Re: The Truth can be ugly and painful, or Why America doesn't count for much anymore.
You can get propane powered backup generators that will automatically switch over when power goes out. Don't know how they compare with diesel for price and fuel storage. For power outages that leave gas service intact (most of them), this can be really great. A full-bore full-house generator (20,000 watts) costs about $4500, and at full load burns about 3 gallons of propane an hour. If you're stingy with power, a smaller one would work. Sure as heck it's cheaper than solar, and works at night. Unlike solar, though, at some point you'd run out of fuel.