Nancy Young wrote:
>
> On 8/2/2013 11:13 AM, Ed Pawlowski wrote:
> > On 8/2/2013 10:16 AM, Nancy Young wrote:
> >> Seems obvious to me, but many, many people were caught with
> >> their car tanks low on gas after Sandy. I was glad I had two
> >> cars full so I was good for the 10 days but a lot of people
> >> were stuck at home.
> >>
> >> When all the electricity is out, the gas stations are out, too.
> >> Fill 'er up if you know a storm is coming.
>
> > Some states are trying to force gas stations to install generators so
> > they can keep operating. While it sounds good, it is expensive and puts
> > the individual stations at a competitive disadvantage unless they can
> > charge much more after a storm.
>
> That's very interesting, I hadn't heard anything about that.
> I wonder what kind of generator they would need to operate just
> the pumps, meaning how big would it have to be. I wouldn't
> oppose state aid to install these generators. The station owners
> are already under a lot of financial pressure, I don't know if it
> should all fall on them when it's all of us who depended on them.
>
> Anyway, interesting idea.
>
> nancy

Figure $25k-$50k total cost depending on the size of the station. That's
a commercial grade generator, transfer switch, installation, permits,
etc. In some cases it could be more given physical space constraints.
It's not nearly as simple as installing a cheap consumer grade standby
generator at a residence.