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For Safer Emergencies, Give Your Power Generator Some Space Video Description for the Visually Impaired
Text on Screen: How Close is Too Close for Portable Generators?
Visual: Dark thunderclouds roll through the sky, rain falls as lightning flashes. Scene cuts to show a darkened house.
Narrator: When the lights go out during a storm, there's nothing more welcome than a portable gas-powered generator, or perhaps nothing more dangerous.
A woman standing in her driveway pulls a cord to start her portable generator.
A carbon monoxide detector mounted on a wall reads 227.
Narrator: It's hard to believe, but a single gas-powered generator can create as much as one hundred times more poisonous carbon monoxide gas than a car's exhaust.
A person off camera adjusts the throttle on a portable generator. A puff of white smoke shoots out from its exhaust.
Close up of a car exhaust.
A sidelong view of a house. Three windows are visible, the closest one is open several inches.
Camera pans up from a portable generator on a lawn next to a house with an extension cord running from the generator through an open window.
Narrator: And, if the generator is operated too close to a house, especially near a window or door, the invisible and odorless toxic gas can easily enter the home, resulting in illness or death.
A top-down schematic of the interior of a house illustrating the presence of carbon monoxide in the various rooms. Red, illustrating dangerous levels of the toxic gas, grows to fill the entire house. Two warning signs come to the foreground. On the left, a red triangle with a skull and crossbones standing over the letters CO, for carbon monoxide. On the right, a generator sticker reads, "Danger, Using a generator indoors will kill you in minutes. Exhaust contains carbon monoxide, a poison gas you cannot see or smell. NEVER use in the home or in partly enclosed areas such as garages. ONLY use outdoors and far away from open windows, doors, and vents."
Narrator: According to a study by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, nearly half of the non-fatal carbon monoxide poisonings reported during the 2004 and 2005 hurricane seasons involved generators run within seven feet of a home.
Text on Screen: CDC, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention
Visual: A CDC MMWR, Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report appears on the screen. The report is dated March 10, 2006. A clipping from the report comes to the foreground, reading "In the study described in this report, even higher percentages (50%) of households were poisoned by outdoor generators, indicating that generators, even when placed outside, can be dangerous sources of CO.
Footage of flooded city streets and hurricane force winds blowing over palm trees.
Text on screen: Steve Emmerich, NIST Mechanical Engineer
Emmerich: The CDC study showed that consumers need clear guidance on where to position a generator to prevent carbon monoxide from entering their homes. Unfortunately, no one had done the research to determine what a safe operating distance is.
Visual: Three men stand outside on a sunny day after starting a generator and begin to walk toward the camera.
Narrator: To help find that safe operating distance, the CDC teamed with building experts from the National Institute of Standards and Technology, or NIST.
Scene cuts to a sign reading, "NIST, National Institute of Standards and Technology, United States Department of Commerce, 100 Bureau Drive"
NIST researchers stand conversing and exchanging documents.
A computer generated image of a house appears on the screen.
A wide view of one-story house.
A NIST researcher reads data from a computer screen.
Narrator: At first, the NIST researchers needed to do two things: collect data on the amount of carbon monoxide released from a portable generator and build a computer model of a one-story test house on the agency's campus in Maryland where the testing was done.
A computer generated image of the cross section of a house. White arrows on the screen indicate air flowing through and over the house, which appears as a grey rectangle on the left of the screen. Nearby, to the right, a small, squat grey box, indicating the generator, sits surrounded by red, yellow, green and light blue bands, indicating levels of CO.
Narrator: The researchers then plugged the data they obtained into two sophisticated computer programs: one to calculate the flow of air and gas contaminants outside the house, and the other to estimate the resulting gas concentrations in the house.
Scene switches to a top-down schematic of the same house. The various rooms transition from blue to orange to yellow to green to red, indicating the levels of CO as they rise throughout the house.
Narrator: Their results, published in a recent NIST report, showed that positioning a generator 15 feet from a house may not be far enough away to keep carbon monoxide out.
A NIST report appears on screen. The report reads, "NIST Technical Note 1637, Modeling the Effects of Outdoor Gasoline Powered Generator Use on Indoor Carbon Monoxide Exposures"
Narrator: The researchers also learned that slow wind speed or lack of wind altogether increases the danger.
Scene switches back to the computer generated cross section image of the house. White arrows, indicating air flow, swirl around, over and through the house. A hand points to various places on the screen.
Text on Screen: Liangzhu (Leon) Wang, NIST Postdoctoral Researcher
Wang: This was the worst case scenario because the carbon monoxide lingers near the house, allowing more opportunity for the gas to enter.
Visual: Wang points to the generator in the computer generated image, tracing currents from the generator through the house.
Narrator: While more research with portable generators is needed to define just what are the safe operating distances for different situations, the NIST team does have some advice for those stormy winter nights when the power goes out.
Visual: With a generator on the left side of the screen, three NIST researchers talk by data collection devices. Screen changes to a red sign that reads, "Gasoline-Powered Generator Test in Progress, Danger of Carbon Monoxide Poisoning, Do Not Enter"
Scene cuts to footage of thunderclouds and lighting.
Emmerich: You should keep your generators outdoors and as far from the house as possible--and certainly away from any doors or windows. And be sure to install a battery-powered or battery backed-up carbon monoxide alarm inside your house near all the sleeping areas.
Text on Screen: Keep generators outdoors
Away from windows and doors
Install CO detectors near sleeping areas
For more information www.nist.gov
For more information on portable generator and carbon monoxide safety www.cpsc.gov, www.cdc.gov
Produced by National Institute of Standards and Technology, Public Affairs Office, October 2009
Video footage provided with permission by Shutterstock Inc., U.S. Consumer Product Safety Commission, NOAA
The display of products and services in this program is for demonstration purposes only and does not imply an endorsement by NIST.