to check your tread depth, if you can see the top of Lincoln's head you need new tires. Look in the wheel wells for signs of rust.
Pop the hood and check the fluid levels and not just the oil and windshield washer but brake, steering and radiator. Look for leaks and worn belts.
Get a helper and make sure all the lights work.

What Did the Winter Do To Your Home?
How well has your house and property weathered the winter? You might want to start another page and call it the Honey Do list.
Check under sinks and around outside faucets for water leaks. Drain your hot water heater. Not only will this clear the buildup of mineral deposits and silt, it will make the hot water heater more efficient and give you more available hot water and faster too, but also more drinking water in case of an emergency.
Look around the foundation, driveway and sidewalks for cracks in the concrete.
Check your foundation, deck and fence for damage or rotting with a pocket knife, particularly around the base of posts. Small piles of sawdust indicate signs of vermin or insect intrusion.
Grab your binoculars and inspect your roof for missing shingles and flashing.
Test your lawn mower, generator and other gas powered equipment and their fuel.

Oh and don't forget to set you clocks the night before. "Spring forward, Fall back."

From the beginning of time, ownership and control of quality farm land and raw materials have been closely associated with wealth creation and prosperity. What can you grow or raise? What resources and commodities do you own and control? How much metal, stone, glass, and wood do you own? Do you have the means, knowledge, tools and skills to produce valuable items from this land and these raw materials?

As America was settled, the pioneers knew very well the fundamentals of non-electric, independence away from the city and just how critical natural resources were to survival. If a parcel did not have fresh water and tillable flat bottom farm land, it was left alone and many years later those same lands are now national parks, national forests, and BLM lands owned by the government.

The primary questions in the minds of those early settlers should also be the same questions in the minds of today’s long-term prepper families. Those questions are simply, “Will this parcel of land support our life?”, and “Do I have ownership and control over the means of production of my food and fuel on this land”?

All along the Blue Ridge mountains, the real estate agents have a phrase they use concerning land value, that phrase is, “the steeper, the cheaper”. It is well known that when you see land advertised as “good hunting land”, that the property really will not support its residents. It is too rocky and hilly, and will not support decent crop production for man and livestock. It is only the last few generations of fearful city type suburbanites and armchair survivalists that have elevated the notion that mountain land remoteness equals security and that is the number one quality to look for in a “retreat”. But mountain living leaves much to be desired in security in many important areas and ways. Never be deluded into thinking that you are safe high up in the woods and that no one will know you are there. It bears reminding everyone of the biblical verse and truth:

Matt 5:14 “A city that is set on an hill cannot be hid”.

Caves and mountains are where you go to if you are on the run, and need temporary shelter from pursuit, just read the Bible and look at history. People only lived that way out of destitute desperation, because everything [needed to support life] must be hauled in on a continual basis in order to survive. Those locations are not an assured long term sustainable solution in many cases. The primary reason is that very little livestock feed can be produced. Be careful that your homestead location does not separate you from the critical means of production, and forever tether you to others for the things you should be producing yourself. If possible then always opt for sustainable systems capabilities in your land purchase decisions as the most important criteria. I encourage forward thinking preppers to expand their retreat and homestead plans to the realities of true societal and monetary system independence. Be willing to transition to an agrarian lifestyle now, and take control over all the means of production of two things in your life: food and fuel. Get to the place where you own the finished goods and things you cannot grow or raise each year such as salt, tools, and ammo. Owning a lifetime supply of salt is something that is not too difficult. You are trying to reach the point where a yearly cycle in food and fuel production is all you have to worry about. This gives you the freedom to stay out of the cities and towns for basic supplies others will be clamoring for; for a great many years. This starts not with the question of how remote is my land from society’s "zombies", but “will my land support life, and do I own all the means of production”? The litmus test is really drawn not at the backyard 4x4 square foot garden level, but rather: can I grow feed for my livestock and my family’s fuel production on this parcel? This is really what the means of production are all about.

It is ownership and control over the means of production of food and fuel that will ensure you and your family of long term survival in a TEOTWAWKI scenario.

Be willing to ask the questions of a pioneer settler with his family in a covered wagon in 1850. “Will this land support life”?, “Can I grow feed for my poultry flocks, dairy and meat animals, aquaculture ponds, and humans”? “Is there a surface fresh water source on this land”? “What about timber and material resources”? Do I have the tools, knowledge, skills, and finished goods for these systems and processes? These are the basics of life and questions that a century ago would have been common knowledge to all, but today’s modern city sheeple prepper wanna-bes too often overlook and discard. Just like we are spoiled with instant everything, we think of every shortcut possible to “instant survival”. At some point you must get to the place where your “retreat” becomes your “mini-farm”. Otherwise, you are simply camping with a can of food.

“Can I produce all my own fuel from this land?” is the second part of the means of production mindset. There are six primary farmstead fuels that wise people should all be in the process of utilizing for their energy independence. They are: wood, charcoal, methane, ethanol, producer gas, and beeswax. Study these fuels, learn all you can and purchase now all the means of production for them on your land. Do not look to the left or to the right. Turn the television off and spend your free time developing these systems and learning the skill sets needed for their production, storage, and use.

Many today will never voluntarily choose an agrarian lifestyle or pursue the ownership and control over the means of production. Instead they will rely solely on commercial packaged food and fuel produced by others who are wise enough to own the means of production. They must haul each load to their retreat, with no hope of new supplies while they keep their city office jobs and suburban comforts till they believe they will “bug out” and be "safe". Lord, help them all is all I can say.

While having the courage to pursue the ownership and control over the means of production instead of mere temporary “preps” is essential, the real challenge for First World urbanites is the shift in practicing and mastering the skills surrounding those means. It takes work and that is a four letter word when everyone wants to be a musician, artist, writer, or celebrity. Choose the agrarian/skills-based lifestyle now even with all the learning curves and mistakes you will make, before you are a fleeing refugee of this empire collapse, and can only wish you would have chosen this path and secured these means sooner. All of the suffering and sacrifice you endure now in becoming skilled and truly prepared, is nothing compared to all of the suffering and sacrifice you would endure later if you are not already skilled and prepared.

I'll close with two more Bible verses:

“Wise men lay up knowledge.” (Prov. 10:14)

“Fools despise wisdom and instruction” (Prov. 1:7)

I'm often asked by my consulting clients about my specific gear recommendations. I've noticed that I repeat mentioning a lot of these, so to save time in my subsequent consulting calls, I'm posting the following list (in no particular order):

• Gamma Seal Bucket Lids. We use these constantly with our bulk storage wheat. rice and beans.
• K & M Industries waterproof match cases. The best, made by a Mom & Pop business
• Gerber Omnivore LED Flashlights. These can use AAA, AA, or CR-123 batteries. Sadly, they're made in Mainland China.
• Maxpedition gear bags. Incredibly tough and well-made.
• Dakota Alert infrared intrusion detection alarms. We leave ours on 24/7/36, here at the ranch.
• Leatherman Wave Multi-Tools. These need no introduction.
• Wiggy's sleeping bags. I've used their FTRSS bags for 20 years.
• Buttstock-mounted ammo/utility pouches. Get one for each long gun.
• Anderson Power Pole D.C. Connectors. These sure beat those enormous cigarette lighter plugs that pop apart unexpectedly
• Save The Rain Downspout Diverters. These pay for themselves just saving water for gardening, and may prove crucial someday!
• Columbia River Knife And Tool (CRKT) Tanto Pocketknives. My everyday carry knife. Buy several, because they will get "borrowed" and never come back.
• Berkey water filters. After 15 years of family camping trips, ours now has a few dings and scratches, but it is still going strong.
• Break-Free CLP . We use it on all of our guns.
• AN/PVS-14 night vision scopes. They cost more, but they're the best.
• Parachute cord. 1001 uses!

James,
To follow up on an earlier letter and your reply, Thermoelectric Generators (TEGs) work by generating power from the movement of heat from the hot side to the cold side of a dissimilar metal junction. An important consideration is that TEGs can become heat saturated or worse if you can melt your TEG, so don't just throw it in the middle of a fire!

I followed a design from "The Boy Electrician" by Alfred P Morgan 1913. It uses German silver wire and copper wire with hammered junctions, there are better combinations but this was easy to get. It would make enough electricity to run a small radio like the kind found on dollar store crank radios or a few LEDs. Modern TEGs are much more efficient and use a solid state Peltier–Seebeck chip. Be sure to buy a high temp solder chip, since the ones used in coolers will melt at much lower temperatures. These solid state devices can also be used with lanterns. In my experiments, I used one attached to a home made brass reflector on a kerosene pressure lantern and produced less than a watt at 3 volts. But several can be ganged [together in series,parallel, or series/parallel arrangements] for higher voltage or amperage. TEG lantern/radios are available.

Shalom, - David in Israel (SurvivalBlog Correspondent in Israel)

James,
Since I have messed with TEGs for some time, I ran across the guys at Hi-Z Technology. Check out the work they and others have done with their product. - Robert, in Nashville, Tennessee

Hello
You folks do an outstanding job of informing those who want to learn! I was just wondering if there was information about homemade thermocouples out there. I was watching my woodburner last night and it has one of those little fans sitting on top that start to spin when they get hot and was wondering if I could find plans to build a bigger version of the thermocouple. I envision something about the size of a briefcase . In a grid down situation this would be set on top the woodburner that would be going for heat and cooking and hopefully produce enough power to run a few lights and charge some batteries etc. Is there anyone who has an information source that could tell me how to go about building this?

Thank You, - Rich N.

JWR Replies: In my opinion thermoelectric generator (TEG) technology has been pitifully under-developed, given its potential for using otherwise wasted heat.

Here is a video of one experimenter's project. And here is a commercial TEG site. I also found a web page for a commercially-built stovetop fan that is powered by thermoelectricity, marketed by Sportsman's Guide.

I encourage readers to do some experimentation with TEGs. Given their irregular voltage output, it would of course be wise to route the power through a charge controller into a battery bank, for later use with a stable output. If nothing else, it will give you the means to trickle charge a few small batteries even when the only fuel you have available is firewood.

Dear Jim,
I have some comments on the comments regarding batteries:

Nickel Iron (Ni-Fe) batteries do indeed have very long shelf and operating lives. But they also have some significant downsides. Similar to NiMH cells (they are not the same) they have a very high self-discharge rate. In some cases approaching 40% per month. If you have a large solar array that is always making excess power, you are all set. But if you are charging with a generator, and have a large bank to keep power available for extended periods, you will waste a lot of the generator's output on self-discharge.

Ni-Fe batteries also do not like high charge/discharge rates, which means you may need a larger bank of them for the same type of service. This effect gets worse as the temperature drops. If you have a big bank, you will also need to waste more energy keeping them charged. Basically, there is a penalty for having your battery bank too big for the application. You would want to make the bank last you no longer than a week or so of typical service, thus limiting the amount of energy wasted to keep it charged.

On the plus side, you can leave the battery discharged for long periods without any problems and they will not freeze (in any sane temperatures). That's good for a little used location. There is only currently one importer in the US that I know of.

There's no conspiracy to keep them out of the market, it's just that most applications work better, smaller or cheaper with lead acid. As the cost of electricity goes up, no one wants to use them for standby applications anymore due to the energy cost with keeping them charged. But as photovoltaic solar power becomes more common, perhaps there will be a revival of the technology.

Regarding lead acid cells with no acid, there are several issues with drying out a new battery for storage. If any acid is left it will cause undesirable changes to the plates. If you attempt to air dry the battery, the air pumped through the battery to dry it out will lead to oxide forming on the plates, ruining the battery in the drying process. There's at least a few patents out there to address some of these issues, but none of them are ideal. Realistically, you would need to discharge the battery, then partially re-charge it, dump and flush the acid and then use inert gas to dry out the plates. Probably not worth the effort, and the required discharge/charge levels would vary based on
interior construction. Not likely to be economical or produce reliable results.

It's too bad that none of the manufactures sell "green" batteries that have not yet been converted, but the required acid mixture and charge cycles to form the plates are most likely a proprietary process that they have no interest in sharing.

You can make your own batteries, but they won't have anywhere near the capacity of a commercial product. Consider that the standard car battery has dozens of square feet of surface area and has been optimized over years of experience. Home made batteries, especially large ones, can lead to seriously unpleasant accidents. Having seen smaller batteries explode due to internal shorts, I would want nothing to do with a 5 gallon bucket of H2SO4 and rolled up sheets of lead.

I'm surprised that no one has mentioned simply not using batteries at all. If you live in a sunny location, one can simply use electricity when the sun is shining or the wind is blowing. Not perfect, but virtually guaranteed to work even after sitting idle for 10 years. Regards, - Cactus

James Wesley;
I found an interesting short video linked at Silver Bear Cafe about Nickel-Iron Edison Cells--a design battery I hadn't about previously. I thought you might enjoy it. Thanks for the web site and all of the information. Regards, - Joe

Sir:
Monday's post mentioned the Nickel-Iron Edison battery. During its evening broadcast on 1-29-10 The Intelligence Report described a method to build your own Ni-Fe battery was discussed in the second half hour of the 8 PM broadcast. It was also mentioned where one could get Nickel without having to resort to melting nickels. At The Intelligence Report's web page, click on "archives" in the left hand part of the screen. Scroll down to 1-29-10 then click on the "8PM" to download the mp3 file.

Great job with the blog! Thank you for the work you are doing. - Mr. C.

Jim,
I have been following with interest over the last several days this thread on batteries and feel I have some information to share. To begin with, the only solution to a long term lead-acid battery bank is to make your own cells. Lead has a perpetual shelf life and oxidizes very little over time if protected. Contrary to the confusion established by the battery manufacturer cartels, both plates begin as simply pure lead (Pb). It is only after the initial charge is applied that the positive plate changes chemically due to the sulfur ion action. While home made cells will not have the high ampacity to pound ratio of commercial cells, they would have qualities most suitable to the long term prepper; namely serviceability and parts replacement. In addition, the positive plates could be made as thick as one wanted to prolong their life span. One could make them in 3 gallon HDPE buckets using standard stud mounted battery posts on the lids. The electrolyte is simply 30% sulfuric acid to 70% water. The plates need maximum surface area exposed to the electrolyte so one must drill many holes or corrugate the lead sheet to increase the surface area. Older plumbing stores still sell large sheets of lead for roof vent stack flashing. Or if one is handy with metal fabrication, a grid plate mold could be fashioned from steel and lead cast into it. Wheel weight lead-alloy will work too. Additional compounds such as antimony are not essential in a home made cell when you have a room full of replacement plates stacked up. They can be either coiled or flat plates. Do not expect the performance of a commercial cell from these, but when sustainability is all important, performance can be compensated for. Just add more cells to the array bank.

However, the real solution to perpetual deep cycle sustainable battery power for the long emergency lies not at all in the lead-acid cell. It lies in the lowly Edison cell. A little known fact is that there are still banks of Edison cells in deep cycle applications today over 80 years old. Edison cell plates are nickel and iron and use lye and water for the electrolyte so they are alkaline and not acid cells. The plates do not corrode over time and they can be stored dry forever before filling and charging. All those nickel [US five cent coin]s that everyone is saving could [conceivably be melted down to provide the material for] the nickel plates for your grandkids batteries if you are wise today. Edison had over 50 patents on these cells and at the turn of the century entire fleets of delivery trucks used these day in, day out hauling massive loads with electric motors running on Edison cells. They were in direct competition with standard oil and big oil plans for gasoline vehicles so they had to be stopped. The electric car industry was eradicated as gas vehicles could go so much faster. Exide eventually bought all the dies and machinery and was still making them until they sold everything to china some years ago. The only importer now from that china plant to the U.S. is a company called beutilityfree.com which is where I bought mine. They only order like 4 times a year and it takes 3 months to get here and they are pricey, but I personally felt the investment was justified and truly multi-generational for my family. Companies like Eveready began several years ago making what was touted as "new technology" and called the cells "nickel-metal hydride" or NiMH as we all know them today. When they first hit the shelves, I just laughed and told my wife, "Look honey Edison cells in AA size". - Dad4Him

Hello Jim -
I took interest in your response to the post by Steven J S "Letter Re: Some Real Life Battery Data" and the concept of storing "dry batteries". From my long and intensive research on this, you are absolutely correct. Finding a true dry battery (one that was not flooded and then emptied) is nearly impossible. Perhaps some other SurvivalBlog readers can provide some help on this topic, but I have found that in order to truly get a dry battery - one that has never been flooded with acid - one would almost have to work at the manufacturing factory or component supply level - i.e. be an insider in the industry. My interest in this topic, as I am sure most of your readers', is in the area of deep cycle and commercial batteries. I do have a small solar generation system, and would love to be able to buy shelf-stable batteries to put up for the future. I find that I get about seven years out of my Trojan L-16s [before they sulfate to the point that they will not hold a charge.] It frustrates me that I can't store extra batteries for future use. Really, most all the companies (Including Trojan) that I have talked to tell me that they can not (or will not) sell true dry batteries to the general public.

So here is the question I have for the chemists out there in your readership base. Would it be possible to buy some freshly manufactured batteries, and then remove the acid yourself and store separately? How difficult is it to evacuate a battery? Can the plates then be neutralized by adding an alkaline solution to stop the small amount of sulfation that has/would take place if the batteries plates were not neutralized? Should the battery then be flushed with fresh water? There has to some way to accomplish this and produce a shelf stable storage strategy for what will become very precious assets in the future. Any help your readers could offer would be much appreciated, and of course, all the safety precautions you mentioned in your first must be strictly adhered to when doing this type of work. Thank You, - Fullclip

Hi Jim,
There are batteries becoming widely available these days with the lithium/iron-phosphate chemistry (different than the lithium/cobalt chemistry in laptop batteries). These lithium iron phosphate (LiFePO4, or LFP) cells were first used in Dewalt brand lithium power tools. The main advantages are a vastly improved cycle life (2,000 - 7,000 cycles versus 500-800 for lead acid and 500-1000 for NiMH), high discharge current closer to lead acid, better deep-cycling performance, they won't explode like laptop batteries and need no maintenance, venting or caustic chemical refills and they operate at almost 100% efficiency. If you topped these batteries off once per year they should remain good for a decade or longer.

The only downsides are the price, which is higher than lead-acid (in Dollars per Amp-Hour) but less than other lithium or metal-hydride batteries. There is also the need for a programmable charger, which can be expensive. The cut-off voltage is unique, unlike lead-acid, NiCd and NiMH batteries, and the batteries will be damaged from overcharging. I've been using a disassembled Dewalt battery pack for my portable radio rig, with this "Dapter" charger. For a house-size battery bank, you could use the Outback Flexmax line of charge controllers, which are programmable from a PC. Most charge controllers support only lead-acid or have fixed settings for only the most common battery types. - Jeff M.

Jim,
The recent article by 'Cactus Jim' got me thinking about a type of battery rarely mentioned, the 'dry-charged' lead acid, where the end-user fills the battery with acid after purchase.

Initial impression is that this type, if kept sealed in a temperature and humidity stable environment, could last indefinitely, only being flooded and charged when needed. Battery acid is stable and does not deteriorate if kept sealed.

Our local NAPA auto parts store stocks small (motorcycle/garden tractor) units and will special order most any size 12v battery. Price is the same as for the equivalent wet-charged units except the acid must be purchased
separately.

If you have any experience with these batteries perhaps you could relate the info to your readers. - Steven J.S.

JWR Replies: Be advised that most of the "just add acid" batteries sold by automotive parts dealers are identical to standard production batteries, but merely "spun dry", after the batteries are factory tested. This leaves traces of battery acid that will cause some sulfation of the battery plates. Also, most of these batteries are designed for engine starting --not true deep cycle duty. But conceivably if you can get dry-condition storage batteries from a battery vendor (such as your local Trojan dealer), then you could leave one of these batteries on the shelf for a couple of decades, add acid, and it would still have a 5+ year service life. In a long-term gird-down scenario, that sure beats the alternative!

When storing carboys of battery acid for this purpose, keep in mind that you' and your helper will need to have the appropriate safety gear, to wit: an apron, heavy rubber gloves, goggles, boots with thick uppers (or better yet, rubber "mud" boots--called "Wellies" in the UK), and a full-coverage heavy long sleeve shirt. OBTW, one trick that my father taught me to keep plastic acid funnels from tipping: Clamp the funnel's lip "tab" in a pair of Vise Grip pliers, to use as a handle.

Battery technology has come a long way in the last 10 years since Y2K. Back in the late 1990s, I stocked various types and brands of batteries for long term storage or use. Batteries ranged from store purchased alkaline, rechargeable alkalines, NiCd, generic deep cycle marine
batteries, gel-cell sealed lead acid, lithium and even the ubiquitous flooded lead acid Trojan T-105 floor scrubber batteries. I wrote dates on all the batteries and rechargeable batteries had logs kept of use and maintenance.

In most cases enough batteries were purchased to allow for a reasonable statistical sampling, thus providing a real level of confidence in the results. Note that the word battery and cell are often used below in singular, even though the same test was repeated multiple times on
different units. All voltages and times are given as composite averages of the tests, removing clear outlier data, such as an obviously failed cells that leaked electrolyte during storage.

10 years later, most of those batteries were still in my possession, untouched (with a some exceptions) and I decided to run controlled experiments on them to see how they fared. Each battery type is discussed by type and brand if applicable. Finally, as technology has
provided for improvements, some additional battery types are discussed that have only received short term testing due to being recently brought to market.

All batteries were stored in 60-to-75 degree F conditions with <50% relative humidity.

Generic Alkaline
These are what you find at most stores on the shelf, having virtually eliminated the old carbon-zinc batteries that were still sold in the 1990s. An extensive selection of all standard sizes was tested, including Energizer, Energizer commercial use (not sold via retail) and
Duracell. The cells offered 2-4 year lifetimes based upon their expiration dates. All were stored for 10 years, with the exception of the commercial Energizer D cells, which were 12 years old at the time of testing.

Several of the Energizer cells (2 out of a lot of 50) had developed leakage failures during storage, in one case contaminating a co-packaged battery. This matches my anecdotal experience with this brand, with several case leak failures damaging equipment that had Energizer brand
batteries left in them for longer time periods (1-2 years). I expect these are design related failures since even newer batteries of this brand leaked, spanning a sample period of five years.

