Generator Installation in Kittery, Maine

Kittery takes the ocean’s weather first. The town’s emergency management agency is still working through federal reimbursement and mitigation for the January 2024 and April 2024 storms, and the January 9 to 13, 2024 storms brought a disaster declaration that covered York County. Snow is its own hazard: the late-January 2026 storm left more than 20 inches in Kittery, the kind of heavy load that brings limbs down across service drops. Across Maine, the October 2017 windstorm cut power to more than 400,000 customers, some for more than a week. Central Maine Power restores the lines, and a generator covers the time in between.

Kittery has a real fuel choice. Unitil lists the town among the Maine communities it serves with natural gas, so a house on a gas main can run a standby generator from the same supply as its furnace, with no tank to refill mid-storm. Elsewhere, propane is the usual fuel. Sizing starts with what must keep running: heating controls, a refrigerator, a sump pump in a low basement near Spruce or Chauncey Creek, and in a home with electric heat, a far larger load than most people expect, since about 13 percent of Kittery homes heat with electricity.

Placement deserves as much thought as size. Much of Kittery lies in the Shoreland overlay or inside a FEMA flood zone mapped in 2024, and the town requires a flood hazard permit, identified before the building permit is issued, for development in those zones. A generator pad near the water may need to sit higher or farther back than it would inland. An automatic transfer switch keeps generator power from flowing back onto CMP’s lines, and for a portable unit, an interlock kit with an outdoor inlet does the same job. Goodnow Electric sizes the load, installs the transfer equipment and pulls Kittery’s electrical permit. A standby unit also needs a yearly check of its battery, oil and exercise cycle, and a portable one should never run in a garage, a basement or under a window, where exhaust can reach living space.