Living Off The Grid

OK I’ll admit it. When I first saw that www.livingoffgrid.org was available it seemed like a sign. Here I was making websites for a living and wanting nothing more than to have a little piece of land to call my own when I came across a domain that seemed to bring it all together. While I was doing my research, making plans and saving money for this long-term investment I could be writing about it, documenting what I learned and maybe even adding a few coins to the pot.

But if I had a choice between a piece of land out of the way with good soil and no electricity nearby, and that same piece of land with a pole right at the end of the driveway – I’d go with the one that could be tied to the grid. That doesn’t mean I’d ever plan on paying the power company, but it is a lot simpler and cheaper to buy, install and maintain a grid-tied, non-battery backup PV system. In fact, you end up spending more money on buying and maintaining batteries than you would spend on utilities in some cases – even if you had no PV at all! And if you get your system sized correctly, you can minimize (almost eliminate in some cases) the amount of money you have to pay for buying back power in Winter at retail prices after you’ve sold it during the Summer at wholesale prices.

I would much rather have chosen a domain name like Homestead.org – but that was already taken by a VERY useful website. To me, living “off the grid” simply means getting out of the rat race and providing for yourself as much as possible, including energy and food. It means no Homeowners’ ASSociation, no traffic, a bit of fresh air and a sense of freedom.

So technically I picked the wrong name for a domain. But I still plan on using this blog to discuss what I learn about living the good life, whether that be totally off the grid or on a grid-tied homestead. Purists be damned. This is my site.