DOING A POWER MOVE

Our plain-English guide to beating load shedding

- LINDSEY SCHUTTERS

Load shedding only continues to complicate our lives, both at work and at home. It's time to gain some energy independence. Here's how to figure out what you need, and how to budget for it. Our guide is divided into three sections.

1 Basic battery

R3 000-30 000

A work-from-home solution for one, or several, laptops with internet access.

2 Family affair

R50 000-150 000

Keep all the electrical devices in your home going, including fridge, TV, kettle, dishwasher and more.

3 Dumping Eskom

R180 000+

With enough batteries and solar panels, you can live without compromises, completely ignoring Eskom's woes.

Basic Battery

The work-from-home solution

Most of the battery backup solutions from brands like Gizzu, Jackery and EcoFlow are portable power stations designed for the outdoor- and camping market, but are now making it into homes to keep things going during load shedding. Bonus points for also being compatible with solar charging.

In the work-from-home economy, the laptop is by far the most important essential to keep alive, so we'll focus on that. A rough estimate for a laptop (70 W) with a full-size monitor (30 W) attached is 100 watts. Add another 20 watts for your broadband connection and WiFi router.

There are three main factors to consider when choosing a battery pack for your work setup: capacity, output, and recharge speed.

Capacity