For the most part, a 22kW home standby generator should be able to run most houses that are between 2000 and 3000 square feet. A 22kW home backup generator can provide emergency power for a whole house, as long as you do not run all your appliances at the same time. The 22-kilowatt size is probably large enough for providing emergency power to a moderately sized house during a power cut. If you have a large house (more than 4000 square feet) with lots of appliances that need to run at the same time, then you may need a more powerful home standby generator. You definitely do not want to end up overloading your home standby generator during an emergency.
What is a 22kW whole house generator?
A home standby generator provides backup power for your whole house when there is a power cut due to electricity grid supply problems. This is usually related to bad weather or natural disasters, although the power might also be turned off for doing maintenance work on the power grid infrastructure.
The home standby generator is connected to the electricity system of the house in such a way that it will turn on automatically after a power outage, and turn off again when electricity is restored to the power grid.
A whole house generator has an engine with an alternator, which generates the electricity. The engine might be either air-cooled or liquid-cooled. It can run on diesel, propane, or natural gas. A 22kW home standby generator produces up to 22000 watts for powering your house. This should be enough for powering a house that is a normal size.
How much propane does a 22kW generator use?
Generally speaking, a 22kW home backup generator might use between 2 gallons and 4 gallons of propane per hour, depending on whether it runs at half speed or full speed. That is a lot of propane gas! For this reason, a home standby generator should be connected to either a large residential propane tank or a natural gas line.
Which 22kW whole house generators are popular?
Some of the most popular brand names are Briggs & Stratton, Generac, Honeywell, and Kohler.
It seems like Generac makes the most popular home standby generators. Their Guardian series home backup generators are often mentioned in reviews and videos. For instance, the Generac 7043 22-kilowatt air-cooled Guardian series home standby generator seems to be a popular choice (view the Generac 7043 22kW model on Amazon).
In addition to their portable generator models, such as the Q6500, Briggs & Stratton also makes home backup generators. I think their home standby generators are known as the PowerProtect series.
Champion Power Equipment has a handful of home standby generators that can automatically power your home during a power cut. I think the smallest model starts at around 8 kilowatts, while the largest model is a 22-kilowatt unit.
I am not familiar with the Kohler residential backup power generators, so I do not have anything to say about them. They seem to have quite a few models on the market, from as small as 6 kilowatts right up to 150 kilowatts.
Conclusion
To conclude, a 22kW home backup generator will be powerful enough to run a small to medium-sized household without a problem. However, a large house will need more power, probably a 24kW model or more.