I'm retiring in 20 days from the power company after 44 1/2 years. I'm very thankful to have been taught very early on as a young lineman to watch out for the Ding Dongs with rigged up generators. After the big ice storm right before Christmas in Tulsa, OK in 2007, one of said Ding Dongs dumbassed his disconnect procedure on his huge portable generator when we got the power to his street back on. He forgot to disconnect his generator before he flipped his main breaker back on. He was back feeding the panel with another breaker below the main. It went KABOOMYOW right in hs face, blew up his panel, backfed onto the energized power lines and burnt all of the backlot lines that fed his house and 9 others. After a week of being without power, they had to be out another night because we had to quit in time to drive back to NW Arkansas where our hotel rooms were. One of the lineman came over the radio and said "At least we will be able to get a truck to the pole tomorrow. His neighbors are gonna burn his house down tonight and we can back the bucket truck across the slab and reach the pole!"
Thank you to the OP, who intends to do it right! [/quote]

I'm too a retired lineman and your story reminds me of one we had happen in an ice storm. Overhead service was broke and laying on ground. Transformer and circuit was dead. No generator. We were attaching service back on house with the pole end still on the ground and were getting shocked on the neutral. What the heck??? It was in a crappy old neighborhood with trash everywhere. Low and behold the genius ran an extension cord under the trash from neighbors basement window to his basement window and hooked up his furnace fan. He hooked it up backwards and had the neutral hot casing us to get shocked. Luckily no one got hurt! And really lucky it was backward so we found it or otherwise someone could have got killed when it backfeed the transformer when we hooked it up.

This is the Generac manual transfer switch I use, totally isolates the generator from the utility.

I don't think you understand how a properly installed manual switch functions, nor do the politicians who passed your law.

In a properly installed manual transfer switch there is no way to back feed anything. It's wiring is no different than automatic transfer switch. I don't really think you even know what the difference is between a manual and automatic transfer switch is, nor do your politicians.

I have a generac 18kw whole-house generator with an automatic transfer switch. Love it. Had it 7 months and it's been needed twice already. I would have no reservations about going with a Kohler too. They make really good generators, but I had fewer options for installers.

We lose power all the time and I didn't want to have to take manual intervention to get the generator going. The whole-house generator is a hands off solution. Never have to worry if I'm not home or don't have enough gas or whatever. Power goes out and it starts. If I lived in an area that didn't lose power a lot I probably would have done a 10kw portable that runs on propane or gas. Build a shed for it with the exhaust piped out and automatic fan venting. You can google it, lots of videos on that. It helps keep your generator safe from rain and helps cut down the noise. Total cost of that would have been maybe 3-4k...which is lots less than the whole house generac. With a 10kw portable you can usually run A/C, but you can't run everything at the same time. It's not that kind of power.

Had I gone with the portable, I would have had an electrician install the hookup and interlock kit. It's local code to have the interlock kit and there's really no chance that you are going to back feed when it's installed properly. It's not a good DIY project. Those linemen have a tough job, nobody should booger up a solution that puts them in jeopardy. You really don't need to worry about it if you have a pro install.

I’m running a generac and love it

24kw powers my house and the shop

I don't think this has been mentioned but an inexpensive alternative to a transfer switch is an interlocking breaker.

The breaker for the generator goes at the top of the panel and has a mechanism that will not allow it to close until the main breaker is open.

an alternative that can be relatively quickly swapped house to house

https://www.homedepot.com/p/GenerLink-30-Amp-Meter-Mounted-Transfer-Switch-MA23-N/301961623

expensive, but saves high $ electrician hourly cost

“This Old House” has a video on an interesting add on secondary breaker box that allows room circuit by room circuit generator power up

( not 100% sure this is the video)

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GLgtFCJlVFQ

That's how I'm setup, a 60-amp breaker in my main utility breaker box powers a sub-panel with 12 breakers that power the circuits I want to keep alive during a power outage. My generator has a 50-amp outlet that goes into the manual transfer switch I showed above that powers only the circuits in the sub-panel. Another advantage to the sub-panel is it frees up space in the main breaker box. (old Zinsco 100-amp)

Yup. In my opinion its a safe inexpensive method to hook up a generator. The auto swap generac stuff gets way too complicated with way too much electronics for my liking.

Its all whether you want to be the one that has to make the transfer on whatever date and time it needs to happen. The value in an automatic one is that you don't have to be there and/or bother waking up in the middle of the night.

Little bump in the road the utility company called today and informed a generator or pool heater doesn't qualify me
for free installation.I need an indoor appliance like water heater, dryer, range etc....
I was planning to get a new range in the near future also a hot water heater. The problem with the range is it is $$$,I need a downdraft slide-in to avoid
any remodel. My current range is a overpriced unreliable Jennair that I bought off Craigslist. So maybe I will just get a hot water heater for now to get the free install.

I have never regretted my gas water heater.

Even when the electric is out the water is still hot.

I miss cooking with gas. So much better than electric but stoves are pricey.

my wife and i bought the last gas stove the appliance dealer in town had before he retired.
that was 40 some years ago, and it has worked flawlessly since. it is a maytag brand.
i ran into that fellow at the drug store a couple of weeks back, and told him i wanted to get it fixed under the "lifetime warrentee", and he said bad words to me !
he is into his 90's, and we have known each other forever. he says he can still kick my azz if he has to........

Installed a Generac last year. Had to upgrade my gas line to feed it. Would have been okay it it was a smaller unit.
KID

We had to get a larger meter. Semco did the upgrade for free. If we went one more size up, they would have charged us.

Two things on this, how do you determine what size unit to buy and how about using a automatic transfer switch that shuts off the local commercial power to the home when the power goes off and then automatically will transfer from the generator back to the commercial power after a set amount of time when the commercial power supply comes back on like twenty or so
All the phone company service (AKA Central Offices) offices that provide dial tone had them back in the day, I have no idea about what the cellular industry does for back up power

There are sizing charts online. It really depends on the appliances you have and what you want to run. Electric heat, hot water heater, dryer, stove, Hot tub all add up fast.

The automatic transfer switch is pretty slick. We lose power and it takes about 10 seconds before the Generac kicks on and takes over. When power returns, I never know. The ATS just flips back to Electric co. no interruption. btw- with Tesla powerwall you don't even lose those 10 seconds of power. But it will cost a crapload.

Once this year we had a huge outage in my area that included cell towers and cable service. We had power but no TV/nternet or cell service. That was unusual. Normally those are unaffected.

Bigger bump in the road. The cost to run NG inside the house and a water heater is nuts. I am going to get a couple more estimates before telling the utility to keep their gas and going to Plan B. I have a nice Kubota 38hp tractor pre Tier4 emissions that doesn't get used much so I will just get a PTO generator.
A 15KW unit will power everything I want along with a manual transfer switch is less than 1/2 the cost of a water heater.