Interestingly, the commercial Energizer batteries, of which I had over 50, did not have a single failure. They also performed slightly better even though they were older. No failures were seen with the Duracell alkaline batteries, but there was a smaller sample available (20 of each
type).

The aged batteries were tested on a constant resistance tester that tracked battery voltage until the cells were completely depleted, to a voltage of 0.2V, which would not provide even the smallest amount of usable light in a flashlight. Initial current drain of approximately
1/20th of manufacturer recommended maximum was used. (12 Ohms for AA cells, 2.75 Ohms for D cells)

The output voltage of the 10 year old batteries started out at approximately 0.1V different from a brand new battery and maintained this difference until the battery chemistry failed, leading to a rapid decline in voltage. For AA batteries, the usable lifetime (to the 0.9V mark) was 18 hrs for the 10 year old battery vs. 22 hrs for a brand new cell. The voltage discharge curves tracked each other with the noted 0.1V difference. At the 18 hr. mark, the old cell dropped to under 0.2V a matter of minutes. The new cell soldiered on, declining slowly from
0.9V at 22 hrs to 0.2V at 27 hrs.

The commercial Energizer cells matched their retail cousins almost identically to the 0.9V cut off. However, they did not exhibit the sharp 20 minute decline to 0.2V once the battery chemistry started to fail. Instead they provided another 5 hours of possibly usable output with a slow decline between the 0.8 and 0.2V marks. This would be indicative of a slightly longer life span in an intermittent on/off usage where the voltage would creep back up to a more usable range during the off cycle.

When batteries were tested at high loads, the 10 year old units showed excessive voltage droop very quickly. This matches with published manufacturer recommendations that alkaline cells should not be used in high current draw applications.

All working cells showed an open cell voltage of 1.4V before being connected to a load.

Conclusions:
Alkaline batteries are usable well beyond their expiration dates.
Alkaline batteries properly stored for 10 years will still provide functional capacity of 75-80 percent with lighter loads such as flashlights and radios.
There will likely be a fallout rate with some percentage of cells showing complete or partial failure during storage. Thus large packs of batteries should be broken up into smaller packs to limit the amount of damage one leaking cell can do and extra batteries should be purchased to take into account such failures.
Batteries sold for commercial use may be built better and will last longer than stuff sold into the general retail market.
If the battery shows a voltage of 1.4V or so after storage, it's still probably usable.

Nickel Cadmium Rechargeable
The entire lot of 1990's era NiCd batteries were found to be unusable, showing shorts or inability to take a charge of any capacity. This technology has drastically improved over the last ten years, although such batteries are still of limited long term storage use due to rapid self discharge and not having a design criteria for long life. There are also many variables that affect the durability of NiCd and NiMH, both from a cycle life and long term storage standpoint. My anecdotal evidence points to cheap batteries not lasting long (as little as 0-3 months for cheap no-name brand packs) and expensive brand name cordless tool packs still going strong after eight years of light use. The well known self-discharge and memory problems are still issues with this chemistry.

Conclusions:
Not suitable for long term storage.
Expensive portable tool packs might have long life spans with periodic use and charging.
Probably acceptable for daily use, but there are better alternatives available in NiMH.
Cheaper than other rechargeables.

Rechargeable Alkaline (no longer made)
A group of Eveready rechargeable alkalines were also tested. This technology was produced for a few years but never really saw commercial success. The batteries had low self discharge, thus being ready to go after longer storage periods but could also be re-charged. The recharge
cycle was unusual in that if the battery was heavily discharged it's recharge cycle life was very short, only 16 cycles or so. With shallow discharges, the battery could be "topped off" hundreds of times. Looked like a perfect fit for long term storage, provided that could be topped
up once a year.

The 10 year old AA and D cells were fully charged before testing. All fell significantly short on both voltage and life, even compared to 12 year old alkaline cells. Starting voltage was only 1.2V and within minutes was 0.2V lower than the 10 year old cells. The cells chemistry failed at the 22 hr mark vs. 28 hours for the 10 year old cells.

Conclusions:
Be careful with new untested technologies.

Nickel Metal Hydride
No Nickel Metal Hydride (NiMH) cells were used in the long term test due to their very high self discharge and the technology being in it's infancy in the 1990s. However, this chemistry deserves mention due to some recent innovations. Although NiMH batteries have higher capacity and most of
the memory effect has been overcome, they continue to suffer from very high self-discharge. A fully charged battery can be at 50% in under a month of sitting idle. In general, the higher the capacity of the cell the faster the self discharge.

Recently a new internal construction was designed that allows NiMH cells to retain up to 80% of their initial charge up to year later .[JWR Adds: These are also sometimes marketed as "Low Self Discharge (LSD)" batteries.] I have been extensively testing these over the last year with very good results. No outright failures to date, good capacity compared to alkaline batteries, very good tolerance for high current drains such as radio transmitters and good shelf life.

These cells are often sold as "pre-charged" or long shelf life NiMH. Duracell Pre-charged and Eneloop are the two most commonly available brands.

Conclusions:
A technology to watch, may replace alkaline batteries in many applications.
Long term life span is currently unknown or unpublished.

Lithium primary batteries
Non-rechargeable lithium batteries are the king of long term storage. They have been around for decades and are well understood, with devices still working 20 years after installation. There are many different chemistries that are used, with the actual type not disclosed to the consumer, so be aware that not all lithium batteries will have long shelf life.

The CR123A battery size almost always comes in a chemistry that will allow for 10+ year storage without a problem. I'm still using up my 12 year old batteries and even in bulb style Surefire lights they last so close to a new cell that it's hard to tell the difference. No tests were
performed on this stock of batteries since they are so well understood and quantified.

I had a limited stock of AA lithium cells from the 1990s and they too appear to be at 80+ percent capacity. When they reach 15 years I will test a few and see if the group test should be put at the 15 or 20 year mark. Note that the 1.5V batteries use a different chemistry than the 3 volt CR123, thus they may have a shorter life span, but that remains to be seen. At 10+ years, they are still the top choice with the exception of price.

Conclusions:
Low weight.
High capacity and high current.
Best for low temperatures.
Extensively verified 10+ year shelf life.
Available in AA, AAA, CR123A and various non-consumer sizes.
Industrial/commercial availability in 9V but metal body versions are slightly oversized.

Lead acid gel cells
Gel cells are a type of truly sealed lead acid battery. They are commonly used in backup devices such as emergency lights and alarm systems. Typically seen as 6V or 12V batteries with connecting tabs, but available commercially in over a hundred different sizes, shapes and
voltages.

The small batch (5 units) of lead acid gel cells I had from 1999 all died various deaths over the last 10 years. All were 12V 7Amp Hour packs of the commonly available 5.94 X 2.56 X 3.70 size. All showed degraded performance (over 10% capacity loss) after the 5th year, even packs that
were 100% unused and one pack that was under a constant charge. All were trickle charged at least once a year to 13.8V to make up for any self discharge and four of them were used intermittently for various purposes from charging a motorcycle battery to powering GPS in aircraft. None were
ever subject to severe discharge cycles or overcharging.

Each cell was charged and then test discharged to 50% once a year to check remaining capacity. Charging was done by constant voltage to 14.2V and discharge test was done at 1/20 capacity, constant resistance to 50% state of charge, as indicated by voltage.

At the seven year mark the first cell had a complete failure. The last unit, which had been installed in a trickle charging backup application failed this month.

Conclusions:
Realistic safe life span of five years.
After the five year mark, sudden failures may take the battery out of service without warning.
Require yearly charge maintenance due to self discharge.
Very high current capacity, allowing for use to minimally re-charge much larger lead acid batteries.
Often used inside of car self-jumpstart packs and for backup batteries in alarms and lighting.

Flooded lead acid batteries
I'm going to skip right past car starting / dual use batteries as they are 100% unsuitable for any long term application. While I have had certain vehicle starting batteries last eight years, there has never been any consistency between brand, size or use. I consider any car start battery over 2 years old to be suspect. The fact that they can be seriously degraded or destroyed by a single deep discharge makes them worthless in any situation where one must depend upon them. Even the consumer branded "deep-cycle" batteries are suspect from my experience.

The long term test batteries encompassed two large deep cycle "maintenance free" Energizer batteries from Wal-Mart and a bank of 24 Trojan T-105 6V industrial units. All were maintained as they would be in an industrial setting with water level, specific gravity and voltage checks each month.

The Trojans were connected to a grid-tied solar system and kept at peak charge for the first three years of their life. They were more heavily discharged at least once a year during power outages or for testing. In 2002 the system was converted to use the batteries each day for a period
of 6 hours, with cycling to 25-50% depth of discharge each day. Although their capacity is currently at about 60% of rated and there has been one hard cell failure in the bank, they continue to function.

The deep cycle batteries from Wal-Mart didn't make it past two years. They were used a few times a year to power tools and lights through an inverter. Note that "maintenance free" often means that there is just a slightly larger reservoir of water and acid in the battery. If you want
to try and use these, cheap batteries you should pop off the top caps with a screwdriver and re-fill the water just like any flooded lead acid battery. I consider any such off the shelf consumer batteries as a poor choice and false economy compared to a commercial battery such as the
Trojans.

Conclusions:
Buy true commercial/industrial batteries.
They cost more, but even my bottom of the line T-105s lasted five times longer than the cheap "deep-cycle".
Flooded batteries require maintenance (water & charging) or they will fail.
Note: Flooded batteries make hydrogen gas and a fine mist of sulphuric acid when being charged. These must be vented to prevent explosions and corrosion of battery terminals other any nearby items.

AGM
Absorbed glass mat (AGM) batteries are a type of true maintenance free lead acid battery. They have no ports to add liquid and will re-combine any generated gas internally. The military and aircraft industry use this technology due to low self discharge (1-3% per month) and no liquid to
spill.
They have only recently become widely available, both in starting applications and for deep cycle use. My actual test time with them has been limited to only two years.

I have three units in starting applications. All are in vehicles that sit for extended time periods (6-12 months), but then get used frequently, thus creating a cycle of many starts followed by long periods of inactivity. I have had one internal cell failure on the most used
battery in it's first year. The two others have worked perfectly, allowing me to start a car that had sat idle for six months as if I had been driven the previous day.

One unit was subject to a severe discharge, showing less than 3V when disconnected. The unit was charged overnight on a commercial bulk charger and then load/capacity tested back down to 10V. All indications were that the battery suffered no damage and it was returned to starting
service.

Current specifications for heavy industrial AGM batteries and accelerated life tests indicate life spans of 20+ years even under heavy use. This would not seem unrealistic given that old industrial telecom backup batteries are often sold after 20 years of service with buyers reporting acceptable capacity of these 20 year old batteries.

There are many cheap imports being labeled as AGM. As it's difficult to tell the difference between a gel-cell and AGM battery from the outside, stick with brands that have been making AGM for commercial use.

Conclusions:
Expensive.
May be the best longer term / large capacity battery technology if weight, space and price are not an issue.
Stick to name brand and industrial battery makers.
Heavy industrial AGM batteries are very expensive but will offer a real 20+ year life.

Contact Corrosion
When batteries are placed inside and object that is subject to motion, and left there for extended periods of time, there is the strong possibility that atmospheric oxidation various types of corrosion will occur. Basically the contacts will become dirty and poor overtime,
leading to the dreaded weak or intermittent flashlight output that magically restores itself when you bang the light a few times. Even sealed flashlights will develop this problem, especially if subject to temperature cycles or vibration, such as storage in a car.

This can be addressed in several ways. The batteries can simply be replaced every year. The contacts can be gently cleaned once a year or whenever low output is noticed. Never use an abrasive to clean contacts, as you may scrape away any protective coating that has been
plated on. Coatings such as gold, silver or nickel are often very thin. The contacts can be safely cleaned by rubbing with with a pencil eraser or clean sheet of paper. The batteries contact areas can also be cleaned in this fashion. Finally, you can place fabric or paper barriers between the batteries and the contacts to prevent metal to metal contact until you want to use the device. Note that this can be useful if you have devices such as radios that slowly drain the battery even when powered off. Some newer electronics use solid state ON/OFF switches or run a clock or memory retention device from the battery, thus slowly draining it. You will want to verify that any any stored settings on the device are saved even without a battery present before disconnecting the battery in this way. If the settings are stored for two weeks, it should be okay to leave the battery out indefinitely.

Dear Editor:
With regards to the battery powered carbon monoxide (CO) detector, I just want to second that. When my family went through the Nov. 2007 ice storm that took out the power to half of Oklahoma, we were running off our generator for two days. The first night I put it outside, but close to the house to help shelter it from winds. Our CO detector went off in the middle of the night. We ended up having the fire department come out and check things. It was determined that the CO came in through either the dryer vent, which was close to where the generator was, or through the attic. Our home was built in the 1960s and has attic vents on the sides. We ended up moving the generator about 10 feet farther away from the house and didn't have any problems after that.

We've also found that one of the plastic kid pools works well with some duct tape to provide a temporary shelter for a generator in case of rain. Thanks for running the site, it's a wonderful resource. - Chad in Texas

James;
I really enjoyed reading "Lessons Learned from an Ice Storm", by G. in the Zarks. I went through a similar experience when I first moved to the hills, and resolved to buy a generator so I wouldn't lose all my perishables (not to mention my mind).

Connecting the generator to the home electrical system was easy enough: simply purchase a transfer switch or a "double throw switch" or a "break before make switch" to the tune of about $200 bucks at any contractor supply house. These handy devices are mechanical switches that route your generator power directly to your home electrical system, and physically separate this source of power from commercial power, thereby preventing the generator's electricity from feeding back into the power company's lines and injuring their linemen trying to restore the system after a power outage. Plus, you don't have to worry about tripping over all those pesky extension cords running to your refrigerator or freezer or whatever.

Next, hire yourself a licensed electrician to install said switch. This cost me under $200, but this was over 10 years ago, so YMMV. Knowledgeable, experienced electricians able to do this work are common in the Ozarks, as many make their living installing transfer switches on chicken houses.

When I bought my generator, all I could afford was a 6,500 watt gasoline-powered screamer. I wish I could have bought something bigger and better (read: diesel), but just couldn't come up with the bucks. Consequently, I am unable to power everything in my (unfortunately) all-electric house simultaneously. This necessitates careful load management. For example, I can run a couple of lights,my well pump and hot water heater at the same time, so hot showers are possible. Once showers are done, the well pump and water heater circuits are turned off and the refrigerator or freezer or what ever else needs doing are turned on.

Not the best situation, but until I can come up with the money to buy a larger generator, it sure beats sitting in the dark and cold praying the power comes back on soon. - L.H.

Mr. Rawles:
Re: The article "Lessons Learned From an Ice Storm, by G. in the Zarks" in the Friday, February 5th posts of SurvivalBlog, can I offer the some lessons I've learned in 40+ years as an Ozarker?

First, I listened and learned as much as I could from the fast-dwindling group of Ozark natives when I moved here. Second, I learned to watch the weather and know something about it. I didn't waste my time with the media weather female meteorologists or guys outstanding in the rain. I looked at the weather maps, remembered my years of experience here, and the stories told me by those whose experience preceded arrival of power lines and pavement. About 8:00 the morning the big ice storm was to hit the Ozarks, I committed to not being here when it did. Experience told me I'd be iced in for some time and the come-latelys would be in the ditches or otherwise draining the resources of our overtaxed and under-staffed sheriff's deputies, volunteer fire, and EMT crews.

It took me just two hours to load up and be on the road in my 16 year old conversion van, further converted to a self-sufficient home on wheels kept well stocked. That included preparing the house for what was ahead too. RV antifreeze in all drains and traps including washing machine and dishwasher, drain the water lines and shut off the electric water heater. Since the house is primarily heated by wood, two electrical strips were left on at low level to keep the inside above freezing. Six inch walls and a modest size make my house easy to keep above freezing and at adequate food storage levels, even in below zero times.

I called my sister-in-law, who lives a few miles away, and told her to drop by when conditions allowed to clean out the refrigerator as appropriate, and check for damage from trees in my 10-acres of hardwoods that surround and hide the house. She did, about a week later when the others who live down my road had cleared a path. The storm had given a war zone background to the beautiful mountains and valleys, but nothing hit either my house or two metal-clad outbuildings. A melted quart of ice cream was the worst clean-up problem.

I met the leading edge of the storm about 75 miles south of home, on the crest of our mountain range, where ice began appearing on the antennas on the van. I was out of danger on the flat land another 25 miles south and headed toward Texas via the shortest and fastest route. Once there and rested up after an overnight in a state Hospitality Center parking lot, I began a leisurely 30 days in the Lone Star State's state parks and other favorite and cheaper Texas camping places. With middle seats removed, my van contains a bed, 40-quart chest-type Engel 12 and 120 volt refrigerator with efficient rotary compressor. I can cook on either microwave or propane stoves. There's a Porta-potty tucked under the table holding the microwave, and food, water, coo ware and other
necessities in cabinets made from Sauder kit furniture units all bolted together and anchored to the mounts that held the middle van seats. Plastic storage units fit elsewhere for other supplies. Solar power panels, discreetly mounted inside the luggage rack on the roof to be invisible to any but someone climbing the van's ladder, keep the refrigerator going through a deep cycle battery. The 190 watt solar system also powers a 750 watt modified sine wave 120 volt power supply that runs the microwave for limited cooking such as my 2-minute oblates, 60-second brown and wild rice and meals. The 120 volts can run the laptop computer's TV module when TV stations are in range. Its own batteries handle e-mail. Some Texas State Parks are sources for free Internet hookups.

The van also is outfitted with three amateur radio and two scanner radios and antennas, to keep friends advised of my whereabouts beyond cell phone range or need, and keep me appraised of what is going on around and above me.

What I've learned from my resourceful and self-sustaining Ozark native friends is not to rush out and stock up after the first warning from the Weather Channel but to be ready to adapt to what ever may be coming, and to know if and when it is coming by experience, monitoring the real news sources of public service and other early warning media.

"Lessons learned from an ice storm?" Really be prepared. Prepared in priority. Power outages, winter storms and summer tornadoes or hurricanes, New Madrid acting up, heat, cold, rain or snow; I can ride them out or bug out in hours or less. Financial collapse, civil unrest, madness spawning something else; look for me gone in these less-likely but slower moving crises. I'll be out there somewhere, identifiable from the next vehicle only by license plate, if you happen to come upon me camping or rolling down some highway or back road. - Vern M.

Dear Editor:
The Oklahoma Ice Storm of 2010 is now melting away and as usual there were lessons learned.   Many of these should have been “known” before but we are never as prepared as we should be.  In that vein I am going to rehash several things that went right, a few that went wrong, and others that we can improve on the next time that “life as usual” is not.

First, the setting: I live in Southwestern Oklahoma and have been here for almost three years.  About January 22nd we started getting word of an impending ice/snow storm scheduled to hit on about January 28th.  As the storm came together we received updates that refined the details.  The reports of January 27th were remarkably accurate to what we would receive as well as the specific times that each type of precipitation would start to fall.

In our town it started to rain at about 7 a.m. on January 28th.   As the temperature dropped that rain froze on metal objects, then on trees and plants, and finally on roads.  At approximately 3 p.m. the rain changed over to sleet and ice pellets and by 9 p.m. we were getting snow.  Unfortunately an inch+ of ice and two inches of sleet/ ice had already destroyed many trees and power lines (both the small distribution lines in town and the major transmission lines into town) were down.
 
Electricity went out about 11 a.m. and was restored by 3 p.m.  It went out again at 4 p.m. and would remain off at our house for the next six days.  This power outage was universal for every house in town and every town within a 30 mile radius.  I should mention that throughout the storm we had full water, sewer, and natural gas service.  There was concern at one point that the sewers would back up, (the sewer lagoons are at an elevation where the sewage has to be pumped to them) and those concerns brought about the possibility of the city turning off the water to prevent sewer backup but power was restored before this eventuality.

Second, the good news list.  Now that we are settled into what we hope is our last home, we keep on hand sufficient food to last for approximately six months.  With reasonable rationing we could go even longer.  We have a good rotation system and keep on hand about four months worth of food that we eat every day and two months worth of emergency type rations.

We enjoy camping and backpacking and have all the equipment to do both activities year round and be comfortable.  This includes lighter weight stoves, packs, tents and sleeping bags and water purifiers to campsite sized Coleman cook stoves, lanterns, Dutch ovens, tents, cots and heavy sleeping bags.  While most of this equipment was not used it was comforting to know that if the situation continued to deteriorate, that we could adapt.

We bought a standard frame house with brick veneer when we moved to Oklahoma which is approximately 35 years old.  We haven’t spent money on kitchen, bathroom or carpet upgrades but we have put 20 inches of blown insulation throughout (to include over the garage and the porches) and we replaced all of the original double pane aluminum frame windows with energy efficient vinyl frame windows.  Realizing that it is possible to do better, we were still pleased that during one seventeen hour period without any heat source in the house, outside temperatures from 17 to 26 degrees, and 20 mph winds, the temperature in the house only dropped five degrees from 67 to 62.

The house has two hot water heaters-one electric that services two bathrooms and one natural gas that services the kitchen and laundry room.  It was very easy to take hot water to the bathtubs and perform personal hygiene.  Showers were courtesy of the two gallon watering bucket that my wife uses to keep the sun room flowers fresh.

The regular phone system remained operational throughout the storm and recovery period.  However, folks that only had cordless phone systems could not access the lines.  In some cases phones with integrated answering systems could dial out but the phones would not ring if the ringer depended on plug in electricity.  We have one of the old style rotary phones that works perfectly on the telephone line current and were able to send and receive calls.

We topped off all the vehicles and gas cans a couple of days before the storm.  I anticipated trouble getting more fuel trucks to town.  What I did not think about was the gas station could not pump gas without electricity anyway.  Ultimately one old fashioned gas station in town hooked up a generator and could run receipts in his office.  Credit cards did not work so cash or an established charge account with the owner was the way to do business.
 
Third, what we can do better.  We have a lot of candles.  I have not done an inventory but there are boxes of them.  We discovered that candles that are about an inch in diameter are optimal.  Larger candles, 2-1/2 to 4 inches burn down in the center and leave a candle rim that blocks light. Ultimately they just shine a small circle of light on the ceiling.  We also learned that the best candles put out very little light.  We have a couple of antique oil lamps but they are for decoration and did not have wicks in them.  We are going to acquire more oil lamps, maintain them, and keep sufficient oil on hand for 4-to-6 months.

