We bought dry ice blocks and put them in the freezer which lasted nearly 2 days-- just in time for the power of course.
How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
41–50 of 384 posts
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#42A test with the freezer as full as possible with just water would be interesting as a best-case set of data points to compare against. I always keep containers full of water in the bowels of my refrigerators/freezers only removing them when the space is required for food. There's not much sense in keeping empty volumes of air in a refrigerated space.
I don't understand why that doesn't make sense. What you do with containers of water is what doesn't make sense to me.
I keep soda/water bottles in a secondary downstairs freezer. They're my ice packs for throwing in coolers. (This, of course, makes more sense if you have more than a primary refrigerator/freezer).
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#43Personally, I throw blocks of dry ice in there as soon as the power has been out a few hours, just in case. Beats regular ice all the way.
How do you safely handle dry ice? I'm legitimately asking, I know retailers sell it with big warning labels but I wouldn't know how to transport it, move it, and similar.
Other people are giving good advice, but you should also know that it isn't that dangerous. People have died from the fumes, but only when they have a lot of dry ice in an enclosed area (e.g. a car). It can cause explosions, but that's mostly from people going out of their way to build bombs. It can cause burns, but not instantly and the pain will warn you before you get seriously injured.
Don't be particularly afraid. It's not hard to handle.
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#44Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#45So much electricity does it use every time you open the door?
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#46A test with the freezer as full as possible with just water would be interesting as a best-case set of data points to compare against. I always keep containers full of water in the bowels of my refrigerators/freezers only removing them when the space is required for food. There's not much sense in keeping empty volumes of air in a refrigerated space.
You'd be better off having lidded containers with no water. Since it stops the air loss every time it's opened. But you don't lose the energy when you take them out.
Water is ~ 1000 times heaver than air so for a fridge, removing the water is the same as letting out air 1000 times.
Freezer is worse because there is also the phase change in the water. But having ice is useful.
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#47A test with the freezer as full as possible with just water would be interesting as a best-case set of data points to compare against. I always keep containers full of water in the bowels of my refrigerators/freezers only removing them when the space is required for food. There's not much sense in keeping empty volumes of air in a refrigerated space.
When there's no airflow in the refrigerator, then it takes a long time to chill food, the reverse of how a blast chiller can chill food really quickly by moving lots of air. But maybe the water chills the air to make up for this, IDK. It would be interesting to experiment.
Chilling food super swiftly / immediately is rarely a concern for regular home residents.
It is a public health concern at scale.
Two overlapping but divergent scenarios.
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#48Last week the power was out Tuesday 2 pm until Friday 8 pm, 78 hours. I left the lid shut on a 7 cubic foot chest freezer in the garage, where the ambient was in the 70s F most of the time due to the cool weather. When the power came back on, the temperature was about 37 degrees at the top of the freezer. Ice cream in the second layer down had a light bit of crystallization, but no other obvious defects. Other food will be evaluated before being eaten, but it should be safe since it was below or at normal refrigerator temperature, although texture may suffer due to being refrozen.
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#49A test with the freezer as full as possible with just water would be interesting as a best-case set of data points to compare against. I always keep containers full of water in the bowels of my refrigerators/freezers only removing them when the space is required for food. There's not much sense in keeping empty volumes of air in a refrigerated space.
You'd be better off having lidded containers with no water. Since it stops the air loss every time it's opened. But you don't lose the energy when you take them out. Water is ~ 1000 times heaver than air so for a fridge, removing the water is the same as letting out air 1000 times. Freezer is worse because there is also the phase change in the water. But having ice is useful.
It depends what you're optimizing for. If you're primarily interested in resilience to power outages, then maybe you are OK with the wasted energy used to freeze/re-freeze the extra water.
Re: How long does a freezer stay frozen when the power goes out?
#50Personally, I throw blocks of dry ice in there as soon as the power has been out a few hours, just in case. Beats regular ice all the way.
How do you safely handle dry ice? I'm legitimately asking, I know retailers sell it with big warning labels but I wouldn't know how to transport it, move it, and similar.
It is not super dangerous stuff. You can (and should not) juggle it bare handed briefly without ill effect. One thing to consider is dry ice is frozen CO2. Camping, it was a clever way to pack in our steaks without having a watery mess. What we figured out, was the mosquitos are attracted to CO2. The poor guy with the food pack had a cloud of blood suckers around him every portage.
A normal cooler works fine. Something that seals and could build pressure would be problematic.