Batteries are Cheap, Backup power is expensive
Dear Audiophiles,
To make a long story short I need to make sure my Internet devices stay on even when power is down for 24 hours, which on the South Carolina coast is realistic.
I have an APC UPS 600VA which I though would do the job but it actually lasts less than 2 hours. So I have been crunching the numbers and have really been surprised at how expensive an APC UPS is per minute of run time vs. modern battery based generators and DIY solutions.
An APC UPS can be anywhere from $1.50 to $2.50 / minute of run time while an EcoFlow Delta for instance is around $0.50 to $0.75 / minute. Not only is the EcoFlow cheaper but just has ten times better run times. A single 1 kWh unit will keep my data closet running close to a full 24 hours. I have too many devices in there which consume ~ 50 watts. 50 x 24 = 1,200
I did in fact purchase a Delta 2 with back up battery for other reasons than the data closet, but when doing the research I also investigated DIY backup solutions and came across the idea of using a Renogy inverter/battery charger + 2x 12V LiFePO4 batteries. It’s even cheaper than the Ecoflow but requires much more effort to set up. I’ll do a full write-up on that soon.
What have you done to back up your home devices?
Thank you!! At this point I went super cheap. Some $70 / 500W inverter from Amazon. Also, much as I'd like to power my batteries by a renewable energy source I'm not there yet. My carbon footprint is exactly the same I'm afraid, but now when the power goes out I can be here with all of you for up to 48 hours! |
This morning around 9 AM my time my home lost all power. We are in SC but weather outside is a lovely summer morning, no wind or rain, scattered clouds. I may have mentioned this before, but we have such incidents around 2x a month, and we are not in the boonies!! I’m 30 minutes from Hilton Head and an hour from Charleston. Anyway, point is, those of you who are in areas where your surge protections is your power plug, you frighten me. My two big needs during the day is my internet hardware + computers. First runs around 50 Watts, second around 160 to 350 depending on how heavy I’m using them. Both of these stacks as it were are fed by a UPS capable of keeping them running for about 30 minutes each. I successfully transferred power over to my Ecoflow for my PCs and my homegrown battery stack for the networking gear without losing power. Not nearly as nice as having an outdoor generator which kicks in after 20 seconds.... but for my budget I have 2 days of electronics + CPAP capabilities in the future. Hurrah. To be clear, the way this worked is that I unplugged the UPS from wall power and plugged the UPS into my batteries. Now it’s battery packs --> UPS --> Electronics. A little inefficient since the batteries are now charging the UPS also, but it means I could transfer over with no interruption. |
@jwei We have at least 2 power "incidents" a month. Sometimes it’s just long enough to reset the power on the microwave and oven. Othertimes I come back and my surge protectors have turned off and have registered an "Extreme Voltage Shutdown" situation were either a brown out or white out has occurred. In terms of long term battery needs, about 1 time every three months. This is at least the third time this year, and once was due to a storm, and once... was some other random thing. The complete lack of predictability is why I keep everything on a surge protector, whether that ruins the imaging or tactile feeling of the music or not. (it does not). |