In the brain dead category we have Coleman stoves and lamps that are dual fuel.  Unfortunately I gave all of our Coleman fuel to the Boy Scouts so we failed in “Being Prepared”.  We shifted to our propane stoves.  I need to point out that these stoves should not be used indoors.  We cooked outside on the patio.  When we do get around to remodeling the kitchen I am going to replace the stove top with a gas appliance.  While we did not bake, we did have the capability by placing a Dutch oven on the propane stove.

In the final analysis we look at the Oklahoma Ice Storm of 2010 as being the most lavish camping trip that we have ever been on.  We never felt as though there were any true hardships and after the initial storm period we spent a lot of time outdoors enjoying the snow and volunteering at the local Red Cross warming/feeding center doing whatever was asked of us.  We look forward to implementing a few changes and the next opportunity to test our preparedness.


Hello!
I am new to reading your blog and love it! I wanted to comment on the ice storm post. I live in Oklahoma so we know all about these ice storms. I started reading a lot of blogs on prepping and storing food during the holidays. I decided to make a menu and strict food budget so I could afford to buy extra food for long-term storage. I bought a month's worth of food this January. I also bought my first water storage container - a 7 gallon Aqua-Tainer from Wal-Mart. Last year, I had a gas heater mounted on my dining room wall, preparing myself for the next inevitable ice storm. A few days before the storm, I bought emergency candles and I am so glad I did! We didn't lose power (thankfully!), but our little town was cleaned out of generators, candles, Coleman stoves, propane, kerosene....everything. I went to Wal-Mart a few days later (when power was still out all over the county) and the shelves were completely empty in some areas. That was a wake-up call to me. In just a few short days, stores can be emptied. It is wise to not wait until the last minute. I am a single mom and a teacher and I know how difficult it is to come up with extra money to help become better prepared. I am doing a little each month and will sleep soundly knowing that my kids will be warm and fed if anything happens. By the way, the ice storm hit seven days ago and people are still without power.

Thanks for the wonderful blog and such useful information! - Kay in Oklahoma

While watching the local weather over the last few days, it has become apparent that a winter storm is heading for our part of the world, bringing with it the distinct possibility of not just snow, but significant amounts of ice. As I pondered this, it brought to mind our recent experiences with ice storms over the last few years, most notably in January 2007. I thought some of our “lessons learned” were worth sharing with others.

We had been blessed with several years of reasonably mild winters leading up to the 2007 storm. Unfortunately, the good times often seem to lull people into a state of complacency, characterized by an artificial sense of well-being and overall lack of awareness. This is, of course, what the late Colonel Cooper referred to as Condition White.

I freely admit to being somewhat guilty of the “All is Well” syndrome where the weather was concerned also. While I have spent my entire adult life trying to make sure my family is prepared for the myriad of difficulties we experience, I must confess that when the weather man said “Chance of ice,” I didn’t really take him all that seriously. I failed to properly evaluate the nature of the threat. In that particular instance, I didn’t think through the potential ice storm scenario to any great degree, because I considered myself and my family to already be prepared for this event. At the very least, I should have gone through the mental exercise of “what if” and reviewed the supplies I had in contrast to what I was likely to need in this situation. In a real emergency, “All is Well” can get you killed.

The ice came. In the early hours of the morning I awoke to find the power had gone off. This was, frankly, no surprise to me. Temporary interruptions in the grid caused by weather are far from unusual here. What I couldn’t know at the time was our power would not be back on for 8 days. Neighbors not far from us were out for 13 days. In contrast, power in the closest town was only out for hours.

Upon waking, I immediately got up, woke my wife and told her the power was out, and took a hot shower before the water in the tank had a chance to cool. My wife did likewise. A hot shower can become an unbelievable luxury in a surprisingly short period of time when the power is out. (Yes, our hot water heater is “gasp!” electric.) Also, I filled the bathtub and several buckets with water in case the generators failed at the local water district. I already had several cases of drinking water and approximately 200 gallons in drums in the garage as well. These are standard precautions on our part, regardless of the time of year.

Heat was the next issue we tackled. Our home is all-electric, but we supplement the electric furnace with portable kerosene heaters in order to keep utility bills manageable. I isolated the living room, which is where we spend most of our waking hours, by stapling blankets over the doorways leading to our hallways and kitchen. This five-minute modification allowed me to more efficiently heat the living room with a kerosene heater, and minimized heat loss into the unused areas of the house. I used the same “compartment” approach at night when heating the bedroom. Of course, kerosene heaters should never be left unattended for any period of time, and a battery-powered CO detector is a must.

A second important lesson regarding heat is to have ample fuel supplies on-hand to handle an emergency. We were burning kerosene on a daily basis before the storm. When the weather forecast seemed ominous, I asked my wife to pick up an extra container of kerosene on her way home from work, since I work long shifts and would not be away from work before the station closed. She forgot, and we faced the storm with less than 5 gallons of kerosene. On the heels of the ice came painfully low temperatures for several days. It became clear that we would not have sufficient fuel for our heaters to last throughout the cold snap. Furthermore, a large percent of the local population had turned to kerosene heaters in the absence of electricity. Local suppliers soon ran out of kerosene. As a result, I eventually found myself standing in line for approximately four hours in order to purchase 10 gallons of kerosene, when it became available. Fortunately, I did have enough cash on hand to make the needed transaction. ATMs were only intermittently operational. The wait, outdoors in single-digit temperatures, with a few hundred other unfortunates, was by far the most valuable lesson I received during this time. The helplessness, anxiety, and shame associated with my lack of preparation have impacted me deeply. By the way, I now buy kerosene in 55 gallon drums. No more queues for me.

That covers water, shelter, and heat. Our next issue was light. I keep several Dietz lanterns and two Aladdin lamps along with several gallons of high-grade lamp oil on hand. Illumination was not a problem. In addition, I have a wide variety of Surefire brand flashlights and spare lithium batteries for nighttime chores around the house. All of the above were put to good use. I was even able to supply some of my neighbors with Dietz lanterns and oil during the time we were off-grid. Several valuable lessons concerning light were learned. First, the Aladdin lamps are excellent, albeit somewhat expensive. They are bright when used according to the instructions. So bright, in fact, that I recommend anyone planning on using them also spend the extra money for lamp shades. They are definitely bright enough to read by without undue eyestrain. They also give off significant amounts of heat, which was helpful in the cold temperatures. They would be less pleasant to utilize in hot weather, however. I was actually able to boil water by holding a metal cup over the top of the chimney for a brief time. This was an excellent technique for preparing some of the freeze-dried Mountain House food we ate during the event. Buy at least twice as many mantles and chimneys as you think you will need, as these are the most fragile parts of the lamp. Also, read the instructions.

Dietz lanterns are excellent tools for the money, but are significantly less bright than the Aladdins. They are easier to use when you are moving around as they have handles and can be carried while lit. All the standard precautions apply when using anything that is actively burning while you handle it.

Surefire lights are also outstanding illumination tools. The major shortfall is battery life. I discovered that when you are using them as a primary illumination source, you will go through a surprising number of batteries. The good news is the batteries generally have a shelf life measured in years, so you can afford to stock up without worrying too much about discharge rates. Don’t buy CR-123 batteries from places like Wal-Mart; they are too expensive there. Instead, order them directly from Surefire’s web site. You can get them in bulk for less than $2 per battery. The battery life problem can also be mitigated somewhat by buying the newer generation of LED lights, as opposed to the older ones with the xenon bulbs.

Food was not an issue due to pre-existing stocks. All our cooking was done outside on a propane burner from a turkey fryer. Coffee prepared in an enameled percolator was definitely the biggest morale-booster from day to day. We even had friends over for “Mountain House night” to provide a little levity and fellowship in an otherwise dreary situation.

The same morning that the power went off, I removed all perishables from the refrigerator and stored them in a Rubbermaid tub in the cold garage. That food was prepared and eaten first. The freezers were left closed as much as possible, and wrapped with blankets for additional insulation. I keep a 5kw generator with the tank drained along with several gallons of stabilized fuel (religiously rotated) and sufficient oil. My only purpose for the genset is to keep the freezers frozen in just such situations. Only one of my freezers in indoors, the others being outside. It was only necessary to run the generator for a couple of hours every two to three days to maintain the integrity of the frozen food. In retrospect, it would be advisable to have the ability to connect the genset to portions of the house (with the appropriate safety measures, of course) for added flexibility in using a limited number of electric appliances.

During the crisis, I had two different coworkers whose homes were “cased” by potential thieves. Each home was rural and isolated, with no neighbors in direct line-of sight. Fortunately, in both cases, when the armed homeowners confronted the would-be thieves, they wisely ran away.

Keep in mind that, while the power was off for several days, this was in fact only a pseudo-disaster. Roads remained passable, and within a day, Wal-Mart was open for business. Within hours they sold out of bottled water, candles, lamps & lamp oil, manual can openers, flashlights, batteries (D-cells were the most in demand), milk, bread, and most foodstuffs that don’t require preparation. Over the course of three days, I watched my closest neighbor make at least two trips to Wal-Mart per day, returning with armloads of white plastic bags each trip. Also, within days, there were enterprising individuals selling small generators out of the back of tractor-trailers. You could hear the rattle and hum of Briggs & Stratton engines in almost every direction.

On a personal note, the experience was also a validation of the preparedness mindset for my wife. While she has always been supportive of my efforts to prepare, she was from time to time also prone to grumbling about the amount of space occupied by our preparedness supplies. More than once during the storm, she would say something like “Gee, it would be nice if we had…” upon which I would go to the back room, rummage around and return with the item she was requesting. By the end of the storm, her most frequent comment was, “I’m glad you’re my husband.”

Lessons Learned:

• An "All is Well" attitude will get you killed. Take threats seriously.
• Have your water taken care of now. It will be one less critical thing to worry about in an emergency.
• Keep fuel in sufficient quantities for emergencies.
• Batteries, batteries, batteries.
• Be able to cook outside.
• Thieves and looters will come, even in rural areas.
• It’s not really a disaster if you can still go to Wal-Mart.

I have just returned to my house after 6 days without power. I Thought I was ready. I had plenty of beans, Band-Aids, bullion and bullets. What I didn’t have was the stuff I needed to get through the first week of a massive power outage. We still had water, even though I had an additional 50 gallons of fresh, treated water for myself, The Beautiful Wife (TBW) and the pets. We had enough short term food that we were able to provide a chili meal for some of our friends and coworkers that were doing without. We had more money of all kinds than we needed. What I hadn’t planned for, was the first week. We had enough flashlights, but a headlight would have served much better. Cooking with a flashlight leave the cook one hand short. I knew that I had a Coleman propane camp stove, but I had neglected to put the propane and the connector hose with the stove. I had a Coleman lantern for light, but I had used the last pair of mantels and had not replaced them, you know, I’ll get them on sale or when we go to town next. And then I forgot! I would have paid three times what the cost just to be able to read after dark. Same thing for the propane, I had one for the grill, one for the stove (Oh, yea, I don’t know where that one is), and a spare. Oh, the spare is in the travel trailer, and has an inch of ice over the storage door. Hummmm! Thank goodness for deicer. Oh, yea, I had to go dig that out of storage in another box.

Have a list! Know what things you need to rotate, replace, use up, whatever. Make sure your BTW or your closest friend knows where that list is, and what it means. Abbreviations on a list that have meaning to you, are worthless to your partner, unless they know what they stand for.

Drill! Work with your partner to fine tune the list. We both knew where the spot flashlight was, we thought! We had moved less than a year ago, and the spot flashlight we both thought we knew the location of, well that was in the old house. We found it in the travel trailer on the fourth day. Have a scavenger hunt and find random items on the list. Where is the fire extinguisher, the spot flashlight, the propane for the stove? What do you need to splint my broken arm from a fall in the ice? How am I supposed to get you to a medical facility without a phone?

I have been reading SurvivalBlog for a year now, and I thought I was doing pretty good. Boy, was I wrong!

Keep up the good work and God Bless. - Ray B.

James-
I wanted to share a money saving tip that applies to inexpensively preparing for TEOTWAWKI. With so many digital devices depending on batteries these days, most of us are conditioned so that, when a device like a digital camera or other smart gadget tells us the AA or AAA batteries need replacing, we simply toss out the “dead” ones and put in fresh batteries. But are the batteries really dead? Usually, not all of them are.

I have a handy little Canon digital camera that we use around the house for insurance documentation, family photo opportunities at parties, pictures for craigslist ads, etc. It uses four AA batteries. Yesterday, while taking some pictures, it issued its standard low battery warning. I took the four “dead” batteries out and replaced them with fresh batteries. I didn’t discard the old batteries. I have a 40 battery rack with tester. I tested each of the four batteries. The tester indicated one battery was completely dead, while the other three still had useful voltage. Without more sophisticated battery testing equipment, I could’t know how much useful amperage was left. So I did an experiment. I placed each of the remaining “good” three batteries in a cheap, single cell AA LED flashlight ($1 each on clearance from Home Depot during the holiday season). I left the flashlights on. For about six hours, each of the lights worked at very good brightness. After that, they continued to produce useful light for another 3 to 4 hours. That’s nearly 30 hours of useful utility/reading/navigating-in-the-dark light from three “dead” batteries most of us would discard without a second thought. How valuable would 30 extra hours of battery powered light be if the power grid was down for an extended period? Very valuable!

I’m putting a simple system in place to take advantage of this: I will now test all “dead” batteries. Ones that still show good voltage go in a plastic bucked, to be used for non-critical, single cell LED flashlight duty. Front-line flashlights (emergency kits, cars, gun mounted lights, gun safes, etc.) will still always get fresh batteries. But the ones I keep in tool boxes, kitchen drawers, etc., now use the “dead” cells. I don’t expect they’ll store forever, but I will keep rotating them and using them until they are truly dead. My fresh battery supply will last longer, and I will save money that can be put toward other preparations.

Keep up the good work. - Rich S.

James,
Your readers recently bring up good points about the advantage of battery powered tools with solar recharging. The advice to use an inverter connected to a 12v deep cycle battery and regular corded AC tools was good advice also, since the batteries may not last very long.

Having just recently purchased a set of Ryobi one+ tools myself, I found a seller on ebay selling an adapter for the one+ tools. It plugs into the tool in place of the battery then you can plug an AC DC power supply into it. This will give the best of both worlds. Use of the Ryobi batteries, then once the batteries no longer hold a charge, you can connect an AC/DC power supply to your 12v deep cycle battery and basically have a corded tool.

Search eBay for "EX-One use AC adapter replace Ryobi One+ P103 Lithium" or seller "lcdpayless". The adapter is only $20 but doesn't come with the AC/DC power adapter. I am not the seller and I haven't ordered one of these yet. I just thought your readers with Ryobi One+ tools might be interested to learn of this possibility for backup power for their tools. - D.L.

Sir:
A clarification for your readers on the article titled: A Simple Off-the-Shelf Solar Power System and Off-Grid Power Tool., The “Bill of Materials” for this project included; “Interstate Marine/RV 12 volt battery #27DC-1 ($68 from Sam's Club)” I spent some time on the internet trying to find exactly what this battery was, given that there aren’t any Sam's Clubs nearby.

A search of Interstate’s web site leads me to two conclusions:

1) The part number cited is a Sam’s Club number and not likely to be useful elsewhere.

2) Interstate only makes (in Group 27) Start Only duty or Start/Deep Cycle duty batteries for marine use, neither of which is optimal for this application.

The best type of marine/RV battery to use for this application is one rated for true “Deep Cycle” duty. Deep Cycle batteries tolerate more frequent and deeper (more than 10%) discharge without early failure. These are not often found in warehouse stores. My local BJs had one this week, but this is the first time in over two years that I’ve seen one there and I live in a “seaside community”. Deep Cycle only batteries are not often found for under $100.

James-
Thanks for the interesting article on the Ryobi 12v solar setup.

Just wanted to chip in some advice on Ryobi batteries: Of the name brand cordless tools, Ryobi seems to have the worst NiCd battery quality. When used carefully, they will work well for a couple of years. If pressed hard, they will die a much earlier death. I have found that some packs will have a bad cell, dramatically shortening the entire pack’s life after only a few months. I’ve experienced this with 9.6v, 14v, and 18v Ryobi setups. Even the healthier packs, when pushed hard, particularly with a high drain device like a circular saw, die a quick death. To maximize the useful life, do not push them to the point where the battery pack gets hot and is completely drained. Such hard use guarantees the pack will lose capacity and cease to hold a charge for extended periods of time.

Ryobi’s latest 18v sets (“ONE+”) can be powered by either their lithium or NiCd packs. If the purchaser can afford the lithium setup, it is a better investment, as the lithium packs last longer in use, hold a charge longer, and have much better shelf life. If you cannot afford the lithium battery packs with the initial purchase, consider adding them later, as the same 18v charging setup you describe will work with either type of battery.

Also, Home Depot’s Rigid cordless tool line currently come with a lifetime warranty that includes the lithium battery packs, and they will replace the batteries if they fail to hold a charge, regardless of the reason. The Rigid line may be a good alternative for those purchases who intend hard use for their cordless tools. The Rigid line is typically twice as costly as the Ryobi line, but they do occasionally go on sale and represent a better value for people who wear out their battery packs. Regards, - Rich S.

Sir,
With regards to A Simple Off-the-Shelf Solar Power System and Off-Grid Power Tools, I must object to a portable tool solution based on short ("2-3 years") rechargeable batteries which are fundamentally non-replaceable after TSHTF as opposed to a contrasting setup using inverters to operate 117 VAC-conventional power tools - all other parameters being identical. Just skip the 18 volt rechargeable tools and batteries and DC-to-DC chargers and stick with regular AC tools.

In order to prolong the deep-cycle lead-acid batteries into the "unlimited" range: stay within the top 10% of the battery capacity. Not only will you not have to worry about replacing high-technology 18volt portable batteries every three years, but you won't even have to worry about replacing deep-cycle lead acid every seven years neither. - R.S.

JWR Replies: I agree with the simplicity of your approach.

Sadly, there is no such thing as a "forever" or "unlimited life" lead-acid battery. Even if they are kept fully charged, they will eventually sulfate. That chemical reaction is inevitable, and can at best just be delayed. One evidence of this telephone companies spending millions of dollars rotating their deep cycle batteries that they they use for backup at the Central Offices (COs). IIRC, they are replaced once every eight years. And those batteries only rarely get drawn down. ("Cycled.") If there were some way to make lead-acid batteries have unlimited life, the phone companies would have implemented it long ago.

This article is written for those who have no experience with solar power and would like to set up a simple beginner system. I have been using this system for over a year and have found it to be efficient. My goal was to put together a system which is easy to use and does not require a lot of technical knowledge.

EQUIPMENT LIST:
1. BatteryMinder #SCC-015 Solar Charger 12 volt with 15 watt solar panel ($150 from Northern Tool and Supply)
2. BatteryMinder #BC2410 battery clip assembly ($10 from Northern Tool and Supply)
3. Interstate Marine/RV 12 volt battery #27DC-1 ($68 from Sam's Club)
4. Battery box for group 27 size battery ($10 from Wal-Mart)
5. Vector #VEC005 12 volt battery clips with accessory outlet ($6 from local hardware store)
6. Ryobi #P130 18 volt vehicle battery charger ($40 from Home Depot)
7. Ryobi #P824 18 volt tool starter kit with drill, circular saw, two 18 volt batteries, house current battery charger, and case ($89 from Home Depot)
8. A two or three level heavy duty shelf

Obviously, you can purchase your equipment wherever you like. If you would like to support SurvivalBlog, you can purchase the BatteryMinder solar charger and battery clip assembly from Northern Tool by starting at the "Affiliates" link on the SurvivalBlog main page, left side, third item from the top. Northern Tool also carries a number of battery powered tools. While at the blog's the "Affiliates" page, you may also want to look at the Allbattery.com site to see what is available in the way of rechargeable batteries and chargers which may be used with this system. The aforementioned equipment reflects the exact hardware that I use, so I know it works. The prices give you an idea of what your system could cost. I have listed Ryobi brand tools because I've used them for a number of years and found them to work well. You could use other brands such as DeWalt, Black and Decker, etc. I suggest you purchase tools which use at least 18 volt batteries.

SETUP: Begin by reading and heeding the instructions with all of the listed equipment. Let's start with the BatteryMinder Solar Charger (item #) and follow the instructions on setup. The instructions are four short pages on how to wire the system, position the solar panel, and how the system works. I leave my system set up 24/7 so that when sunshine is available the system is charging/maintaining the 12 volt deep cycle marine battery and even on a cloudy day some charging activity is going on. I positioned the solar panel near an exterior door of my garage so the wire from the solar panel to the charge controller can be run under the door to a three level shelf just inside the door. This way, the charge controller and the battery condition indicator are not exposed to the weather. I placed the BatteryMinder charge controller and battery condition indicator on the shelf one level above the lowest shelf.

Next, place the Interstate 12 volt marine battery (item #3) into the battery box (item #4) and place both on the bottom level of your shelves. In order to use battery clamps do not place the box top on the battery. The battery comes with two types of posts on the positive and negative sides, one post is larger, smooth sided, and designed for a battery clamp and the other post is threaded. The BatteryMinder's battery connections are the spade style with holes, these can be fastened onto the threaded posts, remember red to positive, black to negative. Northern Tool offers an optional accessory, item #2 in the Equipment List, which replaces the spade style battery connectors with battery clamps. These make it quicker to disconnect the system from the battery. I use the battery clamps instead of the spade style connectors. I connect the clamps to the large, smooth sided posts, again, red to positive, black to negative.

At this point, you have assembled the BatteryMinder system and hooked it up to the 12 volt deep cycle marine battery. When the sun is shining the battery is being charged/maintained. Now you are ready to hook up the Vector 12 volt battery clamps with accessory outlet jack (item #5). It's easy, just hook the Vector battery clamps to the unused post on each side of the battery, in my case, I use the threaded posts, again, red to positive, black to negative, I know, it's getting repetitive!

Last step - place the Ryobi vehicle charger (item #6) on the shelf above the bottom shelf. It needs plenty of space for air circulation because it puts out some heat when in use. Just plug the Ryobi charger male end into the Vector accessory female outlet.

