As part of our preparedness for manmade or natural disasters, we keep three different battery backups: Bluetti AC50, EcoFlow River 2 Max, and Jackery Explorer 300. At least one recent wide-area San Diego power outage had us put all three into service. They performed admirably, providing power for numerous devices for the length of the blackout.
On Feb. 20, 2025, we received notice from the rental management company on behalf of San Diego Gas and Electric that our electricity would be off today from about 7:30 a.m. to 7 p.m. Reason: Uprade the apartment complex to smart meters. Oh joy. At our previous apartment, the utility bill doubled after similar switchover. But that’s topic of a future post, if necessary.
After the lights went out around 7:45 a.m., I pulled out the Jackery, which is smallest of the units, and plugged in one floor lamp and the wireless Internet router. I wanted to see how long the Explorer 300 would last powering the two devices. I kept the other battery backups in reserve should some problem keep the electricity out longer.
The lights blinded us around 5:45 p.m., when as you can see from the Featured Image the Jackery still had 8 percent capacity. Together, the lamp and router consistently drew about 27 watts, which is more than I would have expected.
I used Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra to make the moment. Vitals: f/1.9, ISO 800, 1/60 sec, 13mm (film equivalent); 6:42 p.m.