When extreme weather hits, your priorities include protecting your family and your home.
To do those things, having access to power is useful. Unfortunately, storms, wildfires, and heat waves can knock out the electrical grid.
That's why backup home energy storage is so important, especially as extreme weather events become longer, stronger, and more common because of rising global temperatures.
However, generators are cumbersome and polluting. Total home energy backup, meanwhile, is prohibitively expensive.
BioLite is looking to solve those problems with a sleek, efficient device that can provide emergency backup electricity to keep the fridge running and the lights on.
The company's Backup By Biolite device is as easy to install as a wall-mounted TV. It can even fit in small spaces, such as above a fridge, under a bed, or in a cabinet. As long as it can plug in to a mains socket, it will kick into action when the power goes down, providing up to 30 hours of energy from one system. Use multiple devices, and you could get even more storage.
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"For people who might be looking for more power at a single site, you can actually chain up to seven units for a total of 10.5 kilowatt-hours," Erica Rosen, BioLite's vice president of marketing, told The Cool Down.
That can be extremely important as you make plans to evacuate or hunker down until the grid comes back to life. For anyone with expensive food supplies, this could also save you hundreds of dollars by avoiding spoilage. Meanwhile, for those who rely on insulin or other refrigerated medications, it could literally be a lifesaver.
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And it's more affordable than you might expect. A 3-kilowatt-hour system that includes two units costs $3,000, but with tax credits available from the U.S. government, you can save $900. That means it might cost you only $2,100 for backup energy that can make a huge difference when the grid goes down.
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Yes — a portable generator 
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