Battery-Powered Generator for Home

By Hoss Boyd
Updated on July 3, 2024
article image
courtesy of Briggs and Stratton Corporation
The SimpliPHI Big Genny is rated to provide 1,000 watts of power.

Welcome to our series answering reader questions and concerns about how to cut the utility-company cord. If you find yourself in a long-term power outage, consider a battery-powered generator for home to keep phones charged and a few lights on.

Battery-Powered Generator for Home

I’d like to prepare myself for a prolonged power outage. What emergency 12-volt system do you recommend that would have enough output to power three LED lights and a radio while charging two cellphones? (I’d like a system compact enough to store in an EMP-proof container.)
–Paul

I don’t often work with 12-volt systems, but I can appreciate that everything you’d need to build one could be procured at your local auto-parts store. A much better and safer solution is purchasing one of the portable, battery-powered generators on the market. Several quality brands offer these systems, but I’ve had good experiences using the “Genny” produced by SimpliPHI, a brand of Briggs & Stratton (and a vendor for my company, TeraVolt Energy). SimpliPHI is an innovator in U.S.-made lithium-ion batteries. The company started out working with movie producers who needed a way to keep their cameras rolling while shooting in remote locations. Over time, and after quite a lot of improvements, it went on to supply the military with its system.

Today, Briggs & Stratton, under the SimpliPHI brand, makes a range of batteries, from compact systems useful for the purpose you describe to high-voltage, utility-scale energy-storage systems. After years of trying out various systems of all types, the SimpliPHI Genny is my choice for a dependable emergency power source in a homestead situation. They’re not cheap systems – but I want something of quality that will reliably keep working in times of long-term power outages. The Genny comes in two sizes: a 12-pound, 1-foot-wide “Little Genny” that can power a single LED or a radio for 30 hours and charge a cellphone for nearly 50 hours; or the “Big Genny,” which, at 43 pounds and nearly 2 feet wide, can power your LED, radio, and cellphones for four days or longer. Both systems operate on 12 volts DC input.

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