Reducing your energy needs is the single best energy-specific preparedness measure you can make. Less demand requires fewer resources. If your preparedness plans require heat sources, cooking methods and equipment that are all dependent on energy that won’t be readily available in a catastrophe, you need to make plans to generate that energy (or stockpile a ton of it). This adds a whole other layer of preparedness requirements if you’re to survive a long-term SHTF scenario – and more cost!
The prepping plans I prefer are the ones less dependent on high levels of energy. A long-term doomsday scenario (for those that survive) will look a lot like the days of old – before electricity. People got by without.
So what does it meant to prep for less energy? A comparison:
The Energy Hungry Prepper invested in a nice Honda generator to power the central heating system, well pump and half the house, and gallons upon gallons of stored gasoline. Food isn’t a concern, he has TWO freezers full of meat, veggies and ice cream! He has boxes of batteries in case he needs to power his electronic gadgets and the hoity toity battery powered optics on his mighty AR-15. He has a laptop stored in a faraday cage that contains all of his SHTF files, pdfs upon pdfs of information. WTSHTF he’ll have all the information he could need stored on his hard drive. Back up plans? He’s got ’em. He bought a smalls set of portable solar panels that charge deep cell batteries stored in his basement. He’ll be able to re-charge his cellphone – and yours too!
The Energy Happy Prepper doesn’t own a generator. He heats with wood, puts his food in a cold storage room or root cellar, and cans the rest. He does store some fuel, lamp oil as an example. He dug a well on his property, which proved helpful for the garden he maintains. He has a lot of paperback books that contain the information he needs. If he nears the end of his emergency candle supply he has a backup plan – go to bed early.
Obviously I painted a very stark comparison, but when it comes to energy needs (and many other things in life), less is more.
How do I prep around energy? More comparisons:
- gravity fed Berkey purifier versus a hand pump water purifier (physical energy)
- wood burning stove versus a furnace
- crank flashlights versus non
- crank radios versus non
- cast iron cookware that can be used with an open fire versus more pretty cookware
- bicycle versus a dirt bike
- axe and saw versus chainsaw
- map and compass versus GPS
- iron sights versus battery powered holographic scopes
You get the idea. Conveniently, many of the low-energy items mentioned also have fewer moving parts (and cost less). Simple is good.
Some survival bloggers might disagree with me as they recommend the energy dependent Kindle as a piece of survival gear, but – personally – I can’t justify the expense of the Kindle as a piece of survival gear. I would justify the expense if I thought I’d use the Kindle on a daily basis now, but as survival gear? I’ll build my survival library with paperback books.
I don’t think that anything requiring an outlet or a set of batteries is bad – let’s make that clear. I love my GPS. Nothing would beat a hand held GPS if you needed to bug out of the city. We use our freezer all the time, it’s convenient.
Daily life without power, particularly now in February, would be really rough. A generator would be nice if the power went out for a few days, but that very rarely happens and I can’t justify a generator for that. If the power goes out for a short period of time it’s an “adventure” for the kids. I question the use of the energy dependent generator in a long-term SHTF scenario. It makes noise and stays thirsty. Won’t there be enough other things to feed besides generators and gadgets?
19 comments
I liked your post. I agree with you that paper back books come first. The Kindle is just another tool in the tool chest that may or may not work for someone. The Kindle works for me and I can justify it because I have a solar roll to power it with paper back books to back up the Kindle. Just like you can justify using a GPS because I am sure you have a map and compass to back it up as well. If my Kindle breaks along the way then it is 8.9 oz out the door and I have a back up. If it makes it through TEOTWAWKI, then I have about 200 survival & medical books, non-fiction and fiction books with me at a very low weight (that is all the books I have on there right now). The best part about it is that it has a search feature that you can look up specific information very quickly. Keep up the great blog!
Joel
SurvivalCache.com
A word on the kindle. You notice in todays world when govt does something “we the people” disagree with, if we raise too much ruckass, they will back off. Shortly after, they will serupticiously thru some industry or other vehicle, find a way to impose on you what ever it is that you resisted. The kindle has direct download and no matter what you do, nothing on the web is “secure” there is nothing going on that uncle IBM doesnt know about, they are embeded everywhere on and in the web. The old standby of privacy on your library card is way out the window now. Not only can see what you are reading, but where you got and how much you paid for it. This may sound a lil over the top to you, but our system has been engineered thos way. I am very particular about even what I put on blogs and what can be traced where etc. you should take care to be very aware of your dealings on the web, cell traffic etc. and if you are reading things that you feel could be used to demonize behavior or establish a pattern of behavior or a behavioral profile(predictive in nature) you should take actions to avoid the possablity of those endroads.
