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How well equipped are you?


idun
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French news was showing some poor souls in Normandy living with power cuts, and I was surprised as to how poorly equipped they were.

During our time in France, we had many power cuts. Some lasting minutes, some hours and hours. And sometimes we would have very heavy snow in the valley too, so not the weather to trudge out and buy bread, milk etc.

In consequence, even now we are always well equipped. We can cook as we still have our french cooker with a hob that works on bottled gas in the utility room. Plus an old camping stove that has an oven. We have wood burners with an oven and a parafin heater and lots of candles. Well stocked pantry and always spare long life milk.

Not saying it would be great if we had a few days, but certainly very very manageable for us.

French news also gave a list of priorities during this next cold snap in France, and the last on their list was that there could be power cuts. That there could be power cuts is not mentioned much in the UK, but I imagine that it could easily happen here too, and as it happens, we have actually had a few power cuts here

recently, no idea why, only an hour or so, but it never feels like a

problem to me.

So how well equipped are you?

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Pretty well equipped for most things but funnily enough no longer for power cuts, I sold the generator after 8 years of not a single power outage even for a few seconds, that was 4 years ago and I still havn't suffered one, I recieved a letter saying that it would be off for a morning for transfo repairs but it didnt happen.

 

There probably will be nationwide cuts once the cold weather really sets in as many nuclear generating plants arr off line and there simply is not capacity for a peak in demand.

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electric lighting - back up candles, LED torches and head lights.

Oil central heating (which needs electricity to run) - back up wood burner and gas fire to run from a butane bottle.

Electric oven - back up bottle gas 5 place hob.

The freezers are full and if the power goes off will remain cold for quite some time.

Store cupboards are fully stocked - we could probably last for around 4 weeks without buying food in the extreme. In fact I think we would run out of cat food before anything else.

We always count on there being several days through the winter where we are effectively cut off from everything except the local shop. And if on top of that we are feeling ill or under the weather we want to be in a position not to have to drag ourselves down the hill with perhaps iffy road conditions.

All in all probably fairly well prepared, I would say.
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Living at the back of beyond, we have 3 freezers usually full of food.

After the storm of 2009 we had no electricity for 10 days, and borrowed a petrol-run generator from a friend to keep the freezers going.

The next year we bought one in a sale, so hopefully well prepared.

Currently worried about the cold spell predicted for this week. Last time (2012) our propane supply (buried tank) froze up for nearly 2 weeks. If it happens again we've got some electric radiators, and a woodburner. No hot water though. Microwave for cooking.

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In my personal experience the ability of France to keep the lights on ranks it amongst some 3rd world countries [blink]

I couldn't even hazard a guess at the number of cuts we've had and if there is a storm of almost any severity we can pretty much guarantee one - or more likely multiple ones.

I often sum it up by saying that in 10 years in France we've had more power cuts than in a combined previous 120 years in UK !

Thankfully they are mostly of short duration so although I do have a small generator it's not often pressed into service, I think the longest cut we had was some 10 or 12 hours.

I run a UPS on my TV/Recording system not because of the cuts themselves but simply for my Sky boxes which do not  automatically turn back on when power is restored so if we have a cut whilst we are away from the house the separate recorders start up on their own but of course record nothing !

 

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After the big storm, they put the electric cables underground in the village which has helped, but friends 3 miles away have been without for 2 days. Many micro cuts throughout the year - people don't trim the trees and they touch the lines.

Wood, gas cooker, ups for the computer.
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I guess it dépends where you are and whether the cables are aéro or souterraine, that said mine are aéro and  like ALBF I have never had a power cut in 12 years not even micro-coupures although the lights can dim briefly during a storm.

 

At my village in Sussex, all underground cabling I can say hand on heart that in 30 years I had never gone a month without a power cut, mostly micro-coupures but enough to set all the LED clocks flashing, I stopped resetting them all that time ago and its rare to see anyone elses houses with anthing but flickering digits, to be fair I have not lived there permanantly now for 13 years so it might be better.

 

The micro coupures are caused by automatic overload sensing Equipment to protect the transfos, it cuts on overload and automatically tries to reconnect after a few seconds, that I dont get them here could means that when there is a proper short the subsequent power cut is likely to be for a lot longer.

