How long for the battery to run down? For mine (running only the Hubitat hub) I can get at least 4 hours so I have the hub shut itself down at 3 hours.
Our power is pretty reliable, If we loose power for > 3 hours, rebooting the hub is the last of my concerns.
It seemed easier to get a larger UPS. I have a 1500 with only 2 HE hubs, a Hue hub, switch, and router. Its screen says it has 7 hours of runtime which is longer than our power has ever been out.
You could otherwise connect HE to a tp-link plug or other wifi oulet that can be power cycled independent of HE. If you are using Homebridge, there is a tp-link integration.
My goal is to have network backbone, Internet and all device involving security continue to work when there is power outage or intentional cutoff. I don't care much about other smart devices.
Router, mesh nodes, network switches, POE switch, cable modem, HTPC/file server, Hubitat, Hue Hub are on two 1500VA UPS to make sure Internet and network connection are working all time.
All Dahua-based security cameras are POE powered by POE switches which is connected to one of the UPS. The only camera without back up power is the Dahua doorbell powered by the door chime adapter (I can pull a long extension cable from UPS to power it)
Other 12V retrofitted security sensors (recessed door, window) from previous security system and the Z-wave relays connected to are on a 12V Meanwell UPS. The 12V UPS will also trigger a z-wave relay when line voltage is gone so I get notification if there is a power outage.
In a previous home, I took a large UPS designed for providing a server with clean power, even in third world countries, and yanked the battery. I then connected four, 110ah 12V marine (deep cycle) batteries to supply the UPS with its necessary 48V. It was then connected to a circuit that ran only the FIOS modem, router/switches/APs, alarm system, one TV, and a pellet stove. Worked like a charm, and powered all that easily overnight without coming close to 50% discharge of the batteries. We would get multi-day outages once or twice each year, so this allowed us to turn off the generator at about 7pm, continue watching TV and surfing the web until morning if we didn't open the refrigerators/freezers, and then fire up the generator the next morning. It cut our fuel consumption in half, allowed for a quiet (no generator) evening, and worked great. I tried plugging in a refrigerator as well, but that started to push battery discharge and power consumption higher than I liked. And then we decided to move and I yanked the system, which sits unused in the basement today because we went with an automatic, whole house generator at the new place.
BTW, we suffer outages here several times per year that last a few seconds before the generator kicks in. Small UPS devices handle those well for routers/switches/APS, Starlink, and HE hubs. Everything else in the system just comes right back online when the generator kicks in, including all the z-wave stuff.
Agreed, and this is the direction I chose to go too.
I got a 900 instead of 1500, but for my modem, router, RPi, and Hubitat, the current runtime is over 5 hours. I’m currently shutting devices down when the battery reports itself as low, which is when remaining runtime is less than 5 minutes or the remaining power is less than 10% (which will end up being around 30 minutes of remaining runtime).
It’s definitely overkill at this point, but during the winter storms in Texas this February, we would lose power for 8-14 hours at a time for about a week. That won’t be a frequent occurrence, but I’m still trying to plan ahead for the next one. We get hurricanes too, although we’re far enough inland that we haven’t had power issues yet (flooding is a different story…).
Ooo, that’s a good idea. I’ve got a handful of WeMo plugs in my drawer of shame that I could drag out for this purpose.
I have a KASA HS-105 wifi plug that Hubitat is plugged into. My Node-RED flow that monitors power (pinging a fixed IP device, not on a UPS), restarts HE by turning the KASA plug off and then back on. There is a KASA/TP-Link node that I use. The same flow that restarts HE also shuts down HE when power goes out.
If the UPS battery runs out, then HE will restart when power comes back on in any case.
EDIT: I don't shut down RPi, modem etc. in this process, just HE
EDIT2: The Node-RED solutions is documented here - Shutdown and restart Hub in case of power outage (Node-red solution) - LONG READ
I have AC UPSes for all network gear/hubs/cameras and some lighting that lasts for at least 2 hours.. I also use Ring Range Extenders that have battery backup to maintain my Z-Wave mesh..
I have a little one just for my Hubitat 
happy with that so far. Might extend it to the modem at a later date.
Computers can pull a lot of power, so they will drain the reserve power in a UPS rather quickly. Mechanical hard drives run off of 12 volts and also require significant power.
Devices that run off 5 volt wall worts generally use somewhere between 1-5 watts of power. Thus, even if you have several of them plugged into a USP, it will take quite a while to run out of backup power. Just avoid plugging high wattage devices like computers, monitors, TVs, audio devices, etc. into the same UPS.
I have a separate UPS that just powers my work computer and will safe shutdown windows before the battery drains.
I have a small-medium UPS that controls my Hubitat hub, TV, computer monitors, and 2-in-1 dock (so I can keep my Wyze cam on for local storage at the very least).
I also have a larger UPS with a secondary attachment battery that controls my modem, router, switch, and PC. It's probably overkill as it's telling my that my current estimated runtime is 648 minutes (I'd also shut my PC down if it was an outage and not just a quick disruption).
