Intense summer storms that bring heavy rain and high winds can be just as disruptive to the power grid as snowy winter blasts. And hot-weather power outages pose their own challenges — how do we keep cool without electricity? How do we preserve our food supply without power for our refrigerators and freezers? How do we keep water flowing from a residential well into a home without electricity for a pump?
In most areas, power outages during a summer storm can be brief. But the growing intensity and frequency of seasonal weather has energy experts making it clear that the U.S. power grid is under stress, making longer outages more likely and frequent. Their answer — build a more resilient source of power, including renewables.
“A resilient power system reduces the likelihood of long-duration outages over large service areas, limits the scope and impact of outages when they do occur, and rapidly restores power after an outage,” the U.S. Department of Energy says in a look at energy resilience. “Clean energy can help prevent electric grid disturbances and enable fast recovery after a disturbance. Using renewable energy resources—solar, water, wind, geothermal, and bioenergy—and enhanced power electronics gives us more ways to keep the power on or bring it back after an outage.”
But how does that help a homeowner now? The model is clear — having a source of renewable energy protects your power supply, bridges short power cuts and makes it possible to weather long power outages while supplying basic needs.
mtvSolar customers with solar panels and battery backup systems often don’t even know the power is out in their neighborhood because their lights stay on, refrigerators stay cold and cooling systems keep running during short outages. Their electrical monitoring will alert them, but otherwise life goes on as usual. For longer outages, the cycle of solar charging for battery systems is easily managed by customer controls that let them choose how to spend their solar-generated power. Customers have shared their stories of protecting valuable resources by having solar and batteries during a long electrical disruption.
Want to build your own power resilience for the summers and winters ahead? mtvSolar has the experience to design a system that is proven to work as you need it, for your particular power needs. Get in touch — we’re ready to walk you through your options and set up a site visit to get started.
