[Andrewksu]

I would like to pick your brain. I am writing a How-To book with a supporting website on designing, building, and living off grid, but from a purely practical (conservative) point of view. I think that with the upcoming cap and trade legislation and the “Smart Grid”, off grid living will start to be a bit more popular.

I have found it difficult to find people that have done it on practical principal versus carbon foot print thinking.

[JRandomFreeper]

I'm a conservative. I conserve. I was 'green' before green was cool. I take seriously the Biblical injunction to be a good steward. The eco-idiots, as we saw in the video from California don't have a clue. I don't grow my vegetables on vegetables trees, and output = input - conversion losses. And the second law of thermogoddamics still holds.

Ask away, but maybe on the freepmail side, so we don't clutter the forum.

/johnny

[JRandomFreeper]

Oh, and "get rid of the TV" is my first rule. Man that watches TV doesn't have time for building a place. I IM and post during wait times on a laptop that is with me, but I'm otherwise working from daylight until dark. And then I eat and sleep. You can't do that in front of a TV.

/johnny

[chimera]

When you hear the infamous "Smart Grid" phrase, just substitute "energy rationing", because that's what it really is.

Going off-grid is one way to defeat it. Going "guerrilla" is another (i.e., finding ways around the rationing mechanisms). That is where I am looking right now and, believe me, as someone who has spent time in the power dispatching center "hot seat", I have some pretty good ideas on how to do it.