The Grid: Getting Off It (Step One - Research)

[hsifeng]

Well kids, I think it is time for me to look into this more seriously. We wanted to wait until we put in the garage (so that the solar panels could go there instead of on the house) but I don’t know if that type of esthetic consideration is realistic anymore. I only hope they can put them on the BACK of the house so that they aren’t so nasty looking in the front.

 

Our friggin electric bill was over $450 in the middle of the summer this year and over $650 in the middle of the summer last year. Nach.

 

I understand there are companies in my area that are doing solar leases as well. Other ‘off grid’ items I would like to look into.

 

1) Home gardening: Seems we might be doing a bit of a ‘community garden’ since we have oodles of yard spacetristinmorgan andsaoirse42 are interested in pitching in.
 

http://www.hgtv.com/gl-wildlife-other/no-work-garden/index.html

http://www.americanprofile.com/article/562.html

 

2) Reclaiming Rainwater: A great way to water your garden, and with a mulched garden it takes even less water!

 

http://www.watercache.com/

http://www.ext.colostate.edu/pubs/natres/06702.html

Any other great resources folks would like to point me towards?

Comments

[hsifeng.livejournal.com]

Thanks for the tips, love! We already have the energy efficient bulb throughout the house. The next steps (as it is an OLD house) are insulation - can't afford it at this point - and solar - which we can apparently lease or rent.

So, solar it is! *grin*

The communal vegi garden will help in a lot of ways too as it will both supplement our food intake (in the healthiest, most organic way possible!) and provide for more sunshine time and good old fashioned yard work.

Thomas Jefferson said, in 1781 "Those who labour in the earth are the chosen people of God, if ever he had a chosen people, whose breasts he has made his peculiar deposit for substantial and genuine virtue. It is the focus in which he keeps alive that sacred fire, which otherwise might escape from the face of the earth." And on 1785 Aug. 23 in a letter to John Jay, "Cultivators of the earth are the most valuable citizens. They are the most vigorous, the most independent, the most virtuous, and they are tied to their country and wedded to it's liberty and interests by the most lasting bands."