Hmm, How do I prep around energy? I DONT. It is what it is, I have a wood stove and try to keep as much wood as possable on hand. If I run out in a dire emergency and need wood, I have a husquavarna chainsaw and as a last resort, I will cut any tree I can find. I have lots of lights and things that are battery operated, so I always have batteries on hand. I have some hand crank radios and a car jumper with outlets on it. During toranado season, we use it to run police scanner/wheather radio when we have to hide in the basement. I hv camp stoves, lanterns and candles etc and plenty of fuel for all(and I mean plenty!) and if power goes away for a substantial length of time(more than a month) I will probly be bugging out anyway, dont want to leave anything for the scroungers ya know….
My wood burner Insert has a small low wattage fan attached to it. It only draws about 3 watts and does a great job of circulating the hot air. I have a small solar panel, 12 volt deep cell battery and an inverter outside in an enclosure( panel on top at 45degrees). I have wired an extension cord through the chinney chase to an outlet box. In an emergency outage I can run the fan at night for about 12 hours. It warms up during the day when the battery recharges… and the fire alone keeps the house at about 80…LOL.
Also get your HAM license and a hand held radio….2 meters is good for listening in on the cops and emergency communications. I am not saying 2 meters is the do all end all, just good.
Carl
Yea, Ive been thinkin about a HAM type radion cuz I can use the repeater system and get out really long. I was looking at a Yeasu VX7R(ithink thats rt) but its pretty good chunk for a hand held radio. Ive also looked at the chinese Puxing radios, but I want a multi band so I can cover lots of different bases wit hone pc of gear. IDk, havent looked at it in a while. I really dont want ot geta license either.
I have a wood burner insert as you describe and have thought about the panels for that very reason, but I figure if it’s a worst-case scenario, I can use the old school cast iron stove in our basement. If we just needed to stay warm in a SHTF scenario, we could retreat to the basement.
I found an easy solar panel solution that works very well and is so easy to set up.
My brother just got the similar updated version and calls it a blessing especially in the winter. I will add the link so you can check it out and I can do less typing. https://2d49cd9a-epk70-9n14ucz6ubw.hop.clickbank.net/
No it will not be pre-electric if it gets that bad. It will be worse.
Prior to, that’s right prior to, the industrial revolution, England developed coal mining and distribution because they were running out of wood for heating and local manufacturing (pottery, blacksmithing, etc.). This allowed them to keep less land forested. The land that was instead used to pasture additional horses. The increased use of animal power in farming allowed them to have a agricultural revolution prior to the industrial revolution. From memory, it roughly doubled their output per person.
We will not have a pre-electric level of farming, but a pre-coal level. That is a much iffier proposition.
Egad … that’s a grim thought, but one would hope a scenario like that would be short-lived before some semblance of society started functioning again.
If you live in an Urban/Suburban area, that generator is going to generate (pun intended) a lot of interest from your neighbors. You can let them hook up and allow them to use up all your fuel, or you can be a jerk (to the guy you’ve gotta live next to for how many more years?) and say no.
I once had a neighbor who had multiple 200+ gallon aquariums, both freshwater and saltwater. You go a day with no power w/ a SW tank of that size, and you just lost upwards of a grand or more. That’s one of the only exceptions I can think of for having a urb/suburban generator.
I agree- simple is good- but I also feel that approaching prepping in a tiered model makes good sense. For example, first tier assumes electricity is still in place. Second tier assumes electricity is not in place at your location, but accessible elsewhere. Last tier assumes electricity is knocked out for everyone everywhere. The ‘Energy Happy Prepper’ will live as we all will when we get to that last tier- woodstove and emergency candles, etc… but should the SHTF in some other form leaving us with time and options and people with varying resources across the nation/globe, I’ll gladly hook up my generator, feed off my two freezers full of food supply (until I have to resort to my canned stock), and be thankful that my solar panels are keeping my laptop powered so that I can be connected to information sources beyond my immediate area.
The time may come when we all end up having to live like rabbits in holes and I’m all for preparing for that worse case scenario environment, but I think it’s a well-prepared prepper who puts things in place to survive at a less life-impacting level for as long as possible before falling back on their fire pit and buck saw.
I agree with your “tiered” approach idea, in fact it’s how I originally started writing the post before the post got too long with my defining various layers of energy preparedness needs.
In a no power situation where you aren’t going to get power back again any time soon you cannot afford to run generators or spend $20,000 for solar panels so you can live just like you did before SHTF. A better approach is to have a small PV system from 45 watts to 200 watts and 1 to 3 batteries. It is cheap and will provide light in the evening and power a radio or laptop for a few hours as well. Cook and heat with wood and do it now don’t try to make the change after TSHTF.
