Window AC Generator

This idea answers the question, what happens if you cross a window-installed air conditioner, with a portable electric generator?

You get a small portable generator, which you can install in your window!

I'm writing this idea a few days after hurricane Sandy passed through, with grid power still out in my neighborhood, and power supplied to my house from a portable generator.

It occurs to me that people who live in apartments without power have no way of doing something similar, and thought of this idea as a solution.

Basically, the device consists of a very small generator, made to mount in the opening of a vertically opened sash window, just like a portable air conditioner.

Electrical outlets are on the inside, obviously, eliminating the need for heavy-duty outdoor extension cords. Intake for combustion comes from outside, and exhaust from combustion goes to outside.

A lever, or perhaps a thermostat, determines whether engine cooling is done with air pulled from, and discarded to, the interior or the exterior of the building. If you live someplace that's never ever cold, then you'd get a machine which always uses outside air and vents to the outside.

To minimize noise, and because a high power density is valuable in something which will need to be manually moved around, a Wankel engine would be used.

To maximize safety and cleanliness, the fuel should be propane.

There would be two ways of fueling the generator:

Firstly, on the side of it facing towards the interior of the building, there'd be a place to screw on a disposable one pound propane tank.

Secondly, on side of the machine sticking outside the house, there'd be a refillable propane tank, and a propane hose and regulator. The hose would need to be long enough for the tank to rest on the ground, or on a balcony or fire escape.

The machine would switch between the two fuel sources automatically, at need, or manually. Whenever the machine switches automatically from the outside tank to the inside one, or vice-versa, an alarm would sound, warning the user that one of the tanks needs to be refilled/replaced.

Obviously, the machine needs to be small and light enough to mount into a window, but should be big enough to run a refrigerator, several lights, a radio, and perhaps a small kitchen appliance (microwave, toaster, coffeemaker, hotplate, etc.).

It might have an outlet designated as being for the refrigerator, so it can temporarily turn just that outlet off, if the fridge plus other things exceeds it's generating capacity... sort of like a college dorm combination microwave/refrigerator.