Thanks for that freezer idea, Brad, that’s clever.
Lightbringer, thank you for explaining how your utilities work over there (in this post). I hadn’t realised how different they are compared to here.
In Scotland, you can usually claim about $85 / day compensation if you lose electricity for more than 24 hours. It’s capped at 4 to 10 days worth under extreme circumstances. People who are elderly or disabled can register for priority assistance in the event of problems.
Gas, water and telecoms have similar regulations, although the amounts and criteria vary. In addition to that, if a utility makes an appointment requiring you to be at home, but they don’t show up, you get $35.
Summed over many people, it gives the utilities a serious incentive not to cut you off. Luckily, most of our cables and pipes are underground, and the heavy cross-country stuff is solid enough to harden against bad weather.
In addition to that, the utilities routinely clear power line routes of trees - they have to, or Scotland would never have any power in the winter, given all the storms we get.
If you’re a private landowner who refuses the power company access to clear trees, then you’re liable for the damage if one of your trees falls and brings down a power line. That’s seriously expensive. However, most power line routes are covenanted to require future landowners to grant access, so it’s not usually an issue.
On the other side of the coin, we pay a lot more for our utilities - our annual energy bill is about $1800 - and there’s always a tree somewhere that gets missed, so people lose service for a few hours.
We get there in the end - in my town, the last power cut was 3 hours last year, half an hour a couple of years before that, and a whole evening a couple of years before that. Rural areas get longer power cuts and more often, but rarely for more than 24 hours.