I’ve had a 600VA UPS forever. Surge protection for my modem / router (I’ve had to replace one after a lightning storm even though the whole estate is on underground phone and power). Surge protection for whatever I plug into it.

As a bonus, when power fails, my router keeps working, so does my laptop under its own battery power, hours of internet fun in darkness. My energy monitors are plugged into it too. ( When power fails my usage is zero, but a lot of zero’s look better than nothing, i.e. A gap in the data). The original battery in the UPS was getting past its use-by date and the back-up time was getting shorter and I didn’t want to have to pay for another cheap UPS (or battery) so I used a perfectly good battery I had at my disposal.

But the battery I had was 17Ah, a little larger than the 7Ah battery that is included with the UPS. So I removed the OEM battery, extended the leads and hooked them up to an external battery. (Did I mention I hope the charging circuit doesn’t melt when it has to recharge the higher capacity battery? Floating is OK and running it down to 50% is ok, I’ve not tried more than that. If it fails, I’ll buy another cheap 600VA UPS (<$70AUD)).

Supercharged UPS

On this particular day a rich tourist from down south is driving through town , stops at the local Motel and lays a $100 bill on the desk saying he wants to inspect the rooms upstairs in order to pick one to spend the night.

He gives him keys to a few rooms and as soon as the man walks upstairs, the owner grabs the $100 bill and runs next door to pay his debt to the butcher.

The butcher takes the $100 and runs down the street to repay his debt to the pig farmer.

The pig farmer takes the $100 and heads off to pay his bill at the supplier of feed and fuel.

The guy at the Farmer’s Co-op takes the $100 and runs to pay his drinks bill at the local pub.

The publican slips the money along to the local prostitute drinking at the bar , who has also been facing hard times and has had to offer him “services” on credit.

The hooker rushes to the motel and pays off her room bill to the motel owner with the $100 .

The motel proprietor then places the $100 back on the counter so the rich traveller will not suspect anything.

At that moment the traveller comes down the stairs, picks up the $100 bill, states that the rooms are not satisfactory, pockets the money, and leaves town.

No one produced anything. No one earned anything.

However, the whole town is now out of debt and looking to the future with a lot more optimism.

And that, ladies and gentlemen, is how the Australian Government’s stimulus package works.

I created a page to share what I’m doing to try and keep my annual electricity consumption below the 4000kWh mark (And because I’m a nut). It didn’t format very well here, so click this link to view it in a layout I had more control over.  Target 4000 

Visit their site at : http://www.b24australia.org.au/