Generator Safety: Carbon Monoxide, Placement, and Weather

The uncomfortable fact first: portable generators are involved in roughly 70 to 100+ carbon-monoxide deaths in the US every year — the Consumer Product Safety Commission's own estimate has trended upward across its last several reports — and they cluster in the days right after storms. Almost none involve a machine malfunctioning — they involve a working generator in the wrong place. The rules below are short, absolute, and cover essentially every case.

The placement rules

• Outside only. Never in the house, basement, garage (even with the door open), crawlspace, or enclosed porch. A generator produces as much CO as hundreds of idling cars.
• 20 feet from the house, minimum, with the exhaust pointed away from windows, doors, and vents — the CDC and CPSC number, not a suggestion.
• Never near window AC units or soffit vents; exhaust drifts along walls and finds openings.
• CO alarms with battery backup on every level of the house and outside sleeping areas. If an alarm sounds, get out first, investigate never.

Buy the CO shutoff — it's the seatbelt

Since around 2019, most major brands sell models with a built-in CO sensor that kills the engine if exhaust accumulates around the unit (Honda CO-MINDER, Generac COsense, Champion CO Shield, and similar). CPSC's own rulemaking analysis, run against tens of thousands of simulated accident scenarios, found shutoff sensors alone would have prevented roughly 87% of the deaths in its dataset. If you're choosing between two similar machines, the CO shutoff is worth more than any other feature on the sheet — our catalog flags which models carry one.

Rain, snow, and cords

Generators make lethal voltage and hate water. Run them under an open-sided canopy or a purpose-built generator tent — never a sealed enclosure that traps exhaust and heat, and never a tarp draped over a running machine. Set the unit on a dry, level pad, not in a puddle. Use outdoor-rated 12-gauge-or-heavier cords, fully uncoiled (a coiled cord under load is a heater), routed where they can't be pinched by doors or driven over. If the model has GFCI outlets, use them.

Fuel and burns

• Shut down and cool for several minutes before refueling — gasoline on a hot muffler ignites.
• Store fuel in proper containers, outside living space, away from the generator while it runs.
• The muffler side of the machine stays burn-hot for a long time after shutdown; keep kids and pets away.
• Ground the unit per the manual, especially when feeding a transfer switch.

None of this is complicated, and all of it fits on an index card taped inside the garage: outside, 20 feet, exhaust away, CO alarms in, cool before refueling. Do that and the machine is exactly what it should be — the most boring appliance you own.