Affiliate disclosure: This article contains affiliate links. If you buy through them, SolarHomeCompare may earn a commission at no extra cost to you.
Minnesotans treat a winter outage differently than the rest of the country does, and for good reason: when it is 20 below in Duluth or on the Iron Range, a house without power starts shedding heat the moment the grid drops. Even a gas furnace can’t help you — its blower and ignition run on electricity — so a blackout during a polar-vortex cold snap quickly becomes a frozen-pipe problem. Minnesota sits inside the MISO grid, served by Xcel Energy across the Twin Cities and Minnesota Power up north, and blizzards, ice-loaded lines, and deep cold all take their turns knocking it out. If you’re comparing Minnesota solar quotes, it’s worth knowing a grid-tied rooftop system shuts off in that outage too — an anti-islanding safety rule — unless you also have storage.
When the outage is really about heat
In most of the country the first worry in a blackout is the fridge. In a Minnesota January it’s the furnace. The good news is that the electrical load that keeps you safe is small: a gas furnace’s blower fan pulls a few hundred watts, a fridge about 150W, ten LED bulbs roughly 50W together, a router near 10W, and phone charging about 20W. Add a CPAP and you’re still under a kilowatt of steady draw to hold heat, food, and communication together. Write those down, total the watts, and you’ll size backup around the things that actually matter at 20 below.
Quiet, indoor-safe power that won’t strand you in a snowbank
This is where a battery station beats a gas generator in a Minnesota winter. A gas unit runs at 60 to 90 decibels, has to live outside venting deadly exhaust, and needs you to trudge out through a drift to refuel it in the dark. A Jackery LiFePO4 station runs near 30 decibels, is zero-emission and safe indoors, and starts at the push of a button from your kitchen. The HomePower 3000 delivers 3,072Wh and 3,600W, covers essentials for one to two days, and its bundle includes solar panels so it recharges even in low winter sun.
▶ See the HomePower 3000 solar generator use code DEAL5
If you heat a larger home or want to carry heavier loads through a long stretch of subzero days, the Solar Generator 5000 Plus steps up to 5,040Wh and 7,200W with 120V and 240V and expands to 60kWh — enough for HVAC and several rooms at once.
▶ View the Solar Generator 5000 Plus
Set it up before the first blizzard warning
Backup power is worthless if you’re trying to buy it the morning the forecast turns. Get a unit charged and stashed in a closet at the start of winter, and it’s ready the first time an ice storm or blizzard takes an Xcel or Minnesota Power line down. It’s worth checking current deals before the season sets in.
Keep reading: Minnesota solar incentives & costs · How to keep power during a Wisconsin outage · How to keep power during an Iowa outage