Will my gas fireplace work during a power outage?
In Waynesville, where you sit near 2,650 feet and the heating season runs about three weeks longer than Asheville's, a gas fireplace that lights on a standing pilot or battery backup will keep making heat through an outage. The drafty open fireplaces common in Hazelwood, though, give back most of their warmth up the flue — outage or not.
Cold enough that backup heat isn't optional
Waynesville runs 10 to 15 degrees colder than the lower WNC towns, and the season you'd depend on a fireplace stretches well past when Asheville has warmed up. That raises the stakes on what happens when the power quits. A millivolt gas fireplace makes its own pilot current and keeps radiating with the grid down; a battery-backup electronic unit does the same as long as the pack is fresh. Both beat central heat, which stops the instant the furnace blower loses power. At this elevation, the room you'd ride out an outage in should have one or the other.
Hazelwood's open hearths are the weak link
Much of Waynesville's older Hazelwood housing stock still has the original open masonry fireplace, and those are honest ambiance but poor heaters — an open firebox can actually run a net heat loss, pulling warm room air up the chimney. In an outage that's the opposite of what you want. Converting to a sealed gas insert with a properly sized liner turns that hole in the wall into a real heater, and a millivolt or battery-backup insert keeps it working when the lines go down. For total grid independence some Waynesville homeowners go the other way — a Regency wood insert that owes nothing to the power company.
We permit it in Haywood
Every gas line we run is licensed, permitted work — a mason or showroom can sell the box but can't legally connect the fuel in North Carolina. We pull the Haywood County permit, pressure-test, and meet the inspector. Book a fall assessment before the early cold snaps arrive: call (828) 545-0525.
Fireplace help in Waynesville
We install and service fireplaces throughout Waynesville and the rest of Haywood County — just 35 minutes west from our Asheville-area showroom.
Related questions
- Does a pellet stove work without electricity?
- Does a gas fireplace with electronic ignition still light during a power outage?
- Can natural gas service be interrupted in extreme cold?
- What should I do if there's a propane shortage during a cold snap?
- Can I run an electric fireplace off a portable generator during an outage?