Or pull your generator out and power your cooler and other essentials.

Much easier than trying to get and find dry ice in an emergency.

Where does one normally find dry ice in the US, even when there's no emergency? Is it a commonly stocked thing?

Costco or Walmart will often carry it. Many grocery stores (but definitely not all) will have it so it’s worth asking.

My favorite use is sparkling grapes. https://sciencenotes.org/how-to-make-fizzy-fruit-with-dry-ic...

Put (food grade) dry ice at the bottom of a bowl, then a clean cloth or towel (for insulation), then grapes. Ideally our a loose fitting cover over the bowl.

As the dry ice sublimates, it passes through the grapes which will capture some of the CO2 and carbonate the grapes.

Very fun, and much less practical, use of dry ice…

In my local grocery store it is the Fish / Meat department that has the dry ice.

Fairly common in grocery stores. Regular ice also works just fine, but dry ice is arguably better in freezer applications because, while it doesn't last as long, it is much colder.

Grocery stores usually have it, you just have to ask someone.

The next time you go into a grocery store, look at the front and see if you see a dry ice storage box

I get it all the time for camping trips

A standard residential generator typically holds a gallon of fuel and will burn through that in about 8-12 hours, which is not the ideal way to run a refrigerator. If you run the generator constantly, you'll burn through substantial amounts of fuel, and if you run it only occasionally, you're going to get the kind of temperature fluctuations we're trying to avoid here.

I have a 1kW power station with solar charging, which won't fare a whole lot better; it'll run a fridge for maybe 2-3 days if it's sunny outside.

Low-tech solutions win in power outages of more than a day or two.

My generator holds 2.5 gallons and runs a bit over 24 hours, so that's about right, but I generally have a 15 gallon tank in the shed. That generator can power the A/C, fridge, everything, without having to open it and let cold air out and transfer items.

Power outages typically aren't more than one day, and dry ice is not going to help you for those outages.

I don't have any dry ice suppliers nearby (no the Walmart doesn't stock it), it's not a low-tech solution.

The low tech solution would be a bigger gas canister. 2 gallons a day is not bad at all.

In an apartment building or something I can certain see the use case for dry ice though.

Where I live the local power utility distributes dry ice in the summer during power outages.