Quote:
Originally Posted by Fbone
How do you heat your home? I do have natural gas and the gas company does install natural gas generators that kick in when local power goes out. It does cost $5,000 - 10,000 depending on size but again they need to be installed somehow elevated. Everyone lost their central a/c units also. So things can't be placed on the ground in areas where flooding can occur.
I never realized how destructive salt water was until Hurr Sandy. My water and gas meters had to be replaced. The salt corroded the cast iron casings.
Regarding solar: it just wasn't worth the initial expense with the 30 year payback especially as I don't plan to stay here nearly that long.
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We have electric heat pump, but only turn it on when we are lazy. I run the fan on low (it's a 2-stage fan) 24/7 most of the winter (in summer, it runs a lot, but that's because it gets quite hot). I have one large sliding glass door facing south (I also have a sunroom, but not set up so it helps heat the house, only decreases need for supplemental electric heat in it), so if it's going to be 60+ and sunny, we need no heat at all during the day (it's 76 right now, for example, and I don't think it got over 60 all day and the sun is down).
However, I do cheat - we have all the wood we want for free (other than labor and some fuel to harvest, split), so we run a fire in a freestanding woodstove in the basement (with catalytic converter, it runs quite hot and will still have coals in the morning); if it's raining or going to be quite cold, we'll run a second fire in the morning.
We did have propane and a good freestanding furnace or fireplace insert can heat the house quickly, but I could not stand the smell and oily feel in the air (and it made the house quite humid); some of these issues are not there with natural gas, but propane doesn't require any electric to work (we only used this as a backup, when power was off, when we had it; that's what the wood was supposed to be, too, but we've heated with it for several years now and I like having the house as warm as I want at no increase to the utility bills in winter).
Did your natural gas stay on when the flood hit? Most utility companies can't pump it if their own power is out and most turn it off until they can run thru a disaster area and check for leaks. With earthquakes, that can be a bigger problem (one county south of here lost their gas last week due to a pretty small quake; we don't get many, but one in KY rattled the house for several seconds a couple of weeks ago). It would be good for snow problems, except we can't actually get it here (just because we are extremely far from the closest line and it would be a couple of miles run to get it to the house, if they would even consider it; it wasn't that close until a year or two ago).
As for salt water - yes, I lived on the coast for several years. You definitely don't want to buy used cards from there or anywhere north where they use salt on roads (on the other hand, NM and AZ can be good, provided you get them checked for drug residue, as nothing corrodes much in the desert).
As for solar - the price had been coming down (may again, as China is surpassing us, once again) and becoming more efficient. I've seen paybacks closer to 20 years in some areas and if you go solar hot water only, as little as 5. A maintained and working system will also increase equity, so you can consider that when looking at payback terms (if you only need to recover 30% of the cost, perhaps, the payback might be fine).
You do have to set it up for off-grid use; many are using grid tie-ins only (it's cheaper) and those won't work when the main power is off, either.
....
what was the topic of this thread, again?
Oh yeah, tablets.
Got my samsung galaxy tab 7" - the universal remote app is pretty awesome. I have a free and paid Roku app and they seem comparable (oh well, only out 99 cents, with the google sale), although neither run Angry Birds (must have actual roku remote for that). turns on my samsung tv, which I thought was bluetooth only, controls (so far): yamaha receiver, Dish DVR, roku, panasonic blu-ray and tv. need to add PS3 (will have to use IR interface, which I already have) and try to decide if I want to hook up my HD-DVD player (works great for SACD and I picked up a number of movies when they dropped to 99 cents apiece). With a remote player on my Synology box, I can control everything on the one remote (right now, I'm using two, as I need to install the DS player app on that tablet). I prefer the dish dvr remote, but the universal one does work (if a bit awkwardly, due to no page up/down choices). We'll see how long the battery charge lasts, though, to see if I stay happy with it (could be an issue, if you also try to use it for web surfing and email).