no electricity... how will it affect folks

[rockriver]

i'm wondering what it would be like to live without electricity.
or no electric and no gas service.

a guest is visiting with us.
she went to brazil a few years back and spent some time with some missionaries.
they went back along the zinghu (sp?) river . (branches off the amzon i think)
anyhow, guest was describing how the locals at several stops along the river were preparing
acai (sp?) candy, food, drink from the acai berries.
she described how the women would make up a pan full of mashed berries and then cook
some of it in an oven outside of their hut.
i got curious about this oven that was outside the hut.
guest explained it was heated by a wood fire.
"there was no electricity and no gas in these villages!" she explained.
--
bottom line.
these folks on the zinghu won't change a think if the brazils electric or gas service goes down!
guest was raised without electricity, indoor toilets, plumbing, or gas service. they did just fine!

[monkeybird]

Before I awoke to prepping I had an experience with power loss that opened my eyes to just how conditioned Americans are to the convenience of electricity. Hurricane Ivan brought little damage to my area, but devastated Pensacola. Our area only had minor winds and a power loss. I've never forgotten how miserable I was. I was HOT! The air was heavy and humid. I did fine without TV, lights, etc. It was the loss of Air Conditioning that did me in. I was miserable and cross. Power was out less than a day!

As soon as the Home Depot was resupplied, I purchased a generator and and small window air conditioner.

However, in Pensacola where my sister lives, people were out of power for over a month! People learned to cope. It wasn't easy, but people adapted. As an aside, tempers were high and actual fights occurred at gas stations etc. during the early states of the aftermath. However, it was only a few hours after the storm that governmental help arrived with water, ice and food. (Jeb Bush was excellent with hurricanes)

However, if the government did not arrive with help, it would not be long until riots and disorder occurred. Look at Katrina.

[Rmplstlskn]

I too have seen the post-hurricane adaptations people make, and often it was edgy and if help did not arrive as soon as it did, it would have gotten ugly... It is the HEAT and HUMIDITY that get people into short fuses, then add thirst and hunger... look out!

The biggest danger to losing power in the heat of the year, no matter where you are, is that most modern homes are NOT DESIGNED to provide good ventilation via windows, vents and doors. Most homes, and even worse, condos and apartments, are OVENS without AC. Most have zero cross-ventilation and no way to vent hot air up and out. So a long-term power outage in hot areas in the heat of summer will soon turn bad, very fast, especially if people realize that HELP is not soon coming.

My home now in VA was built in the late 1940's. Although not an ideal "no AC" design (lacks high ceilings and a high vent for hot air to escape), it has tall windows on all sides with an open floor plan, with double-hung windows so the bottom or the top can be opened. It cross-ventilates beautifully! Add a box fan in the windows (low battery/genny draw) and one is comfortable, even in humid summer. We also have a few Maples and Poplars for shade, which helps a lot keeping 1/2 of the roof shaded in the mid-day.

But in a SHTF event, all those windows are a liability... Actually, any side of the whole house could be penetrated by a .308 round, I'm sure. I cannot fathom what a secured & boarded up home in the hotter areas of the US would be like all shut up for security... Closed up, I cannot see how life could be supported inside without AC or some other cooling method...

Now in VA, I have seen a different side. Here in western VA, most of our power outages have been in WINTER. Now the focus is keeping WARM with no power. Keeping food cold is no big deal with snow outside your door... Water too is no big deal with snow outside. Also, the deep snow tends to keep people indoors, not walking around, sweating shirtless, pissed off, looking for water and shade... Living without power in these times, IMO, is much easier. Easier to keep warm than stay cool and avoid heat exhaustion... For many, it would take a week before hunger or search for warmth force them out into the snow...

No matter where you live, emergency power always plays a major role... Most of us, including myself, have never had to live without power for very long, nor do we know how to do it long-term... But I'm working towards that goal all the time... Between some emergency power preps, fans, portable AC unit and heaters, I could be comfy for a long time, more so in winter than in the heat of summer.

Without technology (electricity, refrigeration, AC, appliances, etc...), most of the USA is more pitiful than a primitive village in Central or South America...

