I know most of us are probably prepared for this, but as it's snowing at least 2" an hour outside, it's on my mind. If your electricity goes out, how long can you survive in your home without it? Do you have auxiliary heat, light, means of keeping perishable food (summer and winter)? What about gathering clean water? If your method relies on fuel(I.E: Generator), do you store enough? Do you treat the fuel properly for storage? Just some things to think about. I know many of us will be leaving our homes in a SHTF situation, but for those who don't have an alternative or choose to guard their home, it's important.

Old oil lanterns can be had pretty cheap at yard sales and flea markets, and they're built much better than the new ones. Coleman fuel is a bit expensive, but the old ones will run okay on gasoline and are easy to maintain/repair. Kerosene heaters are dirty and kerosene is expensive, propane is somewhat affordable but in a SHTF situation, do you think the gas company is going to come out to fill your tank? I think wood and coal are the only viable emergency heat sources, but that's my opinion. If you're going to keep wood for emergency heat, get a chainsaw and splitting maul and learn how to use it safely. Cutting firewood is great exercise, and a good way to make extra money.

Keeping fresh meats would be just near impossible in the long run, but the ability to can or cure your fresh meat within a few days(plus a cellar to store it in) would be feasible for those of us in rural areas.

A grill, Coleman stove, or means of cooking without electricity is a plus, too. Cooking on an open fire isn't difficult, but there is a learning curve. A kettle on a wood stove makes a dandy slow cooker, as well. Well, I'd better go check my lanterns, tire chains, etc. In the time it's taken to write this, 2-3" of snow has fallen on the tree limbs. Just remember, it's better to have, and not need than to need, and not have.

Kind of happy I am in the South. It snows sometimes and the power is down a little while. In my area the power has only been out for a day at the longest time. I am still working on the heat and all. I live in a total electric home. I have bought several old oil lamps and a good supply of oil. I have a Coleman lantern I bought a long while back, I have fuel and extra mantels for it. I am looking for a pot bellied stove or put me in a fire place big enough to cook in. I am planning on a generator for the frig and freezer and run it as needed.

Enjoyed the post...... With the limbs and transformers that blew the last snow / ice storm down here.... I hope not to see any again soon.....

Live in snow country too and it's not unusual to get a foot or more from a storm. Have a 4wd suburban to get around in. Yes we actually are prepared for loss of power in the winter. Wood stove with enough wood for at least a few months as backup to the natural gas furnace. I have two 20# propane tanks that are kept for the coleman stove as my primary cooking, it's a 3 burner stove. Have about 10 dutch ovens that can use charcoal or wood fire to cook with. Have a back up dual fuel coleman stove that will take coleman fuel or unleaded gasoline. Have several propane lanterns, a dual fuel lantern and plan on getting 3-5 dietzel lanterns too. As for water, well all I have to do once I run out of the 250 gallons I have stored is to walk out in the yard and scoop up some of the snow and bring it inside to melt. Yes that would be a pain but it is doable and survivable quite easily, especially since I have a 60 quart cooking pot that I could pack with snow at night and when we woke up in the morning would have at least a couple of gallons of water in it without any effort from me.

i'm pretty well setup for prolonged power failure.
Wood stove in the house, garage and shop with several yrs worth of wood cut split and stacked.
A vent free propane heater set up on a portable A frame with several 100 lb propane tanks
Coleman lanterns and kerosene oil lamps with about 10 gals of each fuel
tin boxes full of candles
Several coleman camp stoves and the always present grill
Generator with a smaller backup gennie with about 50 gals of fuel stored( have to rotate this spring)
and to take care of the freezer goods i have stored a propane stove that i can run off a 100lb bottle to take care of last minute canning (yeah i can do it on the wood stove but this would be so much easier), this will be put off till i have to do it. I hate the thought of canning steaks and tenderloins

for really long power failures (generational) I have also stored the plans for a vegtable oil press. to make vegtable oil lamps.
plans can be found here
http://www.ehow.com/how_7269033_diy-oil-press.html

yep...I'm prepared. I have learned the hard way and also learned how easy it is to have holes in your prep plans. It's also easy for a simple thing to knock out some of those plans. We have a huge ice storm a couple of years ago and I was here alone...not scared or anything, but slipping on the ice on the way to get wood, put an end to my plans to go up and down the stairs cleaning out the freezer and processing that food with the canner. I also learned that gas stoves may light just fine on the burners with a lighter, but the oven won't work. Cooking on the grill also doesn't work so well when said grill is encased in 6" of ice and surrounded by a snow bank that also has ice so thick you can't get to it...especially with said twisted ankle.
Ah well, I had wood for the fire and plenty of canned goods, water stored, candles and good books to read.

