I think the most cost-effective solution for you will be to have the existing 17kw generator repaired. Not only does it save you money and hassle from buying a new generator, it saves you money and hassle from potentially having to have your gas meter upgraded (which I suspect you would need to do for the more powerful generator - don't know for sure, though).
I know my brother, I wouldn't do it either but it will increase the value of your house by close to 10k so you're basically getting a generac for 5k
While that may be true, I won't recognize that value until the day I sell my house (and I've lived in this $hithole of a house for 26 years..ugh). Until then, I'd have to eat the cost.
I guess we'll see what the technician says about repairing the current 17kW Generac. Thanks for the advice.
Northern Tool & Equipment has the 24kw Generac Guardian Series Home Standby Generator, 24kW (LP)/21kW (NG), 200 Amp Transfer Switch, Aluminum Enclosure, Model# 7210 for sale for $5847 (discount in cart). Not sure if this is a good deal or not. You may be able to get a bigger discount if you sign up for their credit card. No clue if this is a good deal and you still have to get it installed.
Looking around, standard price looks like it's about $6500 for this model. $650 is a decent discount. Again, you can probably get points or a discount as a reward if you sign up for their credit card. Maybe knock off another $200.
"Free" 7-year warranty, too. I don't know anything about pricing or warranties on these things, though. lol.
The SGG technician came out today and in less than 10 minutes stated the unit is no longer "operable". Whatever the heck that means he's going back to the office and will provide a quote for repair parts. He left the unit off and now the waiting game begins again. If we decide to replace the unit, and SGG, can anyone recommend another installer that's willing to install a unit not purchased from them and also provide regular maintenance? SGG has received a lot of bad reviews since Beryl and it may be time to change vendors.
Got the email from SGG and they're quoting over $4K to repair the existing Generac! At that price I think I'll just replace the whole unit. I can get a new 18kW Generac for $5K with 200amp wifi transfer switch. So does anyone know of a reputable installer that can also service the generator on a regular basis? I think I'm going to drop SGG.
That is a good price but I suspect I would need to upgrade my gas meter to support a larger 24kW Generac. Do you know an installer?
I think the discount on that 24kW Generac is over - at least I don't see it when I click the link above.
Three Mile Island, the power plant near Middletown, Pa., that was the scene of the worst commercial nuclear accident in U.S. history, will reopen to power Microsoft's data centers, which are responsible for powering the tech giant's cloud computing and artificial intelligence programs. https://www.npr.org/2024/09/20/nx-s1-5120581/three-mile-island-nuclear-power-plant-microsoft-ai https://www.npr.org/2024/06/14/nx-s1-5002007/bill-gates-nuclear-power-artificial-intelligence
Bump this thread as a Houston approaches hurricane season. Amazon and Home Depot are having a great sale on the Champion Tri-fuel inverter 9kw generator for $1077. I have this generator and it worked like a champ after Beryl. https://www.homedepot.com/p/Champion-Power-Equipment-9000-Watt-Electric-Start-Gasoline-Propane-and-Natural-Gas-Tri-Fuel-Open-Frame-Inverter-Generator-CO-Shield-NG-LPG-Hose-201176/325556659 Also, does have here have 'Base Power'? https://www.basepowercompany.com/ Essentially you allow this company to install whole house batteries for emergency power backup. The price is heavily discounted at $700 one time + $225/year for 25kwh or $1k one time + $345/year. The homeowner gets seamless emergency power backup. There is an option to add a generator inlet for $1k as well. The catch is that the homeowner agrees to use Base Power as their electricity provider and Base Power gets to use part of the battery to arbitrage (buy when price is low, sell when price is high). So the homeowner is not guaranteed to have use of the full capacity of the battery in case of emergency. With the yearly fee, the company is responsible for maintenance and warranty. I personally think this is a great alternative to a whole house generator if you're okay with pulling out a portable generator during extremely long outages. It's not available in Houston yet, but it is in some surrounding areas like Sugar Land.
Maybe I didn't look long enough, but I didn't see anything definite about a guaranteed percentage of the battery pack that would be allocated to the homeowner in a Multi Day Regional outage. Ranges are given for Estimated Backup time depending on the setup chosen and how much electricity is used, but it does seem that they could have provided more clarity if they had wanted to. By leaving it Foggy, they are leaving themselves a path to sell quite a bit of the stored electricity without breaching a contract with the homeowner. The best Compare & Contrast for somebody considering this might be to find comparable Battery Pack systems that a homeowner would buy directly versus going with one of the packages from Base. Perhaps Base isn't making huge profits from the Battery Packs in normal conditions, but might be able to sell the electricity from the Battery packs for high prices when regular generation capacity is insufficient to meet demand. Base Power Plans Plan overview One 25 kWh battery—get 18 to 29 hours of backup with reduced energy consumption 36-month plan at 9¢/kWh + delivery fees, fixed Get $250 in cancellation fees from your current provider, covered Powered by 100% clean energy to support a greener, more stable Texas grid ........................................Energy + One Battery..................Energy + Two Batteries Backup Total energy.......................25 kilowatt-hours............................50 kilowatt-hours Cost...................................$695 installation...............................$995 installation .....................................$225/year membership fee ................$345/year membership fee ..........................................(year 2 onwards) .............................. (year 2 onwards) Estimated backup................18 to 29 hours ................................35 to 55 hours .........................................(low energy usage)...................... ..(low energy usage) ..............................................9 to 14 hours......................................18 to 29 hours .....................................(average energy usage)......................(average energy usage) Optional generator plug-in (available Fall 2025)....................+$1,000 to installation cost
That's a really good point. Best I can find is on this subreddit https://www.reddit.com/r/BasePowerUsers . People say that the contract states that the battery will not drain below 20%, so the homeowner could potentially only have a fraction of the 25kwh battery pack available. However, people also say that they very rarely see their battery charge dip below 50%. It likely depends on demand on the grid and whether Base Power is getting a great price on exporting. That's definitely a con of Base Power vs owning your own batteries. From a very cursory look, getting a 13kwh battery (roughly equivalent to a 25kwh Base Power system) installed costs between $12k and $15k. It would take 40 years of annual fees to add up to $12k. Honestly I have a hard time figuring out how long it would take Base Power to break even. The deal almost seems too good for the homeowner. Building a dedicated battery farm to maximize arbitrage should be more efficient. I wonder if they're in the burning loads of venture capital cash phase of a start-up to get as many people to sign up as possible.
