Project Zomboid
Generator Fuel Usage
Generators are the difference between a base with power and a base without, and running out of fuel overnight is how people lose freezers full of food.
How this is calculated
Consumption scales with what the generator is powering, not with the generator itself, and the fuel tank has a fixed capacity. The calculator works out runtime from the load you plan to run so you can see how often you actually have to refill.
The arithmetic
- load % = min(100, watts ÷ 1000 × 100)
- fuel per hour = 2.5 L × (watts ÷ 1000) × (condition ÷ 100)
- fuel per day = fuel per hour × 24
What people get wrong
Generators degrade with use and lose efficiency as condition drops, so a well-used generator runs shorter than the calculation suggests. Keep a spare or keep the mechanic skill up, and treat the number here as the best case rather than the guaranteed one.