OPERATION: With the Ryobi vehicle charger hooked to the 12 volt deep cycle battery just plug an 18 volt tool battery into the vehicle charger and wait until the green light comes on. Ryobi says a cold tool battery could take about 1 hour to charge. With the 12 volt deep cycle battery at full charge, you will have no problem charging 4 to 6 tool batteries without discharging the 12 volt deep cycle battery too much. That number of fully charged batteries would be able to do more work than I care to do at one time. If you charge a number of 18 volt tool batteries at one time, be sure to use the battery condition indicator to check the 12 volt deep cycle battery. If the indicator says "Good" you are okay, but if the indicator shows "Fair" or "Poor" you should stop charging tool batteries until the BatteryMinder has had time to catch up and fully charge the 12 volt deep cycle battery. On the battery condition indicator "Good" means the 12 volt deep cycle battery is holding a charge of 12.5 to 13.2 volts, "Fair" is 12.0 to 12.5 volts, and "Poor" is 11.5 to 12.0 volts. My BatteryMinder maintains a full charge on the 12 volt deep cycle battery of about 13.1 volts. Be sure to disconnect the Ryobi tool battery charger when not in use, it does use electricity when not charging a tool battery.

Use of tools - I have found that I use the drill the most, followed by the circular saw, reciprocating saw, and jigsaw. With occasional daily usage, the drill battery will last 2-3 weeks on a single charge. I have found these tools so useful I packed away my corded drill and circular saw. Ryobi and others have a number of other tools which use the 18 volt batteries.

Other uses - Of course you can use this charging system for other things besides charging 18 volt tool batteries. Anything that calls for a 12 volt DC car charging source can be charged, i.e. cell phones, rechargeable batteries, laptop computers, MP3 players, etc. You can also use this system to run 12 volt DC gizmos, just remember, use the battery condition indicator so that you don't too deeply discharge your 12 volt deep cycle battery.

MAINTENANCE: Not much. Other than checking the condition of the 12 volt deep cycle battery the only other thing to check is the level of water. Just fill according to the battery instructions using distilled water. If you were to use a sealed battery you can forget the distilled water. The 18 volt tool batteries last about 2-3 years with fairly steady use so they will have to be replaced. Once this system is placed into use you can stagger your purchases of new 18 volt tool batteries so that all of your tool batteries don't die at about the same time.

CONCLUSIONS: With careful monitoring, I expect the 12 volt deep cycle marine battery in this system to last seven years or more. There are no moving parts so unless an electronic part fails, the rest of the system should last a long time. BatteryMinder says you can maintain 2 parallel connected medium sized 12 volt batteries at the same time. Also, you could rotate any number of 12 volt deep cycle batteries, one at a time, to maintain a bank of fully charged 12 volt deep cycle batteries. The ability to have power tools available when there is no grid power could prove to be very useful. Even if you have a generator, it is very handy to have fully charged tool batteries available without using the generator to recharge the tool batteries. In the event that there were no new 18 volt tool batteries available, with proper battery management, you could still have the use of power tools for several years.

Mr. Rawles,
Just a suggestion about something you and your readers might be interested in. I'm not affiliated with the vendor in any way, just a very satisfied customer.

4Sevens' 2-AA Quark light is good for 30 days continuous on low, and a couple of hours at 200 lumens. These are by far the best LED lights on the market at this time. I hang around the flashlight-nerd subculture, and have 4Sevens lights in all my survival packs. Obviously, you can recharge LSD AA lights with solar chargers, and they'll run off of regular AA and lithium AA batteries too.

This light, on high, is probably brighter than any light a normal family owns, many times brighter than a Mag-Lite, and much smaller. Pocket sized. Personally, I suggest their sporadically available warm white LEDs. You can't tell when meat is cooked with a blue-white LED, which is the norm at the moment from other vendors. You can tell rare from well done with the warm white LEDs. When I say "blue" LEDs, I refer to what passes for "white" LEDs these days. They are basically blue-white in spectral output, and have poor color rendition. None of the mass-marketed LED lights currently is warm white, but that is what you want, if you want to be able to make out colors at night. (You do.) 4Sevens sells some "warm" lights, as does Fenix.

The second best thing out there is Fenix. Their TK-20 is warm white, uses AAs, and will throw a spot at 100 yards. (No, I'm not exaggerating, I used Fenix lights on safari while night hunting. They work. My professional hunter kept mine as part of my tip, and he's thrilled with it.) You can also run one over with a truck, and it will still work fine. I know! (Oops!)

Anyway, 4Sevens and Fenix are 2-5 years ahead of Home Depot and Wal-Mart as far as LED lights go, and forever away as far as quality is concerned. Surefire makes great lights, but they are also way behind in efficiency, though they are very well made. My Surefire 6P, heavily modified with parts from Candlepower Forums, is 1,000 lumens, but only for 3 minutes. Still, for current urban uses, it is the bomb. Way better than Surefire's 120 lumen best effort. Mine is blinding in daylight, and obviously, it owns the night, if briefly.

But I digress. 4Sevens has some incredible lights. They are Surefire-priced ($60-ish), but use AAs and LEDs, have sapphire coated scratch proof lenses, have anti-reflection coated lenses, to get the light out, are waterproof, are small, and use the latest generation LEDs.

I cannot imagine a better solution for illumination, if one can recharge LSD AAs. Anyway, check them out. The 2-AA is the best. The single-AA versions burn up too much power in the voltage converter. The 2-AA is the way to go.

One other note. Tritium vials. Tritium vials are not commonly available here in the "land of the free", but are still easily obtainable [if you look at secondary market sources such as eBay]. The 1.5x5mm glass vials are easily inset into survival equipment (green is by far the brightest), and they last 30 years or so. Useful to be added to any equipment one must find in the dark, in a hurry. Use clear nail polish to set the vials; epoxy turns translucent in short order. Also [large military surplus ] tritium map reading lights [commonly called "Betalights"] can be found without too much trouble. - Nemo

Mr. Rawles:
As an engineer interested in long term sustainability I was most interested in the item from Troy H. mentioning Juhnde, Germany. I took a look at their web site and ran the numbers to look at whether such an installation is commercially viable.

The capital costs listed were EU 5,400,000 or about USD $7,900,000 at present exchange rates; It's not clear when the overall system was constructed but the hot water pipeline system was built around 2005. Apparently, and I will have to look into this further, all of the capital costs were from public funds. This translates out to about $10,395 per resident in capital expenses, excluding operating and maintenance costs. Amortized out over 20 years, straight line amortization with no interest cost, the principal cost would be ~$520 per resident per year. If you included reasonable capital costs, a 20 year fixed 6.0% mortgage would cost $74.51 per month per resident. It might be possible to play with the financing costs and rates to find a sweet spot, but I thought that was sufficient for a first assessment.

Assuming an average family of four, this would mean about $3600 per year (about $2,080 for principle and $1,500 interest) for heat and electricity capital cost plus the unknown operating costs, which I would estimate by rule of thumb for large installs at 50% of the amortized capital expenses. That is $5,400 per year per family, not for housing but just for heat and electricity.

If we include the return from the electrical power (an estimated annual surplus of 2,500,000 kWh) that is a total annual savings of $150,000 at $0.06 per kWh or $197 per resident per year, for an estimated net cost of around $4,600 per family for heat and electricity. (Obviously, electrical costs vary tremendously and affect the analysis)

My costs for my home's physical plant, which include a propane furnace with electric heat pump and associated tanks, duct work, woodstove and chimney, etc., were about $13,000 to support a family of four. My annual energy cost, electricity, propane, and the costs of cutting/splitting wood are about $1,400 per year. (Yes, I have good insulation, and I also don't have a huge house, and I turn off the lights!) Plus an allowance of $500 for repair and replacement. Using the same logic and rates, my mortgage cost for heating is $93.14 per month or ~$1,120 per year capital expenses plus $1,900 in operating expenses including preventative maintenance (PM) and repair allowance. This totals $3,000 per year.

What this analysis tells me is that interesting as Juhnde is, it is not economically sustainable. Sustainable designs have to be sustainable from an economic perspective as well as a technical and biological one. A truly sustainable solution offers economic benefits and a competitive advantage. Now, a highly productive society such as present-day Germany may be able to afford to subsidize a 50% increase in energy costs and a 25% reduction in crop output, at least in a small area over the short term, and this example may be useful as a 'proof of concept' test bed, but in my judgment this is not a viable long term solution for the USA. The real push behind this may be found in the proud statement that the village has reduced it's carbon output by 60%. Regards, - Larry

JWR Replies: Also missing from the grand cost accounting equation are the costs of the fossil fuels used in producing and transporting the crops used in biodigesters. Traditional agriculture in a partially forested region (for firewood) with good topsoil and reliable rains provides a much better shot at true local mutigenerational sustainability. But of course that flies in the face of the uber-greens that are fixated on carbon emissions. Talk about missing the forest for the trees. Our forests are enormous solar energy collectors, renewably providing countless billions of BTUs, there for the taking.

James:
Just a quick observation about the wisdom of sheltering in a missile base or some other Cold War-era fortification. While Chris is correct that history demonstrates that fortifications can and will be breached by enemy forces with the resources and determination to maintain a well-conceived siege, I question whether after TEOTWAWKI the marauders most likely to be challenging such a retreat will have the resources to see a siege through to a successful conclusion.

Presumably, the scarcity of resources is precisely what would make a fortress such an inviting target. Unlike the armies that successfully overran ancient fortifications, there is little hope of people armed only with conventional weapons successfully breaching the walls or blast doors of a structure designed to withstand anything but a direct hit from a sizable nuclear warhead. Additionally, the barbarian hordes in a post-collapse scenario will not have the luxury of sitting in place indefinitely, waiting for those hunkered inside such a bunker to exhaust their own resources. Unless a well-organized and well-armed assault force happens to catch the owners of the fortress completely unprepared, I think that even taking into account the risks of living underground for prolonged periods these sorts of shelters offer the highest degree of security for their owners after TSHTF.

Keep up the great work, - D.

Dear Editor:
Ah, so sorry to sound the defeatist, but the self-sufficiency plans outlined in the recently-posted article by "Chris" would not stand up to scientific scrutiny by folks that actually work with closed-cycle environments.

(A) The article refers to producing methane for power by "dissolving" milkweed in water, and even accelerating the breakdown by immersing the milkweed in salt water and running a current through it. 

In point of fact, merely "dissolving" milkweed will not produce methane.  Methane is produced by the decomposition and fermentation of organic matter.  Said decomposition requires a number of things: (1) a warm, moist environment, (2) a low oxygen content in the biomass being fermented, (3) one or more bacterial cultures that decompose biomass – these are usually found in moist, or semisolid matter, not a salt-water solution.  Decomposition bacteria do *really* poorly in salt water.  It's the reason "salt-curing" is the preservation method of choice for meat in the absence of refrigeration.

One must also ask, if the milkweed is being fermented for methane to generate power, where is the electricity coming from that would be passed through the saltwater solution to supposedly accelerate the dissolution of the milkweed?  Hmm?  It would be a good idea to *produce* more power than one must consume in the production of the power.

Certainly it would be possible to produce methane from compost, and that would be a good means of providing an emergency fuel source and heat source in cold weather.  However for power generation, if we assume that the author is thinking of using a methane-fueled internal combustion engine connected to an alternator, it is first necessary to *compress* the methane.  One kilogram of solid waste subjected to anaerobic fermentation will produce about 120 liters of methane – a year.  A natural gas (i.e. methane) fueled generator producing 5000 watts (a very small home – just enough for lights, a fan and one small refrigerator – uses approximately 2 kg of methane per hour.  Methane weighs about 2 kg per cubic meter, so the 120 liters of methane produced as above would weigh about 0.02 kg.  To keep a methane-powered generator going for a single 24-hour day would require 2400 kg of compost, and could only run the generator for one day out of 365.  Continuous operation would require a compost pit containing >800,000 kg of compost.  Nearly a thousand metric tons of fermenting waste would hardly count as inconspicuous. 

Then there's that compression problem again.  Absent a compressed methane supply, the only possible means of power generation would be external combustion of the methane in an open flame and boiling water.  All of which presumes that sufficient methane can be collected from a compost pit the size a small town and transported to the burner, but alas, that would also require some means of *pushing* the methane into the pipes leading to the burner.  This means fans or pumps, and like compressing the methane or electrifying salt water, would waste the very power being generated. 

(B) Next the article turns to air and water filtration, and is on its strongest foundation.  It is true that algae are a great technique for scrubbing the air of excess CO2 and enriching it with oxygen.  This is the stuff of which long-duration space flight is made.  Better yet, algae is biomass, and can be composted for methane!  However, there are still many issues with the *implementation* of this plan.  First, algae consume CO2 and produce O2 during the day, but a little acknowledged fact is that *all* plants consume O2 and produce CO2 at night when chlorophyll is deprived of the sunlight required to power photosynthesis.  The efficiency of this cycle is about 2:1 given 12 hrs day and 12 hrs night.  Thus for every two liters of O2 produced during daylight, one liter will be consumed the following night.  Unless the algae is grown under artificial sunlight lamps – but there's that pesky problem again of consuming all of the power in the process of generating the fuel to generate the power…

However, what is the efficiency of algae-based air "freshening"?  One can assume that it is not entirely necessary to produce *all* of the breathable air.  Certainly *some* air will be derived from the outside unless it is completely contaminated with fallout, biological weapons or zombie virus.  For the sake of argument, let's say we need to produce enough breathable air for a single person each day.  That way one person can be completely sealed into the bunker, or additional people can be supported by supplementing with outside air.  A single adult male runs about 20,000 liters through their lungs each day.  That's 16 one-liter breaths per minute.  About 1000 liters of O2 are consumed and 1000 liters of CO2 exhaled.  That's between 0.03 and 0.05 kg of each per day, or 15-20 kg/year.  One square meter of algae will consume about 10 kg of CO2 per year and produce about 8 kg of O2, assuming the ideal light and temperature.  So, two square meters of algae under artificial sunlight, with flowing water in the tank, plenty of nutrients on the water – oh, and plenty of water – will likely scrub the air of excess CO2 and enrich it with O2.  But there's still that pesky problem of power to operate the lights and pumps, and the fact that while algae will enrich the air, this is still a far cry from filtering it, and any biological or radiological contaminants that need to be filtered out lest they kill the inhabitants of the bunker would also kill the algae.  Not to mention what to do with the excess biomass of algae that needs to be skimmed from the tank weekly – add it to the 5 square mile compost farm, probably.  

It should be pointed out at this point that there *are* industrial and systems for not only reducing CO2 and producing breathable air, but also turning algae and yeast into biofuels.  They are called bioreactors, and work at very high densities.  Efficient units are quite large and small units take days to weeks to produce enough fuel to power a vehicle or generator for a few hours.  Finally, the inconvenient truth of renewable fuels is that it takes power to make power (fuel).  Bioreactors require *almost* as much energy as they produce just to operate the lights, fans, pumps, stirrers and cooling systems.  They have been proposed mainly as a way of reducing industrial waste CO2 or to convert grid-supply electricity into portable fuels for cars and trucks.  While such systems have been considered for arcologies, Mars missions and orbital facilities, it is primarily because they can tap into the abundant electrical power produced by the nuclear and next generation solar power plants proposed for those installations. 

(C) So what's this about using a Tesla coil for water filtration?  A Tesla coil?  Seriously?  A TESLA COIL?  No.

[JWR Adds: I believe he was referring to using a Tesla coil to generate ozone, and to use that to purify water. That can work, but the power requirements are considerable. A simple ultraviolet light (like those use by koi pond enthusiasts) works just as well, and uses just a tiny fraction of the electricity. ]

First – where does the power come from to generate the electricity output by the Tesla coil?  The piddly little 5000 watt methane-powered generator wouldn't even power a Tesla coil enough to raise the hair on your forearm even after rubbing it with a cat for an hour.  Tesla coils used for those fancy demonstrations are usually powered by industrial generators providing 50-100 kilowatts of electricity.  Powering that will take a compost heap the size of Rhode Island.

Second, electricity kills living cells.  That's clearly the idea behind using electricity for "filtering" the water.  Unfortunately those algae above are living cells.  Run the electricity through the algae tank and there goes the air supply.  One could argue that the Tesla coil will be "downstream" from the algae tank, and not directly in contact.  Still, the insidious thing about electricity is that it tends to short to ground through water – if there is *any* possible connection – such as through the water pipes, the algae will get electrocuted.  Not to mention the sad end for a person that survives civil collapse and retreats to a hidden bunker only to be electrocuted the first time he reaches for the water tap. 

Third, did I mention that Tesla coils consume *power*?

(C)  Waste treatment.  Recycling and recapturing useful compounds out of liquid and solid waste is an excellent idea.  Set up the filters, composters and separators.  Unfortunately I see no provision for disinfecting the waste.  See, urine and feces do not just decompose on their own without help.  Community wastewater treatment plants ferment semisolid waste using specific bacterial cultures.  Solid wastes *are* compressed and either used as fertilizer or burned for fuel.  However, before either can happen, they must be sterilized.  A considerable amount of the "bulk" of solid human waste is live and dead bacteria.  Of those, the most common danger is e. coli.  Without even getting into the problems of typhus and diphtheria which come from food and water supplies contaminated by human wastes - or salmonella which comes from animal wastes - e. coli is particularly hazardous because it is so common.  The human body has a number of defense mechanisms for dealing with e. coli – at least in the regions where it is most commonly encountered – skin, groin, etc.  But e. coli in the mouth, eyes, ears or nose can cause serious infections that can cause cannot be easily treated, and if untreated can cause death.  As for performing the waste treatment in airtight containers, sorry, but no.  Unlike composting, which is an *anaerobic* process, waste decomposition is an *aerobic* process. The reason for this is precisely because the most hazardous of the waste-borne bacteria thrive in low-oxygen situations.  The reason wastewater treatment plants constantly stir waste in huge tanks is to ensure that the material stays oxygenated to reduce the growth of infectious bacteria.  Better to dig a latrine pit, fill it with lime, and lose out on recycling than to have a waste system that kills the user by virtue of insufficient sanitation.  Again, as with all of the concepts presented here, it can be dome properly, but the proper means involve a sufficiency of power, air, water and space.

(D)  Finally, the author references the "very negative biological effects" of deep underground environments on the human body..  From this it can be assumed that the author is referring to experiments where individuals have lived underground or in sealed environments for extended periods.  Yet, aside from lack of sunlight and exercise, the primary effect of living underground is not necessarily detrimental to humans.  What mainly happens is that in the absence of a defined day-night cycle, the human body makes up its own.  Without a sunlight-induced 24-hr clock, the human body will fall into a natural 26-29 hour day. As long as the subject remains isolated from the outside world, this cycle will continue, remarkably stable, and fully functional, not at all detrimental to health.  However, even a small dose of sunlight each day will set up a conflict between the external and internal clocks.  Insomnia and sleep disruption can occur until the subject is fully immersed in either the outside or inside environment.  Other problems with living underground have been more due to temperature, humidity, molds and air contaminants than merely the fact of being underground.   

To summarize, the concepts presented in this article are not practical.  They are the result of looking at some popular ideas in the press without considering the real world implications, or even carefully working through the biology, chemistry or physics of the problem.  Other "neat ideas" and exercises of the imagination are more appropriate to cartoon or fiction than a serious blog about practical survival.  It is one thing to sit and ponder ideas on the basis of "wouldn't it be interesting if this worked?" and another to consider how likely the idea will result in sickness, malnutrition, disease and death.  None of the idea presented here would even meet the authors first stated intent, to live in seclusion - in secret – with none of the ravening hordes aware of the authors existence.  Each idea would require *space* that a secret hide-away could never afford, *power* that could never be generated, *resources* that would be obviously diverted away from public view and into the hide, and *emissions* of noise, heat and effluent that would certainly call attention to such a secret base. 

Sincerely, Dr. T.R., B.S. (Biology/Chemistry), M.S. (Aquatic Biology), Ph.D. (Physiology/Pharmacology)

Last night I watched Jesse Ventura's "Conspiracy Theory" show which centered around the government's cover up of the coming 2012 scenario. The show featured people converting missile silos to survival bunkers. Historical precedent will quickly point out a glaring problem with this approach.

Consider that relative to the technological level of their day, European castles were more heavily fortified than any bunker being built today (by virtue of the fact that your average monarch of Medieval times had far more resources available than anybody seeking to build a shelter). Still, no castle ever withstood siege indefinitely. No matter how much planning, preparation and defense was put into a stronghold, it was eventually overrun, and in these cases the incentive to do so was a fraction of what it will be in the coming scenarios. Today the ante has been upped; more tech exists to create these bunkers, but the same level of tech exists to break down their defenses and it all comes out in the wash. Bunkers will suffer the same fate that any medieval castle suffered, if people know they exist. Given the social chaos that's going to hit well before the 2012 solar event(s), history will repeat itself. If people know a shelter exists, it's going to become a target when they become desperate enough (which isn't going to be long). Being holed up in one of these places, you just became a resource for every starving person who didn't plan ahead. Hordes will gather in desperation to raid a shelter and retrieve whatever is inside. What's actually inside doesn't matter; what will drive these hordes will be what they think is inside.

The best possible defense is to be invisible. People won't raid what they don't know is there. My own plans are quite meticulous in the area of staying hidden. Nobody in town (a rural Central Georgia town) knows that I even know what a shelter is. The subject is never discussed. Building is done in secret. Rammed Earth construction is used for the shelter itself because I don't have to go out and purchase an inordinate amount of materials which people will be wondering what I did with. What I do need to purchase is broken up among various hardware stores in the metro Atlanta area so that I don't spend too much time or money in any given store.

What about covert power sources? Here is one theoretical approach: Milkweed grows just about anywhere; it grows very quickly and breaks down even faster in salt water. Since salt water is an excellent conductor of electricity, putting current through the water may help the milkweed break down even faster. The goal is to generate methane with the milkweed dissolving in an enclosed container. Methane can run a generator. Organic trash goes into this container as well.

Air filtration has outside air running through several stages of an algae-rich water system; exhaust air goes through the same system. Algae converts CO2 to oxygen quite efficiently. A very high voltage Tesla coil in the filtration water ionizes the water and breaks down impurities; this is applied in a later stage of filtration, after the incoming air has passed through the algae-rich water stage. Further filtering (charcoal, etc.) as a final stage completes the process.

