Storms are a fact of life, and when they sweep through the area, power losses are inevitable. The best you can do is to be as prepared as you can be, and an important part of that preparedness is to have some means of backup power at the ready. Unless you’ve “gone green” and are generating all your own electricity, that’s going to mean some kind of generator. We’ll make some recommendations below but understand that the “best home generator for your Great Falls, VA property” is going to be different for each person, depending on your needs and preferences. Let’s take a look at some of the options available:
Gas Generator
The standard gas-powered generator is the first thing most people think of when the subject of backup power comes us. They’re readily available and modestly priced, making them a solid choice. In our view, the best home generator available in Great Falls, VA is the Generac line of generators.
Not only are they rugged, dependable machines, but they also come in a variety of sizes, so you can scale your backup power to perfectly suit your needs. The lowest-priced models offering a fairly modest 7.5kW in power, all the way up to the Generac QT series, which offers a whopping 150kW of backup power, any time you need it.
Solar Generator
The biggest drawback of gas-powered generators is that they require you to keep a hefty stockpile of gas on hand in the event that the power goes out for an extended period.
In the example above, six gallons of gas will get you five hours of 7500 watts of power, so if you want to be prepared for a week-long power outage, that’s going to require you to keep a stockpile of some two-hundred gallons of gas on hand. That’s a lot, and to make matters worse, gas tends to lose its potency over time, which means you’ll have to keep refreshing your supply.
For most people, that’s a bridge too far. The alternative is to get a solar-powered generator. The tradeoff is that they tend to be relatively more expensive and provide less power.
In our view, the best solar home generator in Great Falls, VA is the Nature PowerPak Portable Solar Generator, which will produce 1800 watts of electricity with good sun. You’ll have to be careful, and only plug in the essentials, but it will keep the LED lights on and a few key appliances running until the power company can return things to normal.
A “Multi-Tool”
For some, versatility is important, and we wanted to give an honorable mention to “The Raven.” Consider this to be the Swiss Army Knife of generators. It’s a lawnmower, an ATV, and a 7kW gas-powered generator, all in one.
If the roads are closed in the aftermath of the storm, you can get where you need to go on the Raven, and when you return home, you can plug essential appliances into it to keep your household running.