Herbalpagan wrote:yep...I'm prepared. I have learned the hard way and also learned how easy it is to have holes in your prep plans. It's also easy for a simple thing to knock out some of those plans. We have a huge ice storm a couple of years ago and I was here alone...not scared or anything, but slipping on the ice on the way to get wood, put an end to my plans to go up and down the stairs cleaning out the freezer and processing that food with the canner. I also learned that gas stoves may light just fine on the burners with a lighter, but the oven won't work. Cooking on the grill also doesn't work so well when said grill is encased in 6" of ice and surrounded by a snow bank that also has ice so thick you can't get to it...especially with said twisted ankle.
Ah well, I had wood for the fire and plenty of canned goods, water stored, candles and good books to read.

OK here goes, slipping on the ice is very dangerous and can be fatal. That is what happened to me 2 years ago. It's a long story but a fall on the ice ended up taking my life, thankfully before I expired I was able to yell for help, the wife came saw I was not breathing, went and woke up the daughter (a nurse). She came down checked, no pulse in neck or wrist and not breathing. Administered CPR while wife was on the phone with 911. Daughter revived me less than a minute before paramedics arrived. Story is actually much longer but that's the short version. Definitely have your preps where you don't have to go out into the weather to take advantage of them.

Needless to say I am somewhat more careful in the ice and snow these days.

Wow JamesM - that is a good reminder of how little things can go wrong! I'm glad you made it.
I can remember thinking that no one can get to me, I can't get out, and how serious the situation could be. THAT was the ONLY time I was really scared. It drove home the point that this was real and could actually be life or death. All from a little slip on the ice.

A couple years back we had a pretty bad Ice storm. We lost power for 12 days in a all electric home.
It was a good experience because it showed me what I was lacking in way of preps and what exactly I had done right.
None the less we stayed here with no Utility power, but I have a Back Up Generator and plenty of propane bottles stored for heat and food wasn't a problem because we had our store.

The one unexpected thing was, we had all our children and grandchildren with us by day three. So in total we had 17 people in our 4 bedroom house LOL. it was a little cramped but it was really nice to have every one home again.

The one thing that I did find was Hot Water, other than using the stove to make it ....we didn't have any. So when life got back to normal I purchased a propane on demand water heater. Works great.

dreadstalker wrote:for really long power failures (generational) I have also stored the plans for a vegtable oil press. to make vegtable oil lamps.
plans can be found here
http://www.ehow.com/how_7269033_diy-oil-press.html

I too have been thinking about the production of vegetable oil for cooking and lighting. My biggest question was not about pressing it as you can build or buy a press but in selecting and then producing the right seeds for oil production.

My first question was what plant I would grow for its oil? My requirements being that it grows well in the mid west, not require a lot of soil tillage or care, and be relatively easy to harvest. Essentially there is no such beast (or plant in this case) so I have had to make some concessions. Using the table at this page:
http://www.bioenergy.wa.gov/OilSeed.aspx

I determined that many of the crops I was considering produced way to little oil per acre (for example corn only 18 gallons per acre). So balancing the amount of work required and the amount of oil I would get I ended up deciding on oily sunflowers which can produce 100 gallons of oil per acre.

Next was how many sunflowers did I really need and for that I used this article:
http://journeytoforever.org/biofuel_lib ... press.html

The article describes a simple oil press with pictures and also more importantly describes exactly how many sunflower plants you will need to grow for the amount of oil they think you will need for consumption. Their estimate is that you will need three gallons of oil which will take a plot of land 40` by 56`. On the other hand the Mormons estimate you need about 7.5 gallons of oil per person per year so you might need a larger plot. If we use the earlier referenced Bio Diesel page one acre of sunflowers can produce enough oil for 13 people using the Mormon oil estimates.

The last this is the oil extraction method and I am leaning toward the Piteba Nut and Seed Oil Expeller:
http://www.piteba.com/eng/index_eng.htm
http://www.amazon.com/Piteba-Nut-Seed-O ... 533&sr=8-1

Though your link and the one above from Journeytoforever would work in a pinch.

You came to the same conclusion as i did. sunflower will provide the most oil with the least work on tillage and care.

Thanks for the additional links..hopefully some others will use them as well.