Waste is recycled. Like a septic tank, solid waste is separated from liquid waste. The solid waste is dried (in an enclosed airtight container), pulverized, then burned to help heat the shelter. Handling of liquid waste is still being explored; ammonia and other chemicals need to be extracted but can be bonded with other elements to produce something useful.

Go too deep underground and you get into very negative biological effects on the human body. These are very subtle and gradual to start, but with prolonged, consistent immersion in a deep underground environment, they do intensify.

From the beginning of time, history has shown that unless you have a Mongol horde behind you, you're going to fall if there's any reason to attack you. The Maginot Line was simply marched around and France fell in a few days. The Normandy defenses took a lot of American lives but still fell in a matter of hours. Those attacking you will not be restricted to isolated individuals wandering onto your land. If it's perceived that you have goodies inside (i.e. food), you're going to face mobs and hordes that your little home defenses are not going to compete with. Staying hidden is your only real defense. The government thinks they're going to be safe in their massive bunkers, but they hired countless contractors who helped build the things. These contractors, in desperate times, are going to gather together large assault forces (not difficult to do when everybody is starving) and go after what's inside. My guess is, nearly every government bunker is going to be overrun well before the 2012 event(s) ever occur because social breakdown is going to hit well before that time and the necessity of raiding these shelters will be extreme.

Historical precedent says that you're not going to fight your way through this, no matter what you do. If people know you're there, they're going to come after what you have, in droves. The best option anybody has is to avoid being attacked in the first place. The only way to do this is to remain hidden. - Chris

I’ve been reading SurvivalBlog for almost a year.  I am thankful for the advice that I receive each day.  I have had a “be prepared” attitude for about 30 years, although the past two years have thrown several speed bumps and roadblocks my way.  Two years ago my son and his family were in a life threatening accident.  I spent almost every penny I had saved toward retirement to help my daughter-in-law recover.  This year I fought for and won custody of three of my grandchildren from my daughter.  So now, instead of planning for TEOTWAWKI for just myself, a 50 something divorced woman, I now am the proud “parent” of three elementary aged children.  Even with these changes to my situation, I am still actively preparing.  I wanted to share what I am doing with your readers, so that those who are still in the thinking stages rather than the action stage can see that it’s not too hard to begin. 

Years ago I decided to create a written plan.  I started with my basic premises.  First, I assume that I will live where I’m at forever.  I live 10 miles from a city of 100,000 and 15 miles from a city of 500,000.  While it’s really close to a lot of people, it’s not in the direction that the masses of people would head toward.  I have five acres with a good house, a good well, a great climate for growing food and lots of storage.  With that in mind I need to set up the house and yard to fully sustain me and now the three grandkids.  I also need to make some changes along the property boundary to make it less welcoming.

Second, I assume that when I retire from my government job that my pension income will exist.  That doesn’t mean that it won’t be reduced, I expect the government to steal some of my pension.  (Most people just think that we are given money but I put in 20% of my income into this pension fund) I also expect to receive some social security benefits and plan to start collecting my money as soon as I hit the minimum age.  Barring any additional family disasters, I also plan on having cash on hand.  I am working hard to cut my expenses to almost nothing.  That way I can retire sooner and live prepared rather than being in a state of getting prepared. 

Third, I assume that the weather patterns may fluctuate as they have throughout time, but I will not buy into any of the global warming and cooling as something that we can truly prevent.  If the environmentalists wanted us to change our habits and become more energy efficient, I wish they would have just come out with that statement.  Or, they should say that we can alter our microclimate (planting trees lowers the temperature around our homes, paving roads and parking lots raises the temperature in the city, lakes add to the humidity) rather than trying to scare people into believing that we are destroying the world. 

Fourth, I will practice, as I know that when you practice, the act becomes second nature. Times of trouble is not when you should be learning new things.    

Fifth, I do not panic.  Part of this is because I practice.  Part is because I do not allow myself to be influenced by the news story crisis of the day.  I behave very level headed and am rational.  I know that my attitude and my actions will influence those around me to be either calm or crazy.  I vote for calm.

Sixth, I trust God.  I know that God expects me to take care of myself…or at least to prepare myself to take care of myself.  I can not say I don’t need to be educated, or prepared, or dedicated because God will provide.  I am expected to work hard.  God will take care of me if I try to take care of myself.

The first thing I did in my quest for independence was to determine what I really needed.  The stuff.  I also figured I probably have 30 more years to live, although I hope I’m blessed with much more.  Now I have three more people in the house.  How would I figure how much I need?  I decided to keep track of what I did and what I used.  I started by going through my entire house, room by room, and making an inventory of everything. 

Let’s start with household items.  There are items that can last forever: dishes, glasses, pots, pans, furniture.  There are items that are used up daily, weekly, monthly, and yearly.  Well, how much do you need for the next 30 years?  I started keeping track of what I was using.  Keeping track of exactly how much food purchased, how much toilet paper, paper towels, soap, shampoo, etc. was used in a year gave me a very good idea of what I would need for 10 or 20 or even 30 years.  Then I just started buying extra.  It was simple.  Every time I went to Costco I’d buy an extra laundry detergent, bleach, dish soap, 409, Simple Green, vinegar, etc.  I probably have a 10 year supply on hand without any pain at all. 

I don’t have a basement but I do have a huge garage.  It holds my truck, tractor, freezer, tools, and what seems like miles of floor to ceiling shelves.  It looks like a mini Wal-Mart.  Now that I have the grandchildren, I have devoted space for bins of clothing.  The bins include the basics in every size: jeans, t-shirts (long and short sleeve), sweatshirts, jackets, socks, underwear, hats, gloves, and shoes.  I also sew and have fabric, thread, and am well stocked with sewing supplies. I keep it very organized.  I witness my friends buying things that they know they have somewhere in their homes but they are so disorganized they have no clue what they have or where to find it. 

I’m not going to discuss weapons to any real extent.  This topic is definitely best left to someone who knows what they are talking about.  I really get into this topic on this blog so as to learn more.  I do have a .22 pistol, a .22 rifle, and a 12 gauge shotgun.  The last thing I shot was a rooster who was roaming my yard and continuously tried attacking me.  I know I should have more protection and I also need to involve the children in gun use.  Maybe this summer we will all go to gun camp and then set up a practice target in the back yard. 

Change your diet! Stop eating instant boxed stuff.  If nothing else, you will save lots of money.  Learn to cook.  Learn to bake.  You can buy a pound of yeast at Costco or Sam’s for the same price as three small packages of yeast at the grocery store.  I love the 5 minute bread recipe.  6 cups flour, 3 cups warm water, 1 ½ tablespoon yeast, 1 ½ tablespoon chunky salt (kosher, sea, etc.).  Mix it together with a spoon. Let it rise an hour.  Put some flour onto the counter and pour the dough onto the flour.  (At this point I like to add Italian seasoning to half the dough) Shape into individual rolls or two round loaves.  Bake 350 for 15 minutes.  Noodles are another one of our favorites.  Flour, egg yolk, water, salt. Mix and roll out.  Cut into whatever shape you want.  We use the pizza cutter and make crazy shapes.  Boil for about 10 minutes. 

My garden is my hobby but also something that I’ve set up to feed myself, the grandkids, and my animals.  Since moving to my property 12 years ago I’ve planted fruit trees and plants with most of my spare money.  I have oranges, grapefruit, lemons, limes, kumquats, apples, avocados, cherries, peaches, nectarines, pears, plums, apricots, kiwi, figs, olives, loquats, mulberry, blackberries, raspberries, almonds, asparagus, and probably some others that I’ve forgotten.  I’ve been canning for 30 years now.  If I can’t can it or freeze it we eat fruit and vegetables in season or we don’t eat them.  The only fruit or vegetables I buy are bananas, pineapple, and mushrooms.  I have lots of gardening tools, at least one for each of us so we can all work together: shovels, rakes, hoes, hoses, irrigation parts.  I also have seeds on hand.  It is crazy to spend the money on the latest fad of “non-hybrid seeds in a container for only $150.” Sure, it will grow you a garden, but is it what you like to eat?  Will those varieties do well in your area?  Go to your local nursery and pick up seeds of vegetables you eat.  Have a garden like mine.  Each year I let some of the beets go to seed in the beet section of my garden, I smash a pumpkin on the ground in the pumpkin section, I let broccoli go to seed, etc.  I don’t have to replant the entire garden each year.  The stuff just comes back.  I do replant the corn, eggplant, and peppers.  I do save seed each year to make sure I have a several year supply of all my vegetable seeds.

We have sheep and goats for meat and chickens for eggs.  Although they are easy to raise, I don’t raise rabbits or hogs due to religious dietary restrictions.  I don’t have enough property for a steer because I don’t want to have to rely on buying hay.  I don’t milk the goats because I don’t have time.  I do buy beef and chicken from the store but know that at any time those purchases can stop and we can provide all our meat needs. 

I have a 500 gallon propane tank that never has less than 250 gallons in it .  The propane is used for cooking, heating the house, and the hot water.  We don’t use much for heating the house.  I try to keep the heater turned off during the week.  Since I am at work and the kids are at school, I don’t need to waste propane heating an empty house.  On the weekends I use the woodstove.  Worst case scenario, I would use wood to cook with, heat the house with my wood stove, and at some near future point, set up a solar hot water system. 

We are on a well so we aren’t relying on city water.  My next project (with money from my tax return) will be to set up a solar power system to charge batteries for running the well.  We don’t usually have much wind so I don’t think a wind generator would work.  I’d also like to set up solar for a backup for my appliances.  I don’t need a huge solar system since we use minimal amount of electricity.  We really do conserve on electricity.  My electric bill is only about $40 a month for the refrigerator, freezer, washer, dishwasher, microwave, television, computers, and the kids leaving all the lights on.

Fortunately, we don’t get sick often.  I keep a good stock of vitamins and OTC medicines.  I haven’t been able to convince our doctor to write a prescription for extra medications but I have been able to stock up on some. I do have a large stock of supplies for injuries.  I have a rescue bag in each vehicle plus a large supply at home.  I do want to remind people that even minor injuries can use up lots of supplies.  You need lots of gauze, gauze, and more gauze.  And, gloves, gloves, and more gloves.  Rescue workers will change their latex gloves every 5-15 minutes.  Read the articles already posted about medical supplies.  Go through your cabinets and see what you use.  Buy lots of them. 

We have a great library at home.  Classic books, new books, survival books, cook books, just about all topics for all reading levels.  I also have school books: math, science, grammar, and history for each grade level.  We also have games, puzzles, and cards.  Lots of indoor activities for the kids to do.

We have tons of office supplies: paper, pencils, erasers, pens, paint, crayons and markers, tape, staples, and glue.  Whatever amount you think you need, double it, or triple it!  Take advantage of the end of summer back to school sales. 

Exercise and being active is important.  This past summer I made an obstacle course for the grandkids (and me).  We have tires to run through, a sprinting area, cones to zigzag around, ropes to climb up trees, nets to crawl under, and a cross country running track.  I also set up a tetherball pole, a basketball hoop, badminton and volleyball net, croquette, whiffle ball, and a soccer goal.  We also go hiking and bike riding.  They think it’s just for fun.  I know that being in good condition helps keep the mind in good condition.

Dear Mr. Rawles:
I have owned my retreat for some years and as unbelievable as it may sound, I found a water well that I didn't know I had. When I bought the land in the 1990s, I knew that there had been an old house there at one time, but assumed that they had either used a cistern, or drew water from the stream that runs through the property. However, I found the well. It had an old Gould's 1HP pump at the end of 120 ft. of 2" galvanized pipe. The well had been capped for years, or so it looked when I opened it. Incidentally, there is water at about 60 ft. down. There is no record at the county [offices], nor with the local water management board, for this well. I do not intend to report this find either. They know about the well I drilled a few years ago when we

A question: How can I best develop this well for use and still maintain strict OPSEC? My retreat is shielded from a county road by a large grove of trees, so from the road nobody sees anything, not the house, the barn or anything! The well is about a half mile from the county road in a grove of trees.

One bit of advice: Recruit a veterinarian, physician or even a dentist into your Group if at all possible. They are out there, and are not all of us Liberal Socialists.

Regards, - Robert F., MD

JWR Replies: Congratulations on your find! If you use a poly service line, you can install a well pump by yourself. (The pipe is flexible and fairly lightweight. Since the prices of photovoltaic panels have dropped dramatically in the past two years, you should probably go ahead and put in a PV system, with inverter, to power an AC well pump. (The line loss for a DC well pump hanging at 100 feet would be tremendous.) Bob at Ready Made Resources (one of our advertisers) does free-of-charge consulting on alternative power system specifications. They can let you know how many panels you'll need, the inverter specifications, et cetera. If you install cistern for gravity flow to your house, you can even install a PV system without any batteries, that is simplicity itself: when there is sun it pumps, and when there isn't, it doesn't. (A float switch will stop the pump whenever the cistern is full.)

Dear Jim:
First, thank you for your informative site. I know you`ve helped me, and many others fill in the gaps in knowledge for preparation for times to come. I live just three miles from the San Andreas Fault , so even if the Schumer doesn`t hit the fan, "the big one" could come at any time. Thus I`ve been prepping for many years, but it was a wind storm that helped me think of this trick.

The local utility power recently went down and the girls broke out some candles,while I grabbed a couple of battery powered lanterns. Candles are great, and would not be with out them, but have inherent fire danger, I had just purchased a dozen solar yard [pathway] lights, on close-out sale for about $30 [for all 12]. With all the lights down in the neighborhood they seemed very bright all of a sudden, so I twisted off the fat Frisbee-shape tops ,and brought them inside. I started placing them throughout the house, and was able to bring a little light to each area, they are not bright, but you could walk around the entire house,with out bumping it to anything ,without any other supplemental lighting.

I started playing with improving the lighting produced by them when I realized what a great safe reusable alternative they could be. One easy way is to set them on top of a glass,and set a piece curved foil behind them, or place them in front of a mirror, I even made a little chandelier with four of them that was bright enough to play games under. I became so enamored with them that we use them every night now instead of leaving any lights at all on to make your way to the bathroom, et cetera. Another use they have is you can recharge your size AA batteries for flashlight or radio with them, they also are not going to attract a lot of attention, people may think you have a couple candles going, and [that you] are [just] as unprepared as they are. Meanwhile, you'll save on propane and white gas.

I hope this is of help to others. If you give it a try then I'll bet you`ll put a few in the house at night. Thanks for everything you do Jim, and may the Lord bless you , your family, and your readers, - Steve K.

Hello,
I just wanted to pass along a link to a company that sells new made in USA alternators for common vehicles, 190 up to 270 amps, and brackets and belts to run duals. the base model 190 amp puts out a 130 amps at idle ( factory puts out maybe 60 amps, on a full size truck) these things look built to last, and would run an inverter a lot better than stock, never mind worrying about burning out your electrical system. I will be getting one of these soon! As usual just an interested consumer, not affiliated with company at all. I saw this at the DieselPowerMag.com blog. - Matt Bradley

Sir:
I am not an electrician, and I set as system like this up at my house three years ago. It kept our food cold, and the house tolerably warm for three days when the power was out. But I endorse a couple of important differences.

First, letting your car run at idle will run down your battery. The alternator doesn't reach full output at low RPMs, so you need to kick up the throttle a little bit. How much will depend on your car. I watch the volt-meter built into the inverter, and set the engine at about 1,500 RPM, because that's where the voltage stays high enough for the inverter. Also, make sure to check the output of the alternator. (I looked it up at an online auto parts store.) When my inverter runs at full power, it draws 100 amps at 12 volts. If you have a small alternator (smaller car), then 1,500 RPM may not even be enough to power the inverter. That means you're drawing amperage out of the battery when the inverter runs at higher power.

Second, I would never power the house by using an extension cord with two male ends. JWR was right to point out the danger of potentially back-powering the grid when plugging in a hot extension cord from the inverter. Even with the main breaker turned off, the neutral is still connected to the grid. Can you imagine the liability you would incur if you accidentally electrocuted a local repairman who was trying to get your neighborhood back online? He may even be one of your neighbors. I've made mistakes in my life (no one seriously injured because of them) and I can't justify the risk of injury when it's so easy to avoid. Because the average 1,200-1,500 watt inverter will only power one or two major appliances (or one furnace blower), I recommend that you plug those items directly into the unmodified extension cord from the inverter. Yeah, you gotta move the extension cord around a bit, but you won't hurt anyone and you don't need to worry that you might ruin your inverter when the grid does come back up.

Remember, the main objective is to survive the ordeal, hopefully stay warm, and not accidentally hurt anyone else in the process. - Dave in Missouri

Dear James,
I'm sure Tom H. meant well with his article on using power from a car to power a house, but I have some serious nits to pick.

1. When talks about getting the "largest cable size you can get", it really opens a door for disaster. Electrical cable needs to be sized for the current it will be carrying. If the cable you find is too small, you risk creating an electrical fire. If it's too big, you've wasted money. What you need to do is to have a handle on the power and current that the cable needs to carry, and size it appropriately.

Remember, Power (watts) = Current (amps) x Voltage (volts).

Add up your power requirements for a given voltage, and then determine your amp load.

Current (amps) = Power (watts) / Voltage (volts).

Here is a link that gives conservative estimates for the current carrying capabilities of various American Wire Gauge (AWG) wire sizes.

2. When adding up the wattage you need to support, don't go by the tag value on appliance alone. These are maximum values possible, and probably do not represent the power used under normal circumstances. This is a case where there is no substitute for actually measuring the power draw. The good news is that it's easy to do with a Kill-A-Watt (plug-in power meter). Before TSHTF, test each of your appliances by plugging the Kill A Watt electricity usage monitor into the outlet, and then the appliance into the Kill A Watt. You can see the power being used at that moment, and the power consumed over time. For good measurements, use a Kill A Watt or similar meters.

3. Assuming the proper breakers are thrown, and the proper wires sizes are used, the weak link in this system is not the inverter but the size of the alternator output. The system cannot sustain more continuous power output than the alternator can provide. The battery may act as a 'surge protector' by supply the difference when the demand is larger than the alternator can supply, but that will quickly drain the battery.

It would be wise to find out ahead of time how big your alternator is and plan accordingly. The good news is that there are after market alternators available for some trucks and 4x4s which are designed to output more power to run tools through inverters at remote work sites. Best Regards, - Bear in the Sierra

Mr. Rawles,
There are so many problems with the vehicle/inverter backup system presented in today's article that I felt I had to comment. You are to be commended for pointing out the foolishness of the power cord backfeed method, that can get someone killed in very short order. But there are other reliability/safety concerns the author does not address. These include vehicle alternator issues (overheating from insufficient air flow, diode current ratings, etc.), SLI battery limitations, connection issues, ground bonding, and transient inverter loading concerns.

For the record, I am a degreed electrical engineer and certified reliability engineer, and have over twenty years of experience with power inverters ranging from a few hundred watts up to 300KW (that's right, 300,000 watts). Best Regards, - John in Colorado

JWR -
The article written by Tom H. contains some dangerous advice and overlooks some important issues. He wrote:

"Next, cut the receptacle end (female) off the 120 VAC extension cord and install the replacement 120 VAC plug (male) to the cord. Make sure it's wired correctly. (Black to black, white to white and green to green). You will now have a cord with a [male] plug on both ends."

Such a modified power cord [commonly called a "disaster cord" or more aptly a "suicide cord'] is extremely dangerous, and should never be made. If one end is plugged into a power source, the other end now has exposed electrical contacts and anyone touching them is in danger of electrocution. Don't take the chance of killing your child, spouse, or even yourself by having such a cord around where someone could try to use it.

Tome also wrote: "After making sure the main power disconnect is off, plug in one end of the extension cord to the inverter and the other end into any 120 VAC outlet in your house."

Most homes in the USA have what is known as 120/240 volt single phase power coming into the house from the electrical company. A few may have 3 phase power.

Back feeding a 120 volt outlet with power will only energize 1/2 (or 1/3 if you have 3 phase power) of the 120 volt loads in your house. If your furnace, refrigerator, deep freezer, or other critical load is not on the same "leg" of your power panel as the outlet you are back feeding, it will not get power and will not run. Worse, if a load such as a furnace has motors that run from 240 volts, single or 3 phase, and power is applied to only one leg of the motor, it could damage or destroy the motor.

JWR added this advice: "The best and safest solution is to have a qualified electrician install a proper bypass circuit breaker panel that will eliminate any risk of a back feed!"

This is certainly true, and may be the only easy way to be both safe and meet electrical code when providing backup power to a furnace. There are some other solutions that are safe, however.

Here is an easy solution if your furnace only requires 120 volts AC at some reasonable amount of current. If you are competent to work on your own electrical panel (a working knowledge of electricity is a useful survival skill), you can determine which breaker powers your furnace, and disconnect the wire to the furnace from the breaker. Mount a small electrical box with a single 120 volt outlet on it next to your breaker panel, and feed it from the breaker that former fed the furnace. Drill a hole in the box next to the outlet and bring a short power cord with a male plug on the end out through a grommet (to protect the cord from damage as it exits the box). Run the other end of the cord into the breaker box and wire it safely to the power wires going to the furnace. When the short power cord is plugged into the new outlet, electrically the furnace is hooked up just as it was before you started.

If you unplug the cord from the outlet, and plug the cord into an inverter or generator, you can safely power the furnace with zero danger of back feeding the power lines. Back in 1999 I made such a modified power feed to my furnace, and tested it with an inverter powered from a pair of golf cart batteries. Because the furnace was a low power consumption type (hot water heat) I was able to get around two days of power for my furnace before the batteries needed charging. A large 50 amp battery charger would recharge the pair of batteries in a few hours. Therefore, I would only need to run my generator when I needed to recharge the batteries, or when I needed more power for appliances such as the deep freezer or refrigerator. If I kept the doors shut on the deep freezer and refrigerator, a hour or so of power
twice a day from my generator would keep them cold.

Tom wrote "A car that is quietly idling, parked in the driveway, is not going to stand out. ... As long as you have gas for the car, you are in business."

While most inexpensive generators make more noise than an idling car, they also use far less fuel. If you spend the extra to get a very quiet generator such as many of the modern inverter/generator sets, you can have both the quiet and low fuel consumption.