I have a friend with a really nice new gas stove and when power went out it would not work. It has a shutoff valve that shuts it down when power is off. Plus it’s one of those computerized appliances so nothing will work without electricity.
I have been researching generators for home use and have considered everything from a 10k diesel to a PTO drive system. Fuel storage continues to ruin the viability of such large-scale options, however I cannot access my well water without power due to the depth of the well. After many hours of research and carefully weighing my options I have decided to purchase a small inverter generator suitable for that specific purpose. It could also be used to power one circuit in the house or run a power tool if necessary. It is a tri-fuel system so it is compatible with my existing propane water heater system which I upgraded last summer to 650 gallons of fuel. I also have many 25 gallon portable propane tanks. The generator uses 1 gallon of fuel/1 hour 50 min of use at full load so 25 gallons of fuel will give me 45.8 generator hours. I have a secure, vented location in the basement in which to locate the generator so noise will not be an issue. My idea is to run it only as needed a few times a week, making a schedule of necessary tasks to be performed within a specific time-frame. This way health and cleanliness standards can be maintained along with a measure of convenience which will free up man hours to concentrate on more pressing issues. I see this as a good compromise to an otherwise all or nothing scenario. It is also in addition to my primary source of fuel, which is wood……….and lots of it, already cut and stacked with more standing in the north 40.
I love the tiered approach. Let’s ride the energy and technology horse as long as we can, but be prepared for when we have either less or none of it.
Even if we go back to a pre-industrial revolution existence, we have things they didn’t have, such as solar chargers, batteries, etc.
I’ve just started prepping in earnest within the last couple of months, but it has come easy to me since my father was a sort of a prepper way before anyone ever talked about a survivalist lifestyle. In the 60’s, when I was in grade school we had weekend property in central Wisc. in a wooded area with no electricty or services of any type. My father had a mobile home brought in and we spent nearly every weekend there no matter what the weather. We had no heat other than a small fire box that my father built out of sheet metal. About the only good it did was provide a place to warm your hands. Our outhouse was built on skids so that when the hole filled up you slid it a couple of feet and dug a new hole and throw the dirt on top of the old hole. Our water source was sandpoint well which we drove ourselves. The only modern convienances we had were a couple of flashlights, (only used to find the matches to light a candle if you woke up in the middle of the night) and a single burner coleman stove for cooking and heating water.
I guess I’m not all that impressed with the tiered approach, especailly if you’re just starting down the path of becoming a prepper. Start with an 1880’s mindset that not only can you survive without the modern convienances but also thrive and have fun doing so. Once you are prepared for living in the 1880’s, then start modernizing if you choose to do so.
If you’re serious about preparing for an 1880’s lifestyle take a look into some of the more recent technolgy that you can adapt to such a life. One of the newer ideas based on century old technolgies are Rocket Stoves for heating and cooking. A simple google search on the subject and you will find hundreds of site and I would read them all. In a worse case situation, I would rather collect sticks than have to cut and split firewood. The gas you’re storing for that chainsaw won’t do you any good if this goes on for several years. I can get all the wood I need with a hatchet, bow saw, or lopping shears.
Water purification is another subject that is included in almost every serious prepper site. I have yet to see anyone talk about a slow sand bio filter. Having lived 2 years in Honduras and witnessed the improvement in the lifestyles for some of the poorest people in Central America, I can personally vouch for them. Another new twist on ancient technolgy. There are two drawbacks to them, they are heavy, therefore not portable and they must be kept warm, at least 65 degrees for them to work. All you need to build one is a garbage can full of sand, a bag of pea gravel and about $3 worth of plastic plumbing parts.
I just submitted a rather lengthy comment about water filters and rocket stoves. I neglected to provide my name or E-mail.
Sorry about that, let me know if you did not receive it so I can re-write it if necessary.
thanks,,,
Ron
I was think of trying to rig up a hydrogen heating and cooking system, with PV-powered electrolysis to get the hydrogen from well water. I’ve seen blueprints for digestors that produce (supposedly) odorless methane to the same end, but the idea of cooking and heating with poo gas is less than appealing (and then there’s that “supposedly”). Either way, the whole thing is supposed to be run through a normal propane/natural gas system. My hope is to prep for SHTF situations and save some money in the mean time on heating and cooking.
Belay my last. Talked to a chemist about the idea; he said that hydrogen has a much wider range of conditions in which it explodes than propane or natural gas, and using it for direct heating and cooking was a very bad idea. He suggested piping it into a diesel generator to supply good ole fashioned electricity. Being outdoors, it will dissipate more easily and be much less likely to explode. Added bonus, minimal alterations required, just laying some wire.