Surge Protection
in Sonoma County

Defend Your Home Against Power Surges

The average American home experiences 20 or more power surges per day. Most are small and go unnoticed, but over time these micro-surges degrade the sensitive electronics in your appliances, computers, TVs, HVAC systems, and smart home devices. Larger surges — from lightning strikes, transformer failures, or PG&E grid switching — can destroy thousands of dollars of equipment in a single event. Sonoma County is particularly vulnerable due to our aging grid infrastructure, frequent PSPS events, and winter storm activity.

Eleos Electric installs professional-grade surge protection systems for homes and businesses throughout Windsor, Santa Rosa, Healdsburg, Rohnert Park, Petaluma, Sonoma, and Sebastopol. Unlike the power strips you buy at the store (which provide minimal protection), our whole-home surge protectors are installed directly at your electrical panel and can absorb surges up to 200,000 amps — protecting every circuit in your home simultaneously.

Whole-Home Surge Protection

A whole-home surge protection device (SPD) is installed at your main electrical panel and provides a first line of defense against surges entering your home from the utility grid. These Type 2 SPDs (as defined by UL 1449) clamp surge voltages to safe levels before they reach your branch circuits and the devices connected to them.

We install surge protectors from Eaton, Siemens, Square D, and other industrial-grade manufacturers. These devices feature robust MOV (Metal Oxide Varistor) technology with surge current ratings of 50,000 to 200,000 amps, LED status indicators, and audible alarms when protection is compromised. Installation typically takes about an hour and involves mounting the SPD adjacent to your panel and connecting it to a dedicated two-pole breaker.

As of the 2020 NEC code adoption, surge protection is now required for all new residential construction and service upgrades. If you're upgrading your panel, we include surge protection as part of the project. For existing homes, adding a whole-home SPD is one of the most cost-effective investments you can make in protecting your electrical equipment.

Point-of-Use Surge Protection

For maximum protection, we recommend a layered approach: whole-home surge protection at the panel combined with point-of-use surge protectors at your most valuable equipment. We install hardwired surge-protected outlets for home theater systems, computer workstations, home offices, and medical equipment. These provide an additional layer of clamping beyond the whole-home device.

Why Sonoma County Homes Need Surge Protection

Several factors make surge protection particularly important for Sonoma County properties:

• PSPS Power Restoration — When PG&E restores power after a PSPS event, the re-energization process can produce significant voltage spikes. Every PSPS event in Windsor, Santa Rosa, Healdsburg, and other affected areas carries surge risk.
• Winter Storm Activity — Lightning, downed trees hitting power lines, and transformer failures during storms all generate surges that travel through the power grid.
• Aging Infrastructure — PG&E's Sonoma County grid infrastructure includes equipment that's decades old, which produces more voltage irregularities than newer systems.
• Smart Home Investment — Modern homes in Sebastopol, Sonoma, Petaluma, and Rohnert Park contain thousands of dollars in sensitive electronics. Smart panels, EV chargers, heat pump systems, and home automation equipment all benefit from surge protection.

What Surge Protection Covers

• Computers & home office
• TVs & home theater
• HVAC & heat pumps
• Refrigerators & appliances
• EV chargers
• Smart home equipment
• Solar & battery systems
• Well pumps & motors