Blessings on you and your family! - RAR

Jim:
I think that Tom presented a very inventive idea, but I have personal reservations about it. I haven't actually tried this in a real world test scenario, so these are just theoretical observations:

1.) Under normal circumstances, the higher the load placed on the alternator, the more energized it becomes. As the current draw on it increases, the mechanical resistance required to turn it becomes higher. The engine RPM increases to compensate. Higher RPM, more sound. (If you ever want to see the max amount of power your alternator can put out, try to find instructions on how to "full field" it. I would not recommend doing this on a vehicle with computer controlled anything!)

2.) Power loss because of clip on jumper cable connection will be high. A secondary effect of this will be high heat problems in the DC side of the wiring, possibly enough to melt the insulation off the wire.

On a side note, when looking at jumper cables to carry with you, buy the larger cables (Lowest number AWG). Trying to jumpstart one of my vehicles in 25 degree cold that had been sitting for three months took me two pairs of "el cheapo" 12 gauge cables. Larger diameter cable = lower resistance and heat buildup = more electrons streaming into your dead battery

One way to decrease this would be to replace your vehicle battery cable connectors with marine style terminal ends (The ones with the wing nut and post on them) and securing the inverter to the battery with actual ring terminals. The more surface area you can get in the connection, the better. Be warned however, most marine style terminal ends I have used have a noticeably smaller inside diameter than regular automotive terminals. They will require some force to go over your auto battery terminal posts.

3.) If a running generator will make you a target, a running vehicle will as well. - A.R.

Dear Sir,
As someone who has both solar photovoltaic/battery bank and multiple generator standby power options at home, and at a remote airfield location without grid power, I would like to offer my opinion on the article "Covert Home Power for When The Grids Go Down" offered by Tom H on Thursday December 17th 2009:

The use of a vehicle based generator system does offer a number of potential benefits, most importantly the regular running, maintenance (hopefully?) and fuel replenishment aspects, not to mention a large and safe fuel storage capability - you do always keep your tank at least half full? Without these important activities the author is correct that small gas powered generators become nothing more than "garage queen's" - and expensive ones at that after a year or more in storage.

As with all things in life there are also unfortunately an equally if not larger number of negatives/limitations associated with vehicle based generator methods. The relative fuel economy of a small gas or diesel powered engine, compared with a typical car/pickup engine (and its' 12V electrical generation capability) is vastly different. The much larger vehicle engine capacity and all of the accessories attached to it (water pump, air conditioning pump, power steering pump, and all of the associated drive trains/belts for these etc.) take power, and this comes from the engine and the fuel, increasing consumption. When was the last time you had a vehicle with a pull cord "re-coil" style starter option found on most small gas engines?

There are other issues too, such as leaving your vehicle engine running (not overly covert?) and the risk of vehicle theft as most modern engines will need the key in the ignition to run (especially bad if someone is looking to G.O.O.D. and needs functioning transport with available fuel). If you do choose this option, do you have a spare key to lock the car with the engine running? You may want to consider fitting a wheel clamp or similar to deter someone driving off - you may already have one if you own a larger trailer or caravan/camper?

Connecting to the vehicle battery with jumper cables often stops you from fully closing the hood, or risk a short circuit if you do, so a raised hood may be another give away and can increase the noise signature of the running engine too. The longer the cables (and I agree that thicker is better) the greater the power loss, so shorter cables are better, but this then places the inverter at greater risk of being stolen - you also need to protect the inverter from any water/moisture ingress - even next doors dog relieving itself! Consider permanently fitting a high power 2 pole connector to your battery (e.g. Google "Anderson SB connector") under the hood and a matching end on your jumper cables. This can then be used to jump start other cars, power your inverter (winch, any other 12V appliance), and stops people from borrowing your jumper cables as they only work on your car now! This method also reduces any risk of polarity reversal/short circuit accidents.

One option seldom considered when using a vehicle based generator is the "extra battery method". Take a large car or truck battery (or leisure battery) and connect this using the jumper cables to the vehicle battery. This can be located inside the (ventilated) garage and you can use slightly longer and/or thinner jumper cables with this method. Connect the inverter (also now in the garage) to this second battery and it provides a "reserve of power" for heavy starting loads - recharging from the running vehicle once this is passed. Remember that 2,000 Watts of power from the inverter is around 200 amps at 12 VDC (there are losses in the inverter) so you are placing a considerable strain on the vehicles electrical system - how many vehicles are capable of continuously producing this amount of 12v power from their alternator system, and even if they are the considerable heat generated will not be so easily dissipated as there is little if any air movement that would come from a moving vehicle in normal operation? The radiator fan will cool the engine, but by doing so will blow hot air into the engine bay where the alternator is housed, right next to a really hot engine too. You may want to check the continuous rating of your vehicle's alternator output, and factor in the cost of repairing/replacing it verses the costs of a separate generator?

There are some very special instances with hybrid vehicles where they are capable of generating much larger amounts of electrical power (e.g. Toyota Prius), but these are the exception rather than the norm. If you have a Prius/Lexus then Google "Prius UPS" for details on these systems - they can even automatically start/stop the engine as power is used from their onboard battery systems, increasing fuel efficiency and running time. These really are the best vehicle based generator systems if you already have such a vehicle.

There have been many articles on the use of back feed "suicide cables" to power to grid down locations, and whilst these are functional there are considerable risks associated with this method. The best option would be in install a power inlet and transfer switch if at all possible. If you are going to use a back feed cable I would advise you to set up a check list of actions (for both connecting and disconnecting/returning to grid power), and follow these in strict order to ensure you do not cause a dangerous condition - remember it may be dark/cold when you are doing this and you may not remember exactly from memory what is needed - pilots (amateur and professional) use check lists, and they regularly practice their emergency actions, so take a hint from people who really need to get things right first time! I would also attach a brightly coloured plug or label/streamer to the "live" end of the back feed cable as a reminder not to touch this when the system is back feeding power. The location you choose to plug this in must consider risks from people tripping over the cable and pulling it from the receptacle - exposing the live pins. Anywhere that children may be able to access it is not even considered in my opinion!

A couple of options not considered are small diesel and propane powered generators. Diesel fuel stores for much longer than gas (especially with anti fungal compounds added) and once warm the engine can run on a variety of different "fuels" including cooking oil, heating oil, even clean engine oil at a push, but if you do not have anything else that is diesel powered it can prove difficult to "rotate" your fuel supply" (even if that is only every 2 - 3 years) and they can be much harder to start in cold climates. Propane stores almost indefinitely, you can use it on your gas grill in the summer and this can also provide standby heat and cooking facilities all year. A few medium sized propane bottles (a minimum of 2 - use one, plus a full spare) can be safely stored in a garage or shed, and far more safely than gas (petrol) IMO. The down side for both of these being that the generators are typically more expensive to purchase initially.

Please do not think that I am being negative with my comments. Any system is better than none, and vehicle based systems can and do work so long as you acknowledge their limitations in running time, security and power available etc. (I would not aim for much more than 800 to 1,000 watts continuous, even if you do buy a bigger inverter [~1,500 Watts] to allow for "start-up" surges). The components required for vehicle based systems can also be "recycled" into a more permanent fixed solar/battery/generator system as time and funds permit.

Whilst "modified sine" inverters are much cheaper than the "pure sine" variety, you should be careful with electronics/motors working from modified sine power. Ordinary filament light bulbs work fine, but some compact fluorescent lamps can flicker or make high pitched noises on modified sine power. Some items such as cell phone chargers and other "transformer-less" wall-wart power cubes can fail quite spectacularly on modified sine power, as can some satellite/cable boxes in my experience - if you can afford a pure sine inverter then this is the choice to make.

Finally it should be remembered that any small engine (gas/diesel/propane) can also provide considerable distraction when trying to get them to work after periods of storage, when after a few minutes it should have become obvious that it isn't going to start and that you should abandon it for now and implement plan B, only returning to it when this is working. (You do have a plan B, right?)

My thoughts and prayers are with you and your family at this time, and I hope and pray that the true meaning and message of Christmas will support you all over the holiday season following your loss of the Memsahib. Kind regards, Ian H. - NSoB (Nanny State of Britannia)

Jim,
The Army sent my organization a cheap generator several months ago as part of a bigger system. About a dozen of them went out to various Army posts to be used by civilian trainers, some of them have no military background. This week, several of our sites tried to start their little generators and were shocked that they were inoperative. (I am just as guilty as they are. We have all ignored our generators since September.)

There are basically two types of internal combustion generators out there, main power generators and backup generators. The difference in cost between the two types is substantial. Heavy duty power plants are more than ten times the price of a backup generator, so as a compromise, many of us wind up owning a backup generator of some kind. There are lots of little micro-generators around 1 KW, but I am not talking about those. They are really too small to be much help, but the larger ones can be very useful for keeping refrigeration or pumping water or any number of tasks when the grid is down.

The typical backup generator is about 6 HP gasoline rated for something like 3,500 watts and costs from 300 to 600 dollars. The following is specifically written about a "All Power" AGP3002D 3,500 watt gasoline generator, but since it's is a typical survival generator this will also apply to many different models and sizes. I am talking about any generator too big to carry but small enough to wheel (and has wheels). If it has convenience outlets instead of a wiring collar, and it's big enough to to run a freezer, I am talking about your generator. These are not top-of-the-line generators, but they are a pretty good if you take care of them and use them within their limitations. They are basically backup generators intended for short duration events. They should be fine for short duration crisis and in a total collapse, unless you have made a substantial commitment to storing fuel, your cheap generator will easily outlast your fuel supply.

There are two basic approaches to backup generator maintenance: You can maintain it constantly ready for action, or you can mothball it between missions. Most people don't really need to be able to push a button and have their generator come to life. In fact, if they can get their generator up within about half an hour, that's probably just fine. Also, most people need a backup generator very infrequently. Maybe less than once a year.

Mothballing is probably the best choice for most people.

To mothball a generator, drain out all the gasoline. You can let it run dry or drain it from the fuel filter (or disconnect the fuel line). Be careful. Gasoline is explosive. When you try to start it later, you will have to keep pulling the starter rope until you suck fresh gasoline though the system....be patient and keep pulling.

You can leave the oil in the engine (and probably should) but if it sits for a year without starting, you will need to drain the oil and replace it with new stuff before you use it. Look at the oil before you use it and use common sense. If your oil is ever black for any reason, it needs to be replaced immediately. The engine only holds a little over a half a quart (.6 liter for the model I have). Use regular 10W30 oil. No need to get fancy.

Protect the generator from the elements while in storage. You can leave it in a garage and haul it out when needed. If you must store it outside, you are risking weather damage and theft. Most of these things are not really made to sit outside in the weather, so try to store them in some kind of shelter.

When the grid power goes off and stays off long enough for you to use your generator, Oil it, fuel it and start it up. Plug in your stuff and smile smugly at your own cleverness. You should start it up at least once a year and it should work when you need it. That's pretty much all there is to mothballing.

Or, you can maintain your generator ready to use on short notice. That requires more work. Regular maintenance requires you to run it under load for about an hour per month. You will need to follow some steps to do it safely.

You should follow this procedure whenever you run the generator for any reason.

1. Put in fresh gasoline. For maintenance run-up, about a pint of any kind of unleaded should be enough. Don't use much because gasoline has a short shelf life and turns into varnish (or technically....gunk) in a few months. You ideally want to burn through all your gasoline every couple of months, so only add a little and then run it almost dry every month. I think old fuel may be the most common cause of failure in small engines. Don't leave old gas in your tank or you will be sorry. I don't know much about fuel preservatives, but they seem to be unnecessary unless you are storing a lot of fuel. If you have only a few containers of fuel for emergencies, you can rotate them and burn the fuel in your car or truck. I only keep about 20 gallons and rotate my fuel every month. On my model, there is a fuel filter (glass bowl type) in the back. It has a drain plug for removing water. If you have a fuel filter bowl you really need to check this when you refuel and drain out the water if you see any. (it will be the lower layer...duh). My tank is sized to run the generator about 8 hours under a 1,500 watt load. It holds 4 gallons, so I can expect to need about a half gallon per hour of use.
2. Check the oil level, You will need to change the oil after the first 20 hours of operation and then every 100 hours thereafter. There is often no oil filter so this is really important. You may need to siphon or pump the old oil out if there is no drain. The oil level is usually checked at a cap or plug at the bottom of the engine. There is no dip stick on cheap gas engines. The oil plug is slanted into the base of the engine so that when the generator is level, the oil level should be exactly as much as it will hold with the oil plug out. (like a lot of lawn mower engines.) If a few drops spill out when you open the plug, that's perfect but basically, if you can touch the oil with your finger without inserting it past the first knuckle, (an inch or so below the top) you have enough. Even dirty oil is much better than no oil. If you ever run it without oil you will be very sorry.
3. Check the air filter periodically and wash it with soap and water when it's dirty. (if it's a replaceable filter, you will need spares). The manual on mine says to clean it every 60 hours, but in a smoky or dusty environment, you may need to clean this filter every time you refuel.
4. Ground it! Generators are dangerous. You are supposed to ground it using a long grounding rod. You might be ok strapping it to plumbing, but a dedicated ground rod is usually safer. If you are in doubt, wet the ground around the rod with salt water (or any water)...about 10 gallons to increase conductivity. Sand is a terrible conductor. If you hit bedrock, drive it in horizontally for it's full length instead of leaving it sticking out. This is potentially lethal, so don't screw it up. If you get a kid killed, you are really going to feel bad.
5. Turn on the engine switch (mine is on the control panel, but it can be anywhere. Push the choke as far as it will go if you have a manual choke. (Mine is hidden by the air filter. It will be on the same side).
6. Pull the starter rope fast but smoothly until the engine starts. (crossing your fingers seems to help). When the engine catches, let it run a few minutes and then push the choke back to the run position. Let it run 5 minutes before attaching a load.
7. Attach a load that draws at least 1,000 watts. An electric space heater or even an old steam iron will work for a load. I have always heard that running a generator without a load is bad for it, but I am not sure if this is just superstition or if it is fact. I have always used a load because I am a primitive, superstitious primate. If someone knows the definitive answer, I would love to hear it.

My generator is rated at 3,500 watts, but that's a lie. That's the start up surge capacity. My maximum rated load is only 3,000 watts, and it's not really big enough to run that much. My system is designed to run for long periods at half load, which is only 1,500 watts. That still sounds like a lot until you start counting up the watts you need. To figure out wattage, multiply volts times amps and that gives you watts.

Example: a typical Mr. Coffee (drip coffee maker) draws 7.5 amps at 120 volts. 120 times 7.5 is 900 watts.

Get a heavy duty extension cord for safety. Thin, long cords add a lot of resistance and can heat up under a heavy load. Your cord will need to be pretty long to reach outside to the generator, so get a good one.

Your generator is going to be noisy. If you are hoping to hide a cheap backup generator, forget it. They are much louder than expensive power plants of the same size. You might even need to wear hearing protection if you are working near the engine. I do. Hiding any internal combustion engine will be even harder if everything else in the area is quiet.

Cheap engines are not overly efficient, so they stink. They also put out copious amounts of carbon monoxide. You may want to set it up downwind and far enough away to not be annoyed. Under no circumstances run this thing indoors. Without adequate ventilation \a gas engine can kill you in minutes. - JIR

Hi Jim,
Just a few additional caveats to the article: Covert Home Power for When The Grids Go Down.

Running the 120 VAC electrical system from your automobile may seem like a relatively easy thing to do, but there are some hidden issues one must be aware of.

One issue is called Power Factor which happens when a reactive load (such as a motor) is running. In simple terms you can not simply multiply the current and voltage to get an equivalent power draw from the system. Depending on how the output of the inverter is designed and protected, you can even destroy the inverter outputs. This may happen with a motor that is two large, or by simultaneously running multiple motors. It's best to check the inverter users manual or contact the manufacturer for proper operation of inductive loads like motors.

Another issue that was already mentioned is inrush current on a motor when it is starting. The additional power is used to take a physical piece of material (the motor shaft and get it moving from a stopped position. Overcoming the inertia can take a bit of extra power. A good rule of thumb is 5 to 6 times the running current draw , keeping in mind that a 1 HP motor at 120 VAC will draw at least 6.5 Amps when running under a load. Motors may have this specified on the name plate as Locked Rotor Amps or LRA. A 1 HP motor under load can draw as much as 40 amps (4,800 watts) on startup. This can simply mean that the motor won't start, or can mean you've destroyed your inverter.

Even an incandescent light has some inrush current, so it is better when using more than one at a time to turn them on separately.

Back on the DC side you can do the simple math, but there can be a problem here also. A 1,500 watt inverter at full output will draw about 125 Amps (1,500 Watts / 12 Volts). A typical automobile alternator is rated at 50-75 Amps and the higher output alternators can output 100 or more. Keep in mind also that when supplying the higher power, the automobile engine may be more than just simply idling.

The main thing here is to know the limits of your system, which will typically be your alternator and DC power source, and know those limits (preferably by testing) before you need them. - LVZ in Ohio

There is much written about the Power Grids going down (for whatever reason) and how to prepare for that event. Recommendations have been made for the installation of a generator, solar panels, battery banks, inverters, automatic system switches, on and on and on. These systems range from a simple inexpensive plug in inverter for your car 12 VDC socket (which may power a lap top or a cell phone battery charger) to an extremely complicated self-sufficient system that will operate your whole house. The simple fact is that most people will not install such systems for a variety of reasons ranging from cost to placement and sometimes simply knowledge. Short of installing a complete off the grid system, almost every other solution will require some sort of hassle and inconvenience. If it is winter, the problem is compounded as it takes very large amounts of electricity to run electric heaters, electric stoves, etc.(anything that produces heat). The idea is to do what is absolutely necessary; conveniently, inexpensively effectively.

Many will buy a generator, fill its gas tank, start it to make sure it runs, place it in their garage, put a full five-gallon gas can in the corner and think they have the solution in hand. Over the course of a year, the gas will turn to kerosene, or worse, (gumming up the carburetor and eventually making the gas in the can useless). They will have forgotten how to start the gen set and connect it to the house; dust will gather on both. Without considerable effort and knowledge, this set up becomes useless. Any generator use will produce noise when in operation; broadcasting to all within ear shot that you are producing electricity and potentially make you a target. If you live in a small neighborhood in a city, as most do, this will be of particular concern.

With a little preparation, no ongoing maintenance and very little cost there is a more effective solution to powering part of your house, one or more appliances at a time, and not bring attention to yourself and enjoying the use of electrical power. This is particularly valuable if the power outage is in the winter. Powering only your furnace will keep you warm and keep your pipes from freezing. Most people reading this are already somewhat prepared in the areas of food, first aid, etc.

What Do I Need ?

In its most simple form, you will need the following:

1. Heavy duty automotive jumper cables in the largest cable size (diameter of the wire) that you can get.
2. A 12 VDC to 120 VAC inverter. For $200 or less you can buy this at a discount store, many auto parts or sporting goods stores, and a myriad of other places. Thy typically range in size from 1,000 watts to 2,000 watts in capacity, and are about the size of a small briefcase. The larger size is preferable to the smaller ones as they provide more power and therefore will power more items at the same time.
3. A 120 VAC extension cord. This should also be of the largest wire diameter (gauge) that you can find.
4. A replacement 120 VAC plug for the extension cord.
5. Extra stored gasoline for your car.

What Do I Do With This Stuff?

First, locate the main power disconnect (breaker or switch) that connects your house to the Grid. This is normally on or in the meter box. Turn it off. In this condition, even if the power comes back on, you will have no power coming into your house. This also duplicates a Grid down condition. Under no circumstances turn the main power disconnect back on while the inverter is attached to the house.

Turn off all the sub-breakers in your house. (Hopefully you will have identified which breaker powers what items or rooms in your house). Do not turn off the main breaker in this panel. This second main breaker must be in addition to and separate from the main house power disconnect.

Next, cut the receptacle end (female) off the 120 VAC extension cord and install the replacement 120 VAC plug (male) to the cord. Make sure it's wired correctly. (Black to black, white to white and green to green). You will now have a cord with a plug on both ends.

The shorter you can make any DC cables, the better. (There is significant "line loss" in DC cabling, but not in AC cables.) Make the cords and cables as short as you can between the inverter and car. Do not modify the jumper cables unless you have the tools to do so correctly.

[Editor's Strong Warning: Putting AC power into an outlet in your house might seem like a simple solution, but it can create a dangerous "back feed" condition that could electrocute a power lineman, when an attempt is made to restore power to your neighborhood! It is ABSOLUTELTY ESSENTIAL that you turn off your home's main circuit breaker before energizing your home's wiring with any alternative power system. The main breaker should be "tagged out" with a prominent warning sign, or better yet both tagged out and "locked out" physically. The best and safest solution is to have a qualified electrician install a proper bypass circuit breaker panel that will eliminate any risk of a back feed! - J.W.R.]

Place the inverter on the ground in front of the car. Connect the inverter to the posts on your car battery (pos + to pos + and neg - to neg -) with the jumper cables. Make sure the connections are as tight as possible. After making sure the main power disconnect is off, plug in one end of the extension cord to the inverter and the other end into any 120 VAC outlet in your house.

At this point you should start your car. (Warning: Do not run your car in your garage, or you may get carbon monoxide poisoning.) When you then turn on the inverter, you will have 120 VAC going into your house to the breaker panel. Your car battery will start to discharge and may not have enough juice to start it later, so do not turn on the inverter without the car is running. As you turn on a breaker, it will send power to whatever is plugged into the outlets on that circuit, and those items will operate, unless they require more wattage than the inverter produces.

As long as you have fuel to run the car, the car alternator will charge the battery, which runs the inverter, which then produces 120 VAC power to your house. A car that is quietly idling, parked in the driveway, is not going to stand out. A car can often be idled safely for many hours in cold weather, but in warm weather, over-heating may be a problem.

What I have described is not the ideal, most efficient way to do this, but it is the least expensive and simplest way to have power while not alerting scavengers. As long as you have gas for the car, you are in business.

There Is A Catch

The inverter will only run items which do not exceed the wattage rating of the inverter. For example, if you bought a 1,500 watt inverter, it will only run 1,500 watts total at the same time. (e.g. fifteen 100-watt light bulbs). This necessitates you do a little homework. As you can see, you can quickly overload the inverter. Your electric oven, your electric dryer, and some other appliances will not work. (They require too much power, and are often on 220 VAC circuits.) [JWR Adds: And keep in mind that the peak current draw comes with an electric motor's start-up.]

