The article mentions most of these points and provides some compelling reasons why one might prefer an integrated system. I'd certainly rather have one powered by the truck's engine. It's vastly more fuel-efficient, quieter, and vastly more environmentally-sound than a loud-ass 2-stroke portable generator could ever hope to be, and if you're the kind of working person who'd benefit from this, it's a godsend.
A 2000W inverter generator is much, much quieter than the construction generators you're used to seeing. Still louder than an F150, but quiet enough so it's not very bothersome. 50-60dB or so.
That would depend more on the state of the exhaust of the F150. I have the quietest Honda inverter generator (which AFAIK is the quietest generator) and I have an F150 with the most powerful motor available. The generator is quiet for a generator, but much louder than the F150 at idle. It might be pretty close on a hot day during the times when the high speed fan cycles on, though.
The truck has ~$1k worth of emissions scrubbers in its exhaust, maybe more. You're not going to beat that performance with a portable generator. The Honda generator doesn't even have a catalytic converter.
Yeah, but the scrubbers don’t help CO2, which is the most important pollutant these days.
The hybrid truck could run an inverter off battery (in theory), and cycle the engine on and off. A dirt cheap generator (Predator 8750 from harbor freight) runs 8–12 hours on ~5 gallons (the spec sheet doesn’t give tank capacity)
How many gallons per hour does an idle truck burn?
Honda portable generators are some kind of magic. 90% of that thing must be a muffler, but I've never seen a tear-down. I knew a bunch of people into flying model airplanes, and every single person would have one of these out at the field. Until someone pointed one out to me, I had no idea 5+ generators were actively running around me.