I've got CyberPower 1500s covering critical infrastructure. My servers, which when power dropped get a signal to poweroff, I have a separate one running my cable modem, router, and cellular modem. (DD-WRT router configured with dual failover WAN.). HE is wired to one of the LAN ports on the router as it is core infrastructure. It is on an APC500. I get about 3 hours run time before I need to remote in and power them off.
After the February ice storm. I am planning long term to have a whole house generator to cover for power outages by ice storm or more likely hurricane. EIther way, I need power to stay on...
You guys had it tough. My cousin lives just south of Dallas and was hit like everyone.
The one issue I see with a generator is how to power it. I have an old gasoline 5kw generator, it works great, starts right up but is loud as hell and sucks a lot of gas even when lightly loaded. So the issue becomes how to store enough energy to power the generator. My cousin lost their natural gas so its either propane or gasoline (or diesel).
Siphoning for you vehicle is not a good idea. The fill vapor capture system (since 1998) requires a valve at the end of the fill pipe (in the tank). A siphon tube has a chance of damaging that valve.
I kept mine simple (I think). As I work in the field of electronic security (intruder alarms / swipe card systems etc) getting hold of 12v DC battery backed power supplies was cost effective for me. My ISP modem & router work off 12v DC, so these are hooked up to two power 3 amp supplies. Each power supply has 2x 7AH batteries, as each device pulls less than 1 amp in theory you would get 14+ hours of backup. For the HE I used a similar principle but this has a heavy duty vehicle USB (12v - 5v) multi way convertor/adapter, using a similar battery backed power supply and a 7AH battery.
The mains monitoring is delivered in two ways, using a Fibaro UBS (also 12v and battery backed) i use one of the inputs to monitor a power supply's mains monitoring trigger which operates a delayed and cancelable rule onto HE to shutdown the hub gracefully if mains is off greater than two hours. The second mains monitoring is via my intruder alarm system via GSM - this will text my phone in the event of mains power loss.
Fortunately here in the UK we don't get severe weather events causing power outages like in the US but we do get idiots digging roads and damaging HV cables causing them (twice in 5 years) or as is often the case it's something in the house like a faulty oven heating element tripping the RCD (happened only last week 
)
Another bonus I find using the 12v battery backed power supplies is I have simple LED lighting with manual switching in strategic places which are still operational whilst the mains is off.
I have recently added another UPS for the HE Hubs and 2nd Hue Hub.
The Plex Server along with Drobos is on its own UPS and it will do an orderly shutdown when the UPS is close to giving up.
Another UPS for my M1 Mac Mini, not monitor, along with office managed switches and AP.
Another one for the FTTD router, managed switches, AP, wireless security camera base stations, Fing box, and a Hue Hub.
The micro managed switches are POE as are the remaining APs.
I need to find a way for my M1 Mac Mini to send a shutdown to the HE Hubs if the power is off for too long.
Very rare to have a full power outage, but have had a few power drops recently so these UPS have me covered in the main.
Reading thread above will move the four IKEA zigbee repeaters onto existing UPS and some spare zwave sockets to keep the respective networks stable longer.
You can build your own power source for UPS it's easier than you think:
Two circuits from my electrical panel independently feed the A and B UPS blocks. UPS A has a USB monitoring interface, which is connected to an Opengear ASM7008-2 running NUT for shutdown scripting. The redundant UPS feed A and B input on the Cyberpower PDU15M10AT ATS in the network rack, which powers the network core.
The network switches support POE+ and POE++. Nearly everything wired to the network is either native POE or uses POE extractors. I like the Trendnet TPE-104GS for multi-voltage support up to POE+ power… still looking for cost effective POE++ extractor.
Separately there is a wall box for the wired security system. It contains a 12VDC power supply and battery similar to what @EVOLVING.HOME describes. It’s effectively another UPS that powers a Konnected board and a 5V regulator to power a RasPi Z-Way node. Konnected and Z-Way are both WiFi connected hosts.
@sidjohn1 brilliant idea to use a DC power combiner at the HE. Does your combiner cable have Schottky diodes built-in or did you have to hack something together?
I also appreciate the comments cautioning about the effects of losing mains-powered repeaters. Has me thinking about ways to overcome that problem.
I recently bought this for my computer, which has my DSL modem and router nearby. We just lost power a day ago, and it worked splendidly. My desktop had power for over an hour (I let it run dry just to see.) Because I have DSL, I don't lost internet during a power outage.
I also bought two of these when they were going for $25 bucks (shoulda bought more.) My NVR and Hubitat hub are plugged into one of them.
https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00NTQYUA8/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1
I needed to repeatedly test a power cycle and wrote a small driver to power down/power up a standalone hub (no need for a second device). Same logic may have other uses...
Neat solution. The reason I'm pinging a second device (that is not on a UPS) is to determine if there is a power outage and when power is restored.
Download the Hubitat app