Your furnace may take 1,000 or more watts to run the blower, the microwave may take 1000 watts, the your refrigerator another 1,000 watts, and so forth. You must know how much power is consumed by each item in your house, or you will quickly overload the inverter. If the tag on the appliance doesn't tell you how many watts it takes, it may tell you how many amps it draws. You can convert amps to watts by multiplying the amperage (it may say 2 amps) by the voltage (120 volts). This item will draw 240 watts. The amperage listed is almost always more than it actually takes.

As you can see, this arrangement will allow you to run individual appliances at the same time, but no more than the inverter will handle. You must do a inventory of every item that is plugged in and know what breaker controls each. If you have your refrigerator plugged into the same breaker as your furnace, the inverter may not power both at the same time. You will then need a bigger inverter. Unplug every item in your house that is plugged into an outlet, and know how much power you are using for every item. It may be that all you need to operate concurrently is the furnace and a few lights, or the refrigerator and a few lights. Do the math. You may not want to run lights anyway, as this will only draw attention to you.

If and when the grid power supply returns to normal, disconnect the inverter, from the car and then the house, turn your main house to grid disconnect back on, and you are back to normal.

A little organization, planning, and thought will allow you to continue on through a emergency without a lot of expense, undetected by the outside world.

Jim:
The letter about Generators today inspired me to write this email. I have owned generators for around 20 years for emergency backup and portable power uses. I use my generator primarily for powering sound equipment in the field. As a result I looked for a quiet generator. The very quiet generators all run at 1,800 RPM, but it is expensive to make a generator that runs slow and quiet, and the affordable portable generators all seem to run at 3,600 RPM.

When I purchased my current generator 10 years ago, Coleman had just started using the Briggs and Stratton "Vanguard" OHV engines in their generators. These I found to be significantly quieter than the
typical generator engine, though not as quiet as a 1,800 RPM engine.

With regards draining the fuel, I have found the key is shutting off the valve in the fuel line under the tank and letting the engine run until it starves for lack of fuel. It is not necessary to drain the
fuel tank or take other steps in my experience as long as the valve is closed and the engine run dry of fuel. My current generator has had fuel in the tank for its entire ten year life and starts on the first
pull every time. Of course Sta-Bil. or Amsoil's gas stabilizer is always added to the fuel.

The most important issue for long generator life is clean oil. Oil gets dirty from dirt in the air. The engine on my generator has a dual air filter with both a pleated paper filter and an oil soaked foam filter. The combination seems to do a good job in keeping the engine oil clean.

It is also important to use an oil that does not break down under use, and that keep water in suspension so it does not rust engine parts. I use Amsoil's Synthetic Marine Oil in my generator, but when my current stock of oil is used up I will probably switch to the new Amsoil Synthetic Small Engine Oil. (I recommend Amsoil Synthetic Oils for all your cars as well.)

I have a plastic storage bin that holds spare air filters, spare spark plugs, and oil for my generator along with the needed spark plug wrench and a fuel siphon. I keep one or two 6 gallon gas cans out in
my shed (not in our garage or house for safety). Since all our vehicles have full tanks of fuel, I can always use the siphon to refill the gas cans.

Running the generator under load every few months is an excellent idea. Always start and stop a generator with no load connected. If your loads are connected during start up in particular the voltage
surges as the generator engine gets up to speed and settles to a constant running speed can destroy electronic equipment, and is not good for any equipment. Get the generator running at a steady speed,
and then plug in your power cords. Likewise disconnect the power cords before stopping the generator

Blessings on you and your family! - RAR

Mr. Rawles,
I live in Florida and have had quite a few encounters with week long power outages due to hurricanes. Four years ago I converted my portable generator to run on natural gas for only a little more than $200.00. I don't have to worry about ethanol contamination in the carburetor anymore. The conversion is also able to run on propane, or back to gasoline with only the re-gapping of the spark plug. It has a pull start and only takes one or two pulls to start after sitting in storage for months. Here is the web site where I ordered the kit. - Jim H

Greetings Mr. Rawles,
I just wanted to pass along a quick reminder to your readers who took the time and expense to buy a backup generator, but haven't taken the time to periodically test and maintain it. Here in southeastern Virginia, we are still recovering from what was called the "Atlantic Assault" by the hyperventilating reporters on the Weather Channel. To be fair, though, this was indeed a whopper of a Nor'easter that gave us flooding only a foot or so less than Hurricane Isabel in 2003. We lost power the evening of November 12, but luckily got it back 29 hours later even though we were told to expect several more days of grid-down living. But here's the kicker: on my street, only two of the four houses with generators could get them started. Of three other friends I checked with after the storm, there was one other [like me] that could not start his generator. So what's going on?

As many boaters unfortunately have also discovered, infrequently used engines are suffering significant damage to their carburetors from the ethanol in our gasoline supply. Extra precautions to completely drain fuel tanks, fuel lines, and carburetor float bowls are absolutely essential before putting the generator away for storage. Ask me how I know...

I was also guilty of insufficient testing and maintenance, but I discovered my mistake well before this storm. In early June I pulled my generator out for its yearly testing at the beginning of hurricane season. Yes, I know. Testing my backup power source only once per year was pretty stupid. Anyway, no amount of cord-pulling or carburetor cleaning would induce my generator to start. The gasoline had stabilizer in it, and even draining the old gas and using fresh didn't help. I eventually got tired of messing with it, and I bought a replacement carburetor via eBay for $70. After installing the new carburetor, along with a new in-line fuel filter from the marine parts store, the generator started on the second pull and ran like new.

I now have a standard monthly testing cycle for my generator that runs it under load for about half an hour. I also have a standard routine for servicing my generator after each use. This routine includes draining the fuel tank, pulling and draining the fuel lines, and fully draining the float bowl of the carburetor. I even leave the lid off the fuel tank for a few hours -- in a well-ventilated space -- to let it completely air dry. And I also have a new schedule for changing the engine oil. During heavy use, I change the oil every once three days (about 50 hours) of operation. Otherwise, I just change it once per year. Remember that oil is cheap and it's the life-blood of a small air-cooled engine.

So my generator was one of the ones that worked during the recent storm, and I was able to run 12-gauge extension cords to two of my neighbors to keep their refrigerators running, too. It was nice to be in the position of being able to help others rather than needing help myself. I hope your readers can learn from my mistakes and how I corrected them. - Mike in Virginia

James
One of the most troubling things I see when speaking to people about going off grid is how badly they want to keep all of their electrical appliances and just spend many thousands of dollars on a battery bank more appropriate for a U-boat and solar cells or generators to keep them topped off. Having had a minor role in a micro-satellite system design proposal one thing you learn when confronted by limited power supply is to either economize or do without.

The appliances you own for on grid use are not efficient. They are built to be inexpensive or if you are better off durable, even the fancy electrical appliances out of Europe with the Energy Star are in reality a big waste of power once you are paying by the off grid watt for solar panels and battery banks. There is no reason a normal family shouldn't consider an off grid option for their home. Even in a national emergency and societal breakdown it is very rare for supplies of diesel fuel, gasoline, kerosene, and LP gas to be unavailable for long periods at some price.

Dryer - Enemy number one especially in a large family, a solar clothes dryer is under $5 at nearly every hardware store, ask for a clothesline. Folding indoor drying racks are very popular in Israel. Even in winter indoor drying can be assisted by using a fan, it will also keep the air humidified. After trying the above and finding you just can't make it there are LP gas heated clothes dryers, but these still need mains power for the drum motor.

Oven/Stovetop - There is no reason to use electrical power for cooking. Excellent caterer grade ovens and stoves are available at most appliance stores which run totally on gas. Some may use an electrical ignition or thermostat but nearly all can be retrofitted either with a piezoelectric (no battery needed) spark starter or can just be lit with a match avoiding the danger of the old style pilot light since they now are equipped with a thermal safety. Most people find they actually prefer gas once they are used to it as it is a more even heat. We have had good success using MSR camping kerosene burners when the gas to our home was unavailable for a few weeks.

Hot Water - Nearly any off grid home will benefit from the addition of a solar collector in addition to a well-insulated gas water heater. Think about turning down the thermostat or using a secondary gas instant heating system and low flow shower heads to stretch your hot water supply.

Heating - Most stores and contractors can provide a wide variety of wood, pellet, gas, kerosene, or oil-fueled stoves and furnaces and space heaters. Insulation is key to keeping your alternative heat system from breaking your bank account.

Power Tools - Some older large shop tools can be powered by a PTO shaft or belt system. The possibilities from a gas motor, to steam, to hydro and beyond are limited only by your imagination.

Water pressure - In many areas there is not enough wind for a windmill to keep a water tower full so an electrical or gas pump might work better once all factors are evaluated. If your retreat is located below the summit of the hill it would probably be much easier to install a pool or cistern on the summit to provide pressure for firefighting operations even if your pump is destroyed, for every foot of elevation .433 pounds of water pressure is required for filling your tower or cistern and this pressure is returned when water is used in your home or property. Anyone living in a wilderness area should have in addition to a gravity fed water system of at least 1,500 gallons and a 300 gpm capacity, and at least one portable reservoir. There are portable swimming pools that are the same as US Forest Service uses for firefighting, and a gas powered portable pump for emergency firefighting. Descending water can be run reverse through some pumps generating electricity making it a very effective and inexpensive way to store electrical power once your battery banks are full.

Refrigeration - Most readers if their inventory their refrigerator will find mostly leftovers or things which actually will last until consumption without refrigeration. There are high quality kerosene and LP gas powered absorption refrigerators, some with secondary mains power optional, available from a few suppliers even in the US.

For those with the skills required to build and test a system which can withstand 250 psi anhydrous ammonia, copying the old Crosley Icy-Ball chest refrigerator-freezer is a thrifty option. Since anti-drug manufacturing laws make obtaining anhydrous ammonia difficult, an icy-ball can be built with drains on the absorptive water side to self distill ammonia from cleaning solution. A warning: Ammonia is a dangerous respiratory irritant and any homemade system should be used with caution and kept and recharged outside in case of leakage. One DIY design includes a shutoff valve to keep the ammonia from reabsorbing until the valve is opened allowing it to be stored in a charged condition.

Before refrigeration people would buy eggs and milk fresh in the city or if they could have chickens and a cow or goat would produce their own. A chicken is easily consumed by even a small family once cooked, in less than a day.

A water evaporation cooler cabinet is another very cheap option for keeping food.

Lighting - Gas mantle lighting once found in most urban homes is not difficult to implement using either camping lamps and piped gas or better yet certified indoor lamps. While in college I worked in a gun and camping shop which sold a reverse fitting for refilling disposable Coleman LP gas cartridges from the older non-tip over shutoff bulk tanks making camp lights highly practical for hanging. It must be remembered that gas lighting presents an increased fire hazard so precautions including avoiding clutter and considering the floor and wall surface must be taken into account. Battery powered florescent and LED lights and LED nightlights are also useful for reading and small tinkering. Metal halide lighting is much more power friendly than incandescent if large areas require illumination for security purposes.

Communications - Your radio communications system should have a redundant battery bank and power supply should your services be required in an emergency. It should be remembered the operating rule of just as much power as required and the usage of low power consumption modes like CW. Tube systems are notoriously wasteful of power and tubes have limited life so these should be kept as backup systems in most cases. Only power up satellite Internet systems after you have typed up all the e-mails and set them up to send immediately after going online. There are offline viewers which will call up all the web sites you normally visit and grab them all for later viewing.

Television sets, satellite receivers, and large stereo systems are wasteful of electrical power if left on. A small notebook computer for occasional movies and an MP3 player for music will save many valuable watts. Unplug or employ a disconnect switch [or power strip with switch] on all electronics unless they are in use. This will protect them from power surges in addition to eliminating sleep-state power draw. [Also know as a "phantom load."]

Telephone - If your retreat can obtain telephone service a secondary redundant system connecting you to selected neighbors can be set up in some areas by ordering an old style alarm or bell line to one central home, this is usually cheaper than a line with actual telephone service, and should work in most telephone systems even if the central office with its redundant power goes offline but the wires are still intact. The Telephone company will either splice the wire pairs at the neighborhood box or at the closest central office, officially only for alarm systems, it is possible to set up anything from long run Ethernet or simple voice lines with an old style "everybody rings" party line. This will not save off grid watts but is a good way to add redundancy to your retreat.

Safety - Install at least two combo carbon monoxide sensing smoke alarms in your home in addition to a smoke alarm in every occupied room. In these alarms, install long life lithium batteries and check on the first of the month and every time you change to or from daylight savings. DO NOT use rechargeable batteries for your smoke and carbon monoxide alarms!

Due to the higher fire risk using flame-based alternatives to electricity I even more strongly recommend installation of fire sprinklers in all rooms, flame hoods over all cooking surfaces with automatic sprinklers that have a manual activation, and at least two standpipe and hose cabinets with 100 gpm gravity flow minimum per standpipe, ABC-rated fire extinguisher, gloves, goggles, and Nomex face shroud. Install outdoor standpipes and stocked hose locker for wildfires, a charged mobile phone for 911 (BTW, you need not have an active calling plan to use a cell phone to call 911 in the USA) and if you have to retreat from interior firefighting. Most importantly have an evacuation and rendezvous family accounting plan and volunteer with the local volunteer fire department, learn when the fire is just too big to fight by yourself.

With an engineering eye it is often possible to reduce your home or retreat electrical requirements to an inexpensive few hundred watts once alternatives are considered. Shalom, - David in Israel

Having been a “prepper” for more than 25 years, growing up in Florida where you had to be prepared for the inevitable annual hurricane, I have experienced many powerful storms, with the associated loss of power and the joy of waiting in line for gasoline. These experiences have cultivated a growing interest in solar power and how it relates to providing power in an emergency situation. Until recently photovoltaic (PV) power solutions were out of reach and electric transportation was just a pipe dream. I always wished that I could have a motor vehicle that didn’t depend on the “grid” for its power, i.e. gas, diesel, bio-diesel, ethanol, etc. With recent advances in PV technology and electric vehicle technologies, that wish is now a reality.

In the mind of the “prepper”, PV power has always been a viable means of providing power to his or her retreat, dating back as far as the early 1970s. Early visionaries put largely inefficient banks of PV panels on their homes or barns to utilize the sun’s endless power. However, back then, the primary drawback was the enormous price tag and limited power that first generation PV panels produced.  Until recently PV options have remained principally out of reach; however, with the advancements in solar technology and falling prices, as well as tremendous increase in quality and efficiency of PV panels, energy directly from the sun is now reliable and affordable for the average consumer.

With never-to-be-seen-again Federal Tax incentives, PVs are certainly worth a closer look.  Just think of the uses for solar on the family farm/retreat or even the home in the suburbs.  Power the well, produce all the power needed for the home and sell what you don’t need back to the grid for peak prices.  The uses are virtually endless around the home but what about getting around on the homestead? Why not take advantage of the sun’s limitless power with the vehicle you drive?I’m not talking about those fancy space-age looking gizmos that you’ve seen gliding along on the Salt Flats someplace in Utah. We have developed something more functional and far more cost effective for the average person or family that wants an alternative means of transportation.

The new PV vehicles that are being produced by several manufacturers in the US are classified by the IRS as Low Speed Vehicles (LSVs), most of which can be used on any road, meaning, any public road that is posted 35 mph or under and allowed by local ordinances.  These LSVs are quickly gaining national attention and are completely “Street Legal”. Likewise, there is an “off-road” or ATV classification of the LSV, which can be driven on or off-road while still qualifying as a “Street Legal” LSV. You must be a licensed driver to operate a LSV on any public roadway.

The uses for this type of vehicle on the retreat are endless, not to mention they are a lot of fun to drive. What’s even better is the “fill up” is free; all you have to do is park your LSV in the sun to let it recharge, free of charge. [JWR Adds: Keep in mind, however, that it would take more than two days of full sun to recharge a LSV's batteries that have been deeply discharged. Also, like any other lead-acid deep cycle battery bank, you will need to buy a new set of batteries once every 4 to 7 years, because of inevitable sulfation.]     

This year I had the opportunity to go to work for Long Drive Solar, LLC a company that markets and sells street legal, PV electric hybrid, low speed vehicles (LSVs) for “on-road” and “off-road” use. As long as you have sunlight, you have reliable transportation.

The product line starts with vehicles that may appear similar to a standard golf cart all the way up to 24-seat trams. These vehicles are powered by strong 5.5 horsepower motors, use Curtis charge controllers and a powerful 48-volt battery bank with eight large 6 VDC batteries, (8-Trojan T-145s, producing 260 amp hours), self-adjusting drum brakes, turn signals, headlights, taillights, brake lights, horn, seat belts, and DOT-appoved windshields.  The factory installed 210 or 230 watt solar panel is state-of-the-art, giving you higher performance, greater range, and substantially longer operating time between battery charges. Long Drive Solar has a wide range of on and off-road tires for just about any terrain or environment. Every vehicle has a 120 VAC plug-in charger, in case you ever need a conventional charge. However, under normal usage, you’ll find that the sun is all you need to keep your vehicle fully charged and ready to go.

Options include just about anything you can think of including AM/FM radio, CD player, wood grain trim, etc. But the one that I like the best is the 12 VDC to 120 VAC power inverter. This lets you have a 110 power outlet anywhere you can take the vehicle, as the solar panel acts as your own personal portable generator.  Most models sold by Long Drive Solar have been certified by the IRS and are GSA approved.

So what’s the difference between a standard golf cart and a Low Speed Vehicle (LSV)?  Golf carts are not street legal [in most jurisdictions], and most have a top speed of around 10 mph, whereas the LSVs (by law) must travel between 20 and 25 mph.  The golf cart motor is normally just 3 horsepower, while our LSVs are 5.5 horsepower, and up. There are many additional difference, so when you go to buy your LSV, make sure you get the right vehicle for your money.      

Long Drive Solar has several models to choose from but the one that works best for a retreat application is unquestionably the Scout.  The Scout is designed for on or off-road or trail use. It has 8” ground clearance to the axles, and an unusually-high 19" ground clearance to the bottom of the deck, off-road knobby tires, brush guards/bumper, front basket, and top rack (if you don’t use solar, however, I strongly suggest the solar option). The Scout comes in 2, 4, and 6 seat configurations and can also have a box body on the back for hauling hay, firewood, garden produce, or other items.  This is clearly the way to go for a rural retreat.

One of the most frequently asked questions is how far and how fast will these vehicles go. As previously stated, to qualify as an LSV, the vehicle must go between 20 and 25 mph. As to “how far”, most standard golf carts have a range of about 20 miles on a single charge. Our LSVs are constantly charging the batteries through the solar panel and have an average range of 80-100 miles [in a day] on a single charge.  That mileage may vary depending on terrain and driving conditions.  Either way, you can count on a minimum of at least a 30% increase in performance.  I’ve driven the one I have for several months and I have never had to “plug it in”, not once.

Federal and State Tax Credits
With the Federal and State governments pushing to implement “green technologies”, this opportunity is just right for those interested in buying a vehicle that is a self-sustaining, affordable means of transportation. Although a vehicle like this costs between $7,000 to $10,000 dollars (with a solar top), thanks to Uncle Sam and your local State government you get an early Christmas present in the form of huge Tax Credits. Depending on which State you live in, you could get your “dream-come-true” off-road vehicle for a net cost of zero; that’s right, zero.  If you happen to live in Oklahoma, you have the ability to capture up to 120% of the actual cost. Yes, you can actually make money by purchasing one of these vehicles. Other states, like Georgia, Hawaii, and Florida benefit in the 70-80% Tax Credit range. Go to www.dsireusa.org and http://www.afdc.energy.gov/afdc/ to find out what your State offers as Tax Credits.

Note that the largest part of the Federal Tax Credits expire on December 31, 2009 and will likely mot be renewed, therefore, all electric vehicles must be purchased no later than December 31, 2009, to take advantage of this tax credit. Individual State Tax Credits vary, some end at the end of this year, while others extend until 2015. Please check with your local State Tax Commission on the time lines.

So where can you buy your LSV?
Here’s where I get to plug our company and some of our competition. If you go to our web site LongDriveSolar.com, you can find a lot of good info and can take a look at some of our products.  Long Drive Solar has its corporate offices in Atlanta, Georgia. We also have a large Dealership in Oklahoma City and dealer representatives located throughout the US. Please give us a call or contact us online. Some of the other companies that provide quality products are Tomberlin Vehicles, Eco E ATV, Bad Boy Buggies and several others.  Note: Long Drive Solar is the only company in the US that sells a factory installed solar system on most models of their LSVs.

Beware before you buy: When you go to buy your vehicle, make sure that your dealer provides you with certification from the IRS that their vehicle (and specifically the model you are buying) qualifies for the Federal and State Tax Credits. Make sure you check with your tax accountant regarding any paperwork you will need to get from the dealer, so that you can legally take advantage of the tax credits.

One other important note: All electric vehicles are not created equal with respect to the Federal tax credits. The IRS has many different levels of tax credits on the same vehicle. The amount of credit depends on the amp rating of the battery bank; the higher the amp rating, the higher the credit, so make sure you’re getting the most power and the highest available tax credit for your dollar.

For those of you that lean toward the “green movement”, and believe me I’m all for renewable energy, these vehicles can help with your LEEDS certification points as well as helping to offset your personal carbon footprint.

If you have always wanted a reliable means of transportation with a renewable source of energy it would be well worth your time to take a look at the new forms of sustainable transportation on the market today, as well as the once-in-a-lifetime Tax Credits that could make your solar vehicle absolutely free [after you complete your taxes for 2009]. Believe me, my solar LSV was looking mighty fine when gas was pushing $5 per gallon.

From my perspective this type of transportation is something to consider. Just remember, do your homework and buy the best you can afford because one day your life may depend on what you have invested in.

Jim:
Car batteries are designed for one thing and one thing only - delivering a bunch of power for a very short period of time. Said time is measured in seconds, not minutes, hours, or days.

I have been living "Off the Grid" for fifteen years, and can assure your readers that vehicle batteries can only handle 3-5 complete discharges before they are useless, i.e., after but a few discharges they cannot be recharged and expected to hold said charge. Ergo, they are the wrong choice for any task where discharge exceeds the constant charging input into the battery. They will not last, and the monies and the time procuring and cabling such will have been wasted.

