Household generators

Cape Town South Africa has been experiencing the worst blackouts ever from December 2005. These blackouts occurred due to damage at Koeberg nuclear power plant generator 1. Escom announced that Generator 2 is due for maintenance in March 2006 which may lead to further blackouts unless generator 1 could be repaired in time.

These blackouts lead to severe dissatisfaction from normal residents and business owners as they were stuck without any power since the weekend of 18 February 2006. An influx took place to hardware and outdoors shops as citizens were buying any energy generating device (from gas stoves to high-tech generators) they could lay their hands on in order to cope with the power outages.

The most often asked question when it comes to generators and household use thereof, is how could a normal person calculate the power requirements for a standard household in South Africa in order to ensure that they purchase the correct generator?