Lately I've been thinking a lot about getting off the grid. For me that means self sufficiency above and beyond the systems we use in our society. Food growth and sustainability will be an important factor. Producing our own electricity, water storage and filtration, gardening, a greenhouse, even raising some animals for food will be factors in getting off the grid. We live in a rural area but within a town, city limits as it were, so there will be limits to amounts and types of livestock we can have where we live. I'm thinking to start we may raise some rabbits for meat and get some laying hens for eggs and the occasional chicken for dinner. I'm also wondering if it might be possible to sneak in a goat for milking options though that might really be pushing it. Ive been scouring the internet looking at food growth and other food producing options to cut our grocery bill and get further off the grid.As the prices of food and commodities will steadily increase growing or raising your own food will become a more popular notion as it was in older days.
Getting off of the power grid is high on my priority list. I hate paying electric bills and giving my money to big corporations. I plan to use a few different innovations to produce electricity. Solar panels, wind generators, battery packs and any other viable option I can find to create the power needed to run 100% off grid. I've Been investigating what will be needed for the power systems and have concluded i will have to test my options and use more than one. Wind and solar will likely be the primary sources of off grid power.
One of the challenges will be converting the houses heat sources. As of now we have natural gas but I'm looking at other options. Wood has become a more expensive option than in past years but there are innovations to wood heating units that make it a cheaper means of heat in some instances and those are the options I'm looking at most.
Another challenge will be powering the water heater, well pump, and cooking stove. We have an electric cook stove now that runs on 220 power. I'm not sure what to do about cooking yet. The water heater and the well pump i think i can get to run off of solar / wind power with the use of power inverters. I'm also considering a wood heated water heater of some sort.
There are lots of green possibilities when it comes to producing food, generating your own power, heating and inexpensive green building solutions. My plan is to incorporate the ones I can use and become as independent from the system as i can. Wish me luck.
