2012 is the year I am planning to go "off the grid". Since this is THE year I was hoping to be completely off the grid, Id better get moving. Can I be 100% off the grid by December 31, 2012? I dont see why not.
I will be putting together a plan and update the blog as I work on projects. With wind and solar easier in reach then ever before and with electronics using less wattage... this is entirely possible.
There are Do It Yourself wind turbines, youtube videos to make wind turbines, tips and techniques to make solar panels and fix broken ones. Computers today use very little energy compared to 10 years ago. Many big screen TVs use less energy than that of a light bulb. LED light bulbs are better then ever and keep coming down in price.
If you too are interested in going off the grid, or reducing your dependency, please post a comment and keep in touch so we can share ideas. Thanks!
We installed a 5.8 kW PV system this December in Wisconsin. The system will cover all our electricity use and my electric kiln I fire about every other month. Our utility had a buy-back program that we are part of. They pay us about twice as much as the current residential retail rate for 10 years so our system has 7-8 year payback period. The nice thing about a grid tied system like ours is that no green electricity is wasted at least not directly by us. An off-grid system is really more suitable if you don't have a grid nearby. Otherwise, it would be too expensive and you would have to manage your loads very carefully. We had a stretch this winter with hardly any sunny days and my friends out in the country really had to watch their electricity consumption because the batteries were getting really low.
ReplyDeleteThanks for the info eastside! I am curious, how easy is it to detach your system from the grid, if you wanted to go solo?
ReplyDeleteWell, first of all we would need to purchase lots of batteries, as the sun doesn't always shine and but you would still have electrical loads during that time. Batteries cost a bit of money and require some maintenance. The inverter system is a bit different so we would probably have to take out our mirco inverters, which maximize our system performance due to temporary shading of our system. This would reduce the overall performance of our system. We would have to ask the utility to disconnect our service, which they don't like doing and would charge us a lot of money for. The argument would be something like: What about the next homeowner... Considering all these costs, we would have to spent probably twice as much as we already have. In addition, we would make less money of our system since off the grid, a kWh is only worth as much as we would have paid to the utility, that's about 12 cents, whereas on the the grid, they currently pay us 25 cents for every kWh we produce. In our case, once you do the math, going off-grid would be a bad financial system.
ReplyDeleteNow, if we owned some land out in the country that didn't have electrical service and we wanted to build a house there, I would strongly consider off-grid. The electrical service, depending how far you are from an existing line, can run you tens of thousands of $. In that case, you might be better off investing those $ in a PV system and not deal with the utility.
In the end, it might feel right to want to go "off-grid" and cut your ties to the utility, but a PV system is more like a financial investment and the sooner it will add money back into your bank, the better.
Wow it really sounds like you know your stuff! I have a lot to learn. One thing Im curious is - could you potentially run a line to your neighbor(s) home or homes and sell them your power? I wonder how feasible that would be. Ive read some avant-garde groups in Detroit doing such a thing. Buying an entire city block of $5k homes and putting a big solar array in the center of them all and the block feeding off of it.
ReplyDeletewow that sounds like a great community! I have wanted to get solar and off the grid we don't have any money allocated to it in addition we don't have huge electric bills so not sure if its more a need or love to be off the Grid.... Do you know what the grants are? It seems to get a tax deduction you still have to pay quite a lot. I have seen some solar companies offering it for 0 and they do the foot work. I have an issue of mother Earth Magazine where they show how to put one together. It wouldn't be for a whole house just one item. I saw your post on the Dervaes Path to Freedom. Your blog looks Great. Good luck on moving to off the GRID.
ReplyDeleteNot sure on grants. We also dont have a very big electric bill, so adding in solar would be more of a DIY thing for us and not use a company to do it for us.
ReplyDeleteThere are so many great how-to videos all around the internet on how to DIY solar, wind, reuse of grey water, and even DIY solar water heating.