Living Off-grid means different things to different people. Some internet trolls people challenge me when I say we live off-grid because we still use the internet, cell phones, and get Amazon deliveries. When they think of off-grid life they think of people in the middle of nowhere living entirely off their land and away from society. However, when I use this term I am merely referring to living in a house that is not connected to public utilities (electricity and water). We have created our own power system using solar panels, a wind turbine, and batteries, and our family relies on a personal well on our property for all of our water needs. We are living apart from the power grid in an effort to be more self reliant and have a little more control over our power because the current grid system is fragile and could be disrupted at any time for a number of different reasons. The non-existent hydro bills are also a bonus! Other than where our power comes from, we lead a fairly normal lifestyle with plenty of modern amenities. Modern off-gridders you could call us. Over the years we have slowly upgraded our system to meet our needs and for the most part, do not have to make too many energy sacrifices. For the majority of the year, we can’t even begin to use all the power that we have available to us. But it wasn’t always this way…
When we purchased our home over 10 years ago, it came complete with a solar system and well. This sad little system could barely power a lightbulb overnight much less our lives. A little bit of power was certainly better than nothing, but barely. We used this system during most of the renos, which were very extensive and we did a lot more work than we originally had planned to do. We relied on that little system as well as a generator to power us through. We also used more hand tools than we otherwise would have and invested in a couple more battery powered tools as well, charging the batteries during sunny times or off site when we could.
When we were coming to the end of our renovations we were able to invest in a whole new system including 2 solar trackers with 40 solar panels and a couple of lead acid batteries for energy storage. This served us well for a while but we were longing for more power in the winter months, with a goal to be able to last a couple of days without solar charging, instead of having to run a generator to boost our power every super snowy or cloudy day.
We started tracking power usage and used a watt meter to see how much power each appliance and device was really using. We learned some valuable lessons along the way that came in handy on the not so sunny days. One thing I never thought about before was ghost power. This kind of ghost is especially spooky for the bracket of people who have been forced into adulting and actually have to pay electricity bills (or people who live off-grid and need to be conscious of their energy usage). Ghost power is the energy your home devices, such as laptops, gaming consoles, TVs, appliances, electric toothbrushes, etc., are consuming when they are plugged in but not turned on. We found that our TV especially was using a significant amount of power all day everyday even when it was off! Our simple solution to this was to keep the easily accessible big energy items unplugged when not in use, and plug the hard to reach items into a power cord equipped with an on/off switch. Simple as that. We only had to turn the power bars off on super low energy days, but it made a big enough difference for us.
Our system was sufficient for most of the year but it left us wanting more. Seeing as on a lot of the days the sun was hiding, the wind was out in full force, we decided a wind turbine would be a good addition. After a little planning, a lot of prepping, tree clearing, pole designing and assembling, etc. we raised our wind turbine high into the sky! This addition also gave us the potential to collect power at all hours of the day, not just when the sun was up, which was limiting especially in the weeks surrounding the winter soltice. I’ll tell ya, living off grid has definitely given us a huge appreciation for the solstice and the promise of longer days. Definitely a cause for celebration around here! So now, on stormy days, instead of feeling discouraged and getting ready to fire up the generator, we get excited to see those turbine blades spinnin’!
So all was well but Aaron knew our current lead batteries weren’t going to last forever so he started researching batteries and was drawn to a different style – lithium iron phosphate batteries (LiFe PO4 batteries). The problem was, at this time these batteries were fairly pricey and we still had many other house projects to do so we didn’t really want to find room in the budget for that. But it kept nagging at us so after a little more research, Aaron decided we should definitely go for the LiFe PO 4 batteries – we’ll just make them ourselves! He, a master convincer, talked me into this wild plan of designing our own batteries, ordering all the components from overseas, and assembling them ourselves.
After ordering we had a about a month-long waiting period at which time our old lead acid batteries got the word that they were being replaced with a younger, more attractive model and straight up just started dying. Did I mention this was during the winter, when we needed them the most? We had to limp by and really lean into the whole off-grid lifestyle vibe. For 3 weeks, we saved power any way we could. We used our indoor fireplace for heat so as to avoid using power for the heat pumps in our house. This meant that we had to feed the fire every 3 hours around the clock, giving life-with-a-newborn vibes. *Yawwwwwn*. We also had dinner and evening playtime by candlelight, used the wood stove as an oven, washed all dishes by hand, used wifi only when needed, and did very select loads of laundry only during super sunny times.
It was tough at the time but boy did it make us appreciate those new batteries even more! It also gave us the motivation to complete the battery project in record time! We made these batteries together, as a family, at our kitchen table. A very unique home school project and a core memory for us all. It turned out to be a really great decision! We are still using these batteries today, have been thoroughly impressed by their capabilities, and are in the process of adding more.
Living off-grid has been challenging at times, but we have learned so much along the way and it would be hard for us to revert back to living on grid. We love being in control of our own power, not having an ever increasing hydro bill, and not even noticing when the world around us is having a black out. Being able to store power gives a great sense of security in these uncertain times.
If you’re thinking of adding solar panels to your house to off-set your bill and give yourself energy security, please reach out. Aaron has installed systems for other people both on and off grid and is passionate about renewable energy and helping others take charge of their power!