Rmpl

[crossbow]

Our dairy farm didn't get eletricity til 1952 so it won't bother me at all, in fact i'll enjoy it, it's time my kids and GKs got a wake up call. I often think about the people who can't even go to the bathroom or stand in a food line at the store without a cell phone,Take their ele and they'll get along, take their cell ph and they'll flip out.

[protus]

When we lost power for 14+ days during the 04' canes. Me and the wife joked that we were "camping on carpet". We just went right into camping frame of mind. If people try to live outside their comfort zones when it suits them rather then when it happens, they'll be one step ahead of the game. Thats the reason we camp in primitive camp grounds, back pack etc. I also ( before last year) would live "off grid" for 10 days in Canada while on hunting trips. The main issue i have had on all of these is staying "clean" . Not a "im dirty" frame of mind but more like " oh there's a bag of trash,,lets burn it,because on day 4 there'll be mice in here or sweeping floors to keep dirt ,grime down. Those that i have seen that just show up into this kind of event/trip dont think that way. Their minds are still in the " i have electric,running h20,etc"

[Hawkeye]

People will get really stupid, really fast, when there is no electricity (for any length of time). I've seen it with my own eyes.

[slingshot]

In January '09 we had a terrific ice storm, went 11 days w/o electricity. No problem, I've been prepping since I was a young man in the army over 40 years ago. An snow storm in Wash., DC completely shut us down in the Pentagon. Didn't have to go to work for several days. Girlfriend & I had a great vacation in her apartment. We walked to a nearby 7-11 and found empty shelves only, but found one rotisserie chicken! lol We lived off that chicken and what food she had for the duration! It was great!

The ice storm here left power lines down in the road, driveways blocked by fallen limbs & trees, no cell phones, no TV, only distant radio stations, stores closed, shelters popping up at the school gym and couple of churches. Complete shutdown! I ocassionally started the generator, warmed the house with my woodburning furnace central heat pre-warming the water to the propane hot water tank. We ate a good hot breakfast cooked on our propane cookstove, drank hot coffee and listened to the radio. Thusly fortified I took my chainsaw, got on my ATV and started cutting out my neighbors. They still wave at me when they drive down our road, lotsa good will. I even had the opportunity to give some neighbors a good hot shower in a bathroom warmed by a propane wall heater, coffee & snacks, a little TV (after I chipped the ice off the satellite dish) and an enjoyable break from the isolation of their houses (those that stayed at home.) The horror stories about the "shelters" made a lot of people refuse to go there.

Instead of a disaster, it was a minor inconvenience to us, and an opportunity to help our neighbors, and a good test run on our preps. In fact, we felt a little guilty about how minor it was to us after hearing how thousands of other people suffered. Some folks went for over a month w/o electricity. During that entire 11 days I burned only about 10 or 11 gallons of gas in the generator (5K 10hp,) which was no problem because I had plenty in cans with Sta-bil. Plenty of TP, etc. We ate good too. Plenty of canned goods, 2 freezers, etc. It wasn't that bad at all, for us!

[EX121]

After Hurrican Hugo in SC I got out all my camping gear and just stayed at home. The biggest difficulty was sanitation as there was no water to flush the toilet, I ahd filled the bathtub so no problem. My neeighbors and I had huge feasts starting the 3 day as we cooked what was thawed in the freezers. Luckly the weather after was very calm and didn't cause more problems
One of the biggest problems my neighbors complained about were all of the mosquitoes that swarmed soon after the storm.

[crossbow]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sHQXU9Kzgr8&feature=channel

[BigJohn]

The electric grid is our life blood...not just for consumer electronics.

The problem is not conveniences like AC, television or cell phones (although I will miss having AC more than I can express). The problem is the fragile nature of our western civilization. Our society rests on 5 pillars that we cannot do without for long.

1. Electric Grid
2. Government services (law enforcement, water, sewage, trash etc)
3. Transportation and communication (These sort of go together in my mind)
4. Finance (and commerce)
5. Fuel production and distribution

There are other services that we cannot do without forever, but these five are so critical we cannot do without them, even for a short period. If you knock out one pillar, we are on a time limit to restore it or the other pillars will collapse. Once you pull a card out, the whole house of cards can collapse quickly.