If one intends to utilize batteries and a charger of whatever source to power lights or equipment of any sort, only use "Deep Cycle" types as the plate construction used in these is designed for multiple deep-discharges. The number of discharges varies given the size of the battery itself, and can range from as few as 100 to well over 2,000. Yes, in the case of batteries, size matters.

Another little hint: When engaged in the mathematics of power generated in relationship to end use, whether from solar, microhydro, wind, or fuel powered generators, remember that when using a battery to "store" generated power, factor in a loss of 6% of the power produced due the requirements of the chemical reaction in the battery. Period. And never forget that "Volts X Amps = Watts". If you don't model your production and usage with these numbers in mind, say goodbye to your batteries.

On the way out the door, one more bit of advice, this on "Phantom Loads." Many of the appliances we buy today are never actually "off", even though one believes such is the case. A few decades back, the appliance manufacturers decided to stroke our egos because having to wait a few seconds for an appliance to "warm up" was frustrating. Now such a wait would border on a personal insult. We demand "instant on" from everything, and this comes with a price. Even "off", many of your appliances consume power. Either you pay the power monopoly for it, or if "Off the Grid", you deplete and perhaps even destroy your batteries.

The easiest way to find how much your favorite appliance is robbing you is to buy a little device called a Kill-A-Watt [electricity usage monitor], about $30.00 or so, available at hardware stores and places like Lowe's and Home Depot. One plugs it into the wall and then you plug the appliance into it, with the appliance still "off". Much to your surprise and then chagrin, a little digital readout tells you how many "watts" that appliance uses when it's "off". Pardon the pun, but the results will "shock" you. That television that is presumed "off" may well be using 30-40 watts constantly, 24-7-365. Add in stereo components, computers, printers, and all those other things that we believe make life worth living and pretty soon we're talking about real money. And if you are dependent on a battery bank, well, you get my drift. It's more than just money.

Solution? Whether "Off the Grid" or dependent on a power monopoly, put all such appliances on power strips, and when you want them truly off, shut down the power strip. Then "Off" really means "Off". There's no point in paying for something your aren't using, and if out there pioneering, ignoring this will destroy your batteries, Good Luck! - J. Mo

James,
I noted with concern one item in the recent blog article: How to Capitalize on Urine, Car Batteries, Wood Ashes, Bones and Bird Schumer, by Jeff M. He recommended using car batteries for lead to cast bullets from. As a caster myself I have learned that this is an extremely hazardous thing to do. The lead plates in car batteries are impregnated with arsenic and calcium to aid the the chemical reaction to generate electricity. Melting these down will generate arsine gas which is highly poisonous. He also recommended using lead wheel weights. [Traditional lead alloy] wheel weights [made before the recent switch to zinc] are the preferred metal for most bullet casters. While they contain about a quarter of a percent of arsenic they do not contain calcium and do not generate arsine gas when melted. Safety First!
God Bless, - Jim E.

Throughout the last few centuries, mankind has been building and building up, combining raw materials and energy to create... stuff. This stuff is scattered all over urban population centers, and many of it can be used for basic life-sustaining purposes. I thought I'd write in and share some information I've gathered over the years in my work and in my hobbies, as it relates to sustaining life if you're trapped in an urban area. I'm enumerating the primitive uses of some very basic components for those interested, this wasn't meant as a guide for building any of this stuff, further research is definitely necessary and DO NOT try any lab chemistry without becoming an expert first and observing all the appropriate safety precautions. [JWR Adds: Handling strong acids and bases also necessitates wearing goggles, extra long gloves, long sleeves, a safety apron, having proper ventilation, and having an eye flushing bottle (or fixture) and neutralizers close at hand!] I hope this inspires others to share similar uses for modern waste.

Many urbanites will not have enough room to grow self-sustaining gardens in the soil in your backyard, with the limited growing season, and even if you did it would become a target for looters. Construction of a greenhouse in your backyard with adequate security may be a worthwhile compromise. Using hydroponics in your greenhouse will maximize your yield. Hydroponics requires that you're moving fluids around in a growing medium, and this movement requires electricity in the simplest setup. It also allows you to maximize your space by eliminating huge buckets of soil. One downside to hydroponics is that it requires more advanced technology, and most often an energy supply. Another downside is a requirement for more specific fertilizers.

Car batteries can be used to power your food supply and your home, a typical setup is a very sturdy shelf to hold rows of the deep cycle variant. You can calculate how much energy you'd need to power your appliances but a better setup for survival would be to only power a single DC circuit, with some very energy efficient appliances; LED lights, laptop computers, radios, flashlight battery chargers. I have a circuit wired in my basement which can be switched to backup power, so for me it would just be a matter of wiring an extension cable out to my greenhouse.

The equipment to build a battery backup system is widely available, it's very mature technology and has been very easy to afford with the increased usage of solar energy. Solar panel prices have also dropped almost 40% in the last couple of years. I recommend that someone with the cash to spend, who has already bought a long-term supply of food and other essentials, build themselves a photovoltaic backup system to keep your electronics running for years, using deep-cycle marine batteries for storage. It happens to be the cheapest form of storage, the deep cycle batteries are available from Wal-Mart and Costco at the best prices.

I recommend some form of sustainable electricity. Most fuels will go bad with time, the easiest fuel to reliably store is propane and many homes are equipped with propane and natural gas powered backup generators. Propane is extraordinarily cheap right now as well. A 300-to-500 gallon propane tank can be bought used for around $500 in most places, and propane is selling in my area for $1.79/gallon. Propane is produced from natural gas and, along with coal, are the two fossil fuels we're least likely to see a shortage of. Regarding solar, you don't need a 5,000 watt solar panel farm to power your essentials. Just one large solar panel on a pole will be enough [to provide charging] for your odds and ends DC-powered electronics.

If you intend to use scavenged car batteries for home power, you will need to come up with a scheme to charge them. If you charge a random collection of batteries off of one charger some of them may overheat and explode. You need to have an individual charging circuit for each of them, a temperature probe is good but not necessary. The best way to do this with a generator setup is with a multiple-bank charger or charging station, or with multiple charge controllers in a solar setup. It would be a good idea to have backups, so you might as well have one charge controller for every battery. If you're running a generator, it is especially important that you use a battery backup system, as it allows you to use the energy more efficiently to charge up a battery bank which you can use for days to power efficient appliances.

Another interesting thing about car batteries is what you can do with them if you're not using them for power. Car batteries contain two main ingredients, sulfuric acid and lead. Sulfuric acid is used in many industrial processes. It's a source of elemental sulfur, and these strong acids are used to convert many other substances to something usable.

Hundreds of years ago people made saltpeter for formulating black powder by urinating in a jar and adding straw to it (almost too easy, huh?). A more industrious method would be to mix straw and manure into a pile and urinate on it regularly to keep it moist. This was called a "niter-bed". After a year, run water through it and then run the resulting mixture through a wood ash filter, and then air dry the resulting mixture in the sun. Any failed batches could always be used as [the basis for a larger quantity of] fertilizer. Your urine contains nitrogen in the form of a chemical called urea, which means it also makes a good fertilizer (1 part urine and 10 parts water immediately applied makes a decent fertilizer). The urine/straw mixture would change over the course of a few months to contain nitrates, mostly a chemical called potassium nitrate, or saltpeter. Wood ash contains mostly potassium compounds and can be used to convert remaining nitrates to potassium nitrate. Potassium nitrate is a powerful oxidizer. Mixed with a fuel it forms the ingredients of many fireworks such as bottle rockets. Black powder is made with a mixture of 75% potassium nitrate, 15% charcoal, and 10% sulfur. Sulfur can be found on the electrodes of the car batteries, or it can be produced through electrolysis of the sulfuric acid. A good rocket fuel is 60% potassium nitrate and 40% powdered sugar, should you have a need for rockets, perhaps as a signal flare.

You can buy potassium nitrate over the counter from the hardware store (Lowe's and Home Depot). It's known as stump remover and is available in 1lb bottles. If you're doing that last minute shopping, it might be a good idea to swing by the pesticides shelf and buy all the stump remover while you're getting your fertilizers and everything. Potassium nitrate has an NPK rating of 13-0-38.

In the 1890s, widespread use of "smokeless powder" was adopted, which is about three times as powerful as simple black powder. This was a result of a substance called nitro-cellulose or guncotton, which is which can be made from cellulose and nitric acid and some other chemicals by means of nitration. Nitric acid is a very useful substance. Nitro-groups or nitronium ions can be added to certain chemicals to create explosives. Compounded with hexamine fuel tablets (Esbit fuel), it forms [the equivalent of ] RDX explosive. Compounded with glycerine, it forms nitroglycerine, that with added stabilizers forms dynamite or blasting gelatin. (Not to be confused with trinitrotoluene (TNT), which is generated by the nitration of toluene.) The most useful application of nitric acid though is in making smokeless powder, commonly just called "gunpowder" today, which is a compound of nitrocellulose and a number of other proprietary ingredients. It can be made from cellulose and nitric acid and some other chemicals by means of nitration. [Reader M.H. Adds: Doing any of this will take considerable study and storing some other chemicals, since nitric acid just by itself will not (to any significant degree) nitrate organic compound such as glycerine, hexamine or toluene. For details, see the book titled "Chemistry and Technology of Explosives" by Urbanski (available online).]

The government has made it difficult to purchase nitric acid without a valid reason. You can make it out of sulfuric acid, from the car batteries, and potassium nitrate, from the niter beds. You will need some basic lab equipment to do this, a glass distillery connected to a vacuum pump (a vacuum distillery), and a hot plate. With the leftover parts of the car battery, mainly lead [and wheel weights as a source of antimony for hardening], you can mold lead bullets. The lab equipment required to perform some of these reactions is useful in many other processes, such as an ethanol distillery, so it may be something you'd want, regardless. Take care that you don't cross into illegal territory with your experimenting. Potassium nitrate and black powder aren't controlled substances, but at some point gunpowder becomes classified as an explosive and requires a permit to manufacture. [JWR Adds a Strong Proviso: This summary information is provided for educational purposes only. EXTREME safety measures must be taken, and all the legalities and zoning issues must be researched, permits obtained, et cetera. Also, be advised that the instructions presented in many of the published references on do-it-yourself explosives making have insufficient safety margins. For example, the set of directions on making nitroglycerin in the book The Anarchist Cookbook, could best be described as a "recipe for disaster." It will get you killed or at least maimed, in short order!]

Another interesting thing I'll mention is that handgun calibers and muzzleloaders are better suited for lead bullets with no copper jacket, since they travel through the barrel slower they can be made softer. Forming a copper jacket around a bullet is difficult and expensive. [JWR Adds: One notable exception to this is making jackets for .22 caliber bullets, which can be made with discarded .22 LR brass and lead wire, using commercially available forming dies.] I think it's also worthwhile to own at least one muzzle-loading black-powder rifle, and bullet forming equipment. Manufacturing guncotton is not nearly as easy as black powder. You can no longer readily buy black powder [in gun shops] today, it is less stable and more expensive to ship. Even the modern muzzle-loader propellants (like Pyrodex) are smokeless powders. So, you may find black powder is all people are using one of these days, as they can make it in their backyard. Either stockpile thousands of primers or use a flintlock style rifle.

I mentioned that urine can be used as a fertilizer, nowhere is this more true than in a hydroponic system. Plants need three main chemicals to grow, all three of which must be in a soluble form. urine is easily the best source of nitrogen in soluble form. Potassium can be gathered from wood ash easily by running fluids through it. Phosphorous is the hard part, and many fruiting plants need phosphorus, so it is the area where you focus the most energy. Bone has phosphorus in it, and a commonly used fertilizer for plants is bone meal in the form of calcium phosphate. Bone meal has an NPK rating of 4-12-0. Bat guano is one of the best sources of phosphorous, and bird droppings ("Bird Schumer") can similarly provide a good supply. Be careful with bird droppings though, many contain diseases especially pigeons. You may want to boil it first. Match heads can also be used for their phosphorus content, if for some reason you have thousands of matches with no barter value.

Back to urine fertilizers: When you urinate into the water your urine and many other nitrate fertilizers begin to break down into ammonia, which needs to be filtered out. If you've ever maintained a koi pond you know this can be accomplished with the use of a bio-filter. Another way to do it is with an aquaculture setup, which means connecting a fish hatchery to a hydroponics setup. The fish and the plants thrive off of each other. This has evolved into it's own industry called aquaponics, and has proven to be a commercial success, mainly to serve as leafy plant production on top of a primarily fish producing setup. If you get sick of eating that dried corn, try feeding it to a 55-gallon barrels full of Tilapia. Tilapia has been the preferred fish stock as it will eat a wider range of things, but the temperature must be kept warm. It's possible that even in colder climates a greenhouse would provide sufficient trapped heat to keep the fish alive.

Many of these techniques can form the foundations of exciting hobbies such as model rocketry, aquaculture, hydroponics and gunsmithing. I strongly encourage you to absorb some of these hobbies in your life, if they appeal to you. [Do plenty of research, and get lots of practice,] especially when it comes to something sensitive like fish or hydroponics. Beginner's mistakes could spell the end of you if you're depending on this for your urban survival. I've opted to fortify my suburban home on a quarter acre and optimize it for survival, with over two years of food storage for me and my family to get started and enough energy to cook it. If this is all you can afford then make the most of it!

Letter Re: Making Do at a Rural Vermont Retreat

James,
While I could wish to be west of the Mississippi, my wife and I will have to retreat where we are. My elderly parents are nearby, and my wife has made it very clear she has moved for the last time. Vermont is where we will be for the foreseeable future.

We live within a rural town of approximately 2,000 residents. We are about seven miles outside of a twin-city with a population of 28,000. We lack like-minded neighbors both in faith and preparedness. We hope our far-flung family will be able to rally here, but are realistic about their chances. Not an ideal location, but we work with what God have given us.

We own 60 acres, mostly wooded with some pasture, up and three miles out of town on a dirt road. Our home is close to the middle of the land, at the end of an 1,100 foot driveway and it is not visible from the road. The driveway could be easily blocked if necessary. We have cleared good areas around the house without giving up our privacy. We heat with any of three sources, wood, pellets, or oil. Our neighbors include a medical doctor and a nurse/midwife and two miles down the hill is a dairy farm with 400 head.

We have three spring-fed ponds, (one is stocked with trout), a deep artesian well and a developed spring with a concrete cistern. We use a small greenhouse to extend our short growing season and have apple trees and blueberry, raspberry and blackberry bushes. We can and dry fruits and veggies, I hunt and we both cook. We have about 18 months of food in storage (dehydrated, canned, frozen and grains) and expand our larder as we are able. We used to be cold weather tent- campers and have all of the equipment that goes along with that sport in both propane and white gas.
Our arsenal is varied, deep and redundant. It includes four muzzleloaders and supplies; they are hunting and hobby rifles, but they will still put food on the table or provide defense in a pinch.

We have much on our “things to do” list. Fuel storage is a problem in quantity due to permitting issues. We do have the fuel oil tank in the cellar for the tractor, but gasoline will be limited to our cans. Our only generator is small, only able to power the pellet stove, a couple of lights and a radio. We do hope to add solar in the future. Our home is not as defensible as I would like due to glass windows and doors and we lack man-power for long term survival.

We will never be as ready as want to be, but we will be as ready as we are able. Our greatest assets are Jesus and each other. - B.C.

I just met this past weekend with a group of " preparedness folk." They are on a farm about 30 miles from here. I have become interested in the subject after reading One Second After (a New York Times best seller, highly recommended!) and some writings by James Wesley, Rawles. I was surprised at who they were and the mindset I encountered. A few observations:

1) The root idea is that whether or not some disaster hits, we are far too dependent on a very fragile and tenuous energy and distribution grid. Raising your own chickens, goats, vegetables, rabbits, turkeys, pigs and cows is preferable (and more nutritious and tasty!) to standing around in a Kroger (think "post-Katrina") looking at the empty aisles.

2) They were "green" but green in a good way, and not the fashionable mindless silliness coming out of the "environmentally conscious" crowd. (Sorry if my contempt shows here)

I am talking about using a local stream to turn a box of old alternators from junked cars to produce current to charge batteries, building a steam fired boiler to run a generator, and lots of other cool ideas that are scavenged from junkyards...., including using a scrapped walk in cooler from a convenience store for a chicken coop (no insulation needed, and less heat source needed during cold weather).

3) The mark of an "advanced" society is division of labor, with the dependency on each other coming from specialization of labor being more efficient and less costly. However, we have evolved into a society of urban dwellers who produce nothing necessary for root survival needs. Cities are extremely dependent on everything being trucked in, and the ones who make the most money are the ones most efficient in distribution rather than production (think "Wal-Mart"). If that distribution system is disrupted, due to a failure of the electrical grid or a fuel supply disruption, we would be helpless. These folks recognize that.

4) I did not meet any tin foil hat folks, which surprised me. There were realtors, veterinarians, an auto parts distributor, a programmer, a cop, and a contract security guy (a "Blackwater" type, although he never worked for Xe). They were just normal folks living their lives, but concerned about the potential for future instability of a calamitous nature.

5) I was surprised at the political make-up of the group. I expected to see a bunch of rabid Republicans, fearful of antichrist Obama and the New World Order, blah, blah, blah. Rather, they were amazingly cynical of any politics, and were just as critical of Reagan (for different reasons) as Obama. Their attitude was more that of folks just trying to live their lives while being confident that their best shot at any change would come from being fiercely independent and doing what they could to remain so.

6) I was probably the biggest Bible Thumper out there. No religious zealotry at all. In my life, I have encountered a lot of religious whack jobs. I expected this crowd to be a magnet for them. It wasn't

7) I was also surprised about their attitude about guns. I expected to find a bunch of hyperventilating folks screaming out "Molon Labe!" as a password or something to enter the farm. Instead, I encountered a crowd of mostly ex-military guys who understood that guns are tools. They all hunt (mostly deer, but also squirrel, turkey, dove, and some varmints), and they all believe that they have a duty and a right to protect their families themselves and their freedoms and rights against all who would challenge them. Their attitude was that you would no more expect to defend rights and freedoms without guns than try to change a tire without a jack. Especially enlightening to me were the remarks of the contract security guy who worked security in Kosovo. Rather than sitting on his pile of weapons fervently wishing for social collapse so he could play "Rambo" or something, he just emphatically declared that if you ever lived in a society where the social order even partially breaks down, you will want to prepare for it here, but no one in his right mind would wish it.

7) The final funny observation is how close these guys are with all the ex-hippie counterculture who have moved south from Chapel Hill as the area has become completely yuppified. In fact, one of the guys there at the group was just a total stoner who had essentially moved down to smoke his own hydroponic, live cheaply, eat his own "organic" produce, and shoot, prepare, and jerk his own venison. The two types of "fringe" groups have a sort of affinity for each other, even if many other ideas are polarized apart.

The whole group of folks were not now living on the farm. There are only three families there. However, they are all affiliated with it and looking to it as a kind of resource/preparedness area in the event of:
1) a major earthquake (we sit on a huge fault line in North Carolina. I never knew that)
2) a failure of the oil distribution system
3) a major currency collapse (my bets are on this one as having the best odds)
4) a major terrorist attack on the US.
5) ..... you fill in the blank.

My wife and I are not moving down there (smile), but we are interested in some people whose ideas about simplicity and "back to nature" mirror what we would like to see ourselves. I think "survival" is an improper goal for a Christian. We are supposed to be "dead" already, having surrendered all this stuff anyway. I do think that "working with your hands so that you may have something to share with those in need" is a proper goal for myself, though. I am looking forward to interacting more with these folk.

JWR,
I've mentioned before a gizmo called a Generlink which allows a lot of flexibility when using a generator for backup power. This device is installed behind your power meter and, depending on the capacity of your generator, allows you to power any circuit in your home via the selective use of the circuit breakers. It's especially useful in that nothing has to be re-wired in the house to safely use your generator. It does require some planning for installation in that your power company will have to agree to it's use and will probably want to install it, mine was installed by my local power co-op for free. Regards, - K. in Texas

Jim,

I've recently read several of your books and found them both interesting and educational. I would like to offer some personal insights based on my experiences from living in a small rural town one of the larger Caribbean islands. Most of my notes are cheap solutions used by people in developing nations all over the world. There may be better ways, but these work and cost next to nothing.

Water:

There is something especially disturbing about opening the faucet and hearing a sucking air sound. Not being able to shower, flush, or wash dishes is the worst.

One or more 55 gallon drums and 5 gallon plastic buckets are essential items to have. When you see that hurricane on the news, put the barrel it in the shower and fill it up right away. Add a few capfuls of bleach to make it keep longer. Expect the quality of water from the town water supply to drop. Rainwater collection should be set up right away. If possible the roof should fill a large cistern with a pressure pump. A gravity tank should be put on the roof.

Washing up from a bucket is easy enough. A small plastic cup and a five gallon bucket makes is easy. If the water is cold don’t try to heat up all the water. Bring a good sized cooking pot to a near boil and add it to the cold water. A person can wash easily in 2 gallons of water.

Pouring about two gallons of water rapidly into a toilet from a 5-gallon bucket will flush a toilet.

Washing dishes from a bucket without using gallons of water is tricky. It takes some practice to do it right. If you don’t stack your dirty plates and wash them right away, you only have one dirty side and no dried food.

It is very easy to contaminate your water supply. Dirty bucket bottoms and careless bathing are common causes, be vigilant.

Food:

Our community is an exporter of meat, milk, eggs, rice, vegetables and we have a 365-day growing season. Most families have a garden plot to supplement household food. Storing food is always wise but not nearly the problem it is in some other locations. Much of our farming is done with hand work.

Power:

We have daily blackouts here and most houses have invertors with battery backups. Since we have occasional power most people do not have generators but just charge when the lights are on. Most businesses have diesel generators.

A 2.5 KW inverter system with 4 deep cycle batteries will keep a few lights on, a laptop and a fan or two for about two days and costs about $2,000. The better systems run on 24 VDC. Here we are all very aware of vampire appliances [aka "phantom loads."]. All those VCRs, TVs, microwaves, wi-fi boxes, alarm systems, clocks, all pull a significant loa