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It could also be my emplacement, I draw electric from the réseau for the Airbus factory, its interesting that during the miners strike the factories were put on a 3 day week but here in France its the domestic customers who are going to lose their supply this winter.
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Our electricity used to be very fragile and would go off at the drop of a hat. Something (I forget what) was upgraded about 8 years ago and since then power cuts have been nearly non-existent. I think we would be OK for at least a few day except for water.

The local water tower is not very big and is refilled overnight.  On the very rare occasions when this has failed, tap water runs out pretty quickly after the first day.  We keep a couple of 5 litre bottles of water just in case and can use rainwater for flushing the loo.

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We have a lot of power cuts, especially in high winds when trees fall on the lines. We had a twelve hour one a few weeks ago. We keep candles, have a big woodburner and the cooker hob runs off bottled gas. We keep a lot of food in stock and can always get milk from the neighbours. We also have a bread oven and have made bread for the hamlet before now. We used to get cut off in the snow but now have a village snow-blade that fits on a tractor. The farmers love using it so the roads get cleared quickly.

We have thought about a generator for the freezer and the fosse septique pump, but never quite got round to it. We grow a lot of fruit and veg and it would be hard to lose it but it seems a lot of money to spend?
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Another wrote "Well aren't you the lucky one"

I guess, but due you know what, I have never had a problem with French dentists either. I have had loads of dentists over the years and I go twice yearly. Not one problem. I go, they clean my teeth, I pay and I leave.

I was reading on another forum (the funny face forum) that dippy Brit expats living somewhere in the SW are so disgusted with French dentists that they fly to Bulgaria or somewhere for treatment.

No power cuts and good dentists. Is there a correlation ?
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Methinks that going to Bulgaria etc, has more to do with the price of some dentistry things in France than anything else.

My biggest qualm was always that some french dentists seemed to think that a simple filling took three or four visits, and pansements being put on everytime. As I hate going, but do go, it was always torture for me.

I eventually found a dentist who just got on with the job, but boy oh boy do I wish that all the work he did was now in my bank account, as when I saw my last xray, the amount of work is just incredible and sadly some of it, with old age, is not standing the test of time......... I suppose like the rest of me, but I had hoped, never the less that it would.[:(]

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OH just had a root canal and two fillings..took the dentist 2 hours..total cost 276euros and he got back 130 euros and we don't have a mutualle , My brother had the same thing done in the UK and it cost him £1600. My implant, done in France, was 2000 euros in total. I doubt it would have been any cheaper in Bulgaria. My dentist is Romanian!
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We were here during the storm of winter 1999. Power was off for 2 weeks and we weren't able to get out of the village for 6 days. Needless to say we are now very much more prepared for power cuts, being snowed-in, etc. etc.

We have a good supply of batteries, including solar rechargers, LED lamps, tinned food stocks, water, and wine of course :)
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How has this topic on being prepared for cold weather and its accompanying trials and shortages morphed into one about dentists?[:-))]

Where I live we have had one single winter, 2012 I think, when we had snow.  It was all gone after about a week.  We couldn't get out for 2 days but only because we have a steep drive and the car wouldn't go up it.  Once out of the village, less than 2 minutes, the main road had been cleared.

Now I get a bit complacent and don't prepare at all though I always have a full larder and nearly always a full freezer year round.

Don't have any power cuts to speak of and only once in nearly 7 years have we had a cut that lasted more than 12 hours.

The water though is a different matter; that might be off, often with no warning letter beforehand, and that used to infuriate me and I complained bitterly at the mairie.  Now, they have switched our supply to a nearer source and the water tastes noticeably better.

The grand froid is upon us but I have equipped myself with 3 alpaca jumpers from leboncoin and they are wonderfully comforting[:)]

Keep warm everybody and keep posting.............. 

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Partly yes and partly no.

So yes we are cold, living at 3000ft todays high is around -9C, but down in the valley it is -5C so still quite cold - especially by English standards. On some days when there is an inversion it can even work the other way. +8C with us and in bright sunlight; and -8C in the valley under a layer of cloud.

Ballpark numbers you can probably attribute 5-6C temperature difference to the altitude. The rest of the low temperatures are due to being a long way from the sea with an onshore weather pattern (North Atlantic Drift). We had very similar weather in Germany when living in the Rhine valley and I always reckoned that the temperature we gained from moving south we lost by going up the mountain. In both cases we were situated in/by a major North South river valley.
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