Power Cut Kit for Greek Homes: Power Banks, Lights and Power Stations That Make Sense

Most power cuts in Greece are an annoyance, and a few are a real problem: a fridge full of food, a medicine that has to stay cold, a phone at 8% when you need to call the DEDDIE fault line. A good kit costs less than a restaurant dinner for two and fits in a drawer. This guide tells you what to put in it, in plain numbers.

The ten-minute kit

• A fully charged power bank (and the right cable for every phone in the house)
• Two LED lights that do not need mains power, plus spare batteries if they take them
• A headlamp for the person who has to find the fuse box
• A battery or crank radio, or at least a phone with offline access to this site's emergency contacts
• A fridge thermometer, so you know whether food is still safe
• Printed numbers: DEDDIE fault line 11500, your insurer, your electricity supplier (see who to call)
• Any medicine that needs refrigeration: know where the cold-pack alternative is
• A surge-protected power strip for the expensive electronics

Power banks: how many phone charges do you really get?

The number on the box is in mAh. To compare with anything else, convert it: Wh = mAh × 3.7 V ÷ 1,000. That is the nominal energy. In real use you lose roughly a third to conversion, heat and the cable, so plan on about 60–70% of it.

Most phone batteries are 4,000–5,000 mAh (roughly 15–19 Wh). That puts a 10,000 mAh bank at about 1.5–2 charges and a 20,000 mAh bank at about 3–4. A laptop battery is usually 40–70 Wh, so a 20,000 mAh bank gives you at most about one laptop charge. Both 20,000 mAh banks sit below the 100 Wh limit that airlines typically allow in cabin baggage.

Lights: what works and what does not

Candles are a well-known fire risk during outages, so go LED. A headlamp is the best first purchase because it leaves your hands free. For a room, you want a lantern or a work light that does not depend on the mains.

Two inexpensive lamps from Public, with an honest note each:

If the lamp takes batteries, store spare batteries with it. A flat torch is the most common failure in an emergency drawer.

The surge strip you plug in when power returns

Power coming back is not always clean: voltage can spike for a moment as a neighbourhood reconnects. Two habits help more than any gadget. Unplug sensitive electronics (PC, TV, console, router) when the power drops, and plug them back in once the supply has been steady for a few minutes. For equipment you cannot unplug, use a surge-protected strip.

Surge protectors absorb a limited amount of energy and wear out over time, so replace them after a major spike. For expensive equipment, compare the joule rating across several listings.

Bigger loads: power stations and fridges

A portable power station is a big battery with sockets. Two numbers matter: capacity in Wh (how long) and output in W (how much at once). To size one for a fridge:

1. Find the energy label on the fridge: kWh per year.
2. Divide by 365 to get kWh per day. An appliance labelled 200 kWh/year uses about 0.55 kWh (550 Wh) a day.
3. Multiply the station's capacity by about 0.85 to allow for conversion losses. A 1,000 Wh station gives about 850 Wh, or around a day and a half for that fridge, if nothing else is plugged in.
4. Make sure the station's output (W) is higher than the fridge's start-up surge. Check the appliance manual or ask the manufacturer.

We looked at specific models, but several well-known ones were out of stock when we checked and we only link products that are on sale, so here is the current range:

Never run a petrol or diesel generator indoors, in a garage or on a balcony next to a window. Carbon monoxide kills quietly. Our safety guide has more.

The DIY route (only if you know what you are doing)

12 V LiFePO4 batteries are the building block of many off-grid and backup systems. If you are comfortable with correct chargers, a battery management system and an inverter, ZAPS sells the batteries. If you are not, buy a ready-made power station instead.

Food and medicine

Keep the fridge and freezer closed. Commonly cited food-safety guidance is that a closed fridge stays cold for about four hours and a full freezer for 24–48 hours, but that varies with the appliance and the temperature in your kitchen. A fridge thermometer removes the guesswork. For medicines such as insulin, check the leaflet or ask your pharmacist how long they can stay out of the fridge.

Do these five things before the next cut

1. Charge the power bank and test the lights this week.
2. Save the fault-line number (11500 for DEDDIE) in your phone.
3. Put the router and fibre box on a UPS: see our UPS guide and how to stay online.
4. Check what your home insurance says about electrical damage: power surge damage and insurance.
5. When the next cut happens, report it. Every report helps your neighbours and builds the data we use in our summer 2026 report.