The electric grid itself is a frankenstein made up of power generation, long haul distribution and end point distribution networks. All of these are tied together precariously by SCADA systems that control generation, flow and demand. If a large chunk of the grid drops, technicians have to communicate with each other to coordinate turning on "islands" of power, (while carefuly synching the frequency and balancing loads) and slowly turn the whole grid back on. To do this, they use power from outside the grid. Most generation plants require electricity from outside to restart. Nobody has EVER tried to black-start all three US grids at once. Undoubtedly, it can be done, but how long will it take? If it takes more than a few days, we start losing other services (like law enforcement and telephones) and the whole thing gets harder....or even impossible.

Government services sound like something we can do without, but don't kid yourself. Government provides law enforcement, sewage treatment, trash collection road clearing and other services we need. All of the critical services above depend on a stable lawful environment to work. Nobody drives through a riot to deliver potato chips....or fuel. Without electric pumps, most towns and cities will run out of water to drink or flush in a few days. Once that happens, people are going to get very desperate and strain law enforcement even more.

Our finance system depends on reliable power and rule of law (and in the longer term, on transportation). Once the power goes out, buying and selling is going to be difficult or impossible. Without constant bank transactions, the economy grinds to a halt. Most "money" is just digits on somebody's hard drive these days. How much cash do most people have on hand? How much do YOU have right now. About 3 months ago, I was standing in line in a Kroger grocery store and the local computer system stopped working. All commerce stopped! They turned hundreds of customers away rather than sell to them manually! They had NO procedures ready to transition to cash sales and manual record keeping.

Our transportation network is made up of trucks, trains and boats...all of these require law and order, constant fuel deliveries and a working finance system. Without any one of these, nothing moves. (I didnt mention aircraft because they move relatively small amounts of goods).

Much of our food is stored in regional warehouses (and much of it would spoil without refrigeration). It is owned by corporations, not the people who need it. Without a working finance system, nobody can buy it and no deliveries will be made to local stores.

Fuel is transported over pipelines that require electric power and a working finance system or by trucks that require finance and law and order. Fuel distribution points require power and finance...also they typically maintain a couple of days fuel for normal circumstances...not enough to fill everyone's tanks at once. If there is a run on fuel, most will run out in a few hours. All of them will run out in a few days.

Fuel for coal plants is transported by trains, which require finance, but may not be too effected by general lawlessness. Coal plants usually maintain several days of fuel on site, but gas turbines require electricity to maintain gas flow. They typically don't store any fuel stocks.

EMP, the worst case scenario? Hurricane Katrina was a joke compared to a major HEMP event. Katrina flooded a relatively small area of the south and dropped a small section of the Eastern Grid. The government was largely uneffected. The finance system and a stable currency was untouched. The transportation systems were only effected in a very small area and all the roads were servicable and clear again within a few weeks. Law and order broke down in a tiny region for a short period of time and was quickly restored by government resources from outside the region. Food, clean water and other important consumables were rushed into the area by government and NGOs outside the region. In a widespread event, outside help will not be available.

If the grid drops for any reason and cannot be repaired quickly, we could be in deep trouble. Unless most of the finance and law enforcement systems are still entact like they were during Katrina, re-supply is going to be impossible. This is not much of a problem for you and I, but a world-ending disaster for most folks. Most people don't have much food on hand. I think we are about 4 days out from rioting and about 3-4 weeks from complete anarchy.

There are going to be about 300 million hungry people in the USA within days or weeks. Many of these people are armed and all of them will de desperate. As some of you have already pointed out, hungry, thirsty, scared and desperate people tend to behave badly. Somebody may shoot you for a bottle of water.

In other words, I don't worry too much about air conditioning.

[monkeybird]

The AC from the upstairs of my house went our yesterday morning. Last night the inside temperature upstairs 94 degrees and stagnant. I slept poorly on the sofa downstairs but at least I was cool. Husband tried the bed, but was up at 2:45 A.M. seeking relief.

I tried to imagine how it would be to live without air, or electricity, forever. I think most people can cope for even several weeks, but in this heat, tempers flare and tolerance wanes.