I recently saw the movie "Off the Grid". It's about Les Stroud (Survivor man) and his family building a self sufficient house in the woods and going to live off the grid (not dependent on water or electricity).

After seeing the film, it made me dream of a life like that. I would push it to even further independence and grow all of my food. I also realized that a lot of people in the raw food movement think this way.

I let the idea grow and what come up is an idea for an off the grid village. We could collaborate and create something extraordinary. I know it's the dream of a lot of people following a raw food diet to grow their own food and have a sustainable and non pollutant source of electricity and water so why not collaborate our forces and create something!

What we should do, in my opinion is build a website (task that I can easily do) to promote our idea and attract donations and ideas. We should then recruit people who would be seriously interested in this project form a group with subscribed members. There would be an elected board of representatives taking decisions and making sure things move in the right way. Every interested member would have to give a certain amount monthly to the project to help getting enough money to leverage such a project. Then, in a couple of years, when our financial resources permits it, we buy a big piece of land in a country where it's suitable to grow organic food year round and where we would be far away from city pollution and in direct contact with nature and start building our future.

If this idea takes hold and become reality, we could, in a couple of years, live in peace and healthy with like minded people and practice gardening, building, yoga, sports and relaxation as our main activity. We could use everyones expertise to help us in the process.

The other benefit is that we would be the first modern self-sufficient village. We would live in complete harmony with nature and our eco footprint would be very close to none. We could then write website articles as well as books to describe our accomplishment and help others with living a healthy life in peace with nature. We could also use our village as a retreat for visitors who would be willing to pay to get in total contact with themselves and nature.

Now, I know this may seem far fetched and idealist, but if you think about it seriously, it is feasible and the benefits are huge. Now, the depth of my idea is not given justice because of my not so perfect English but please take the above statements simply as beginning ideas and feel free to expand the idea.

I already live off the grid with my wife and our baby to come. Electricity from solar panels and a wind generator in the making, and water from the stream that we have to catch upstream and drive to the house. We produce almost all our food on the land. We have a website, but not finished yet, and mostly in french for now, sorry.

Raw Fruit Festival
[www.raw-fruit-festival.net]
Health, Fitness and Fasting Retreats in Spain
[www.fit-in-nature.net]

Daryl Hannah lives off the grid apparently [www.off-grid.net]

Something I'd like to contemplate in the longer term.

Cheers,
J

Storm and Jinjee are doing something called the Raw Vegan Village. I'm not sure if it's 100% off the grid or not, but it's out in California, and there's orcharding and eco-housing for sure.

Sounds lovely to me!

Better to become self-sufficient while we still have the choice (ARGH at my own dependent situation)...!

I don't think that I could be able to do that, but it sure sounds nice. I do plan to move out into nature someday, even if circumstances forbid that now.

I would love to do that. I am meditating on it a lot.

I read a book on that a few years ago - an MIT grad student who had been a technology lover his entire life wondered if technology really does make our lives better - so for his PhD thesis he decided to live off the grid for a year with another student (his "wife". He said the community they found to live in made the Amish look modern - he didn't state its location in order to respect their privacy. The book is called "Better Off". It was really interesting.

I'm slowly working toward living like that. My husband is very attached to "modern" living and it takes a lot of baby steps to get him to a place of understanding and then believing that many times the traditional ways of thinking/living aren't actually the best.

We're headed to California for some much needed sunshine and fresh air, and he is finally convinced that it will be fun to travel across country in an RV. Then, when we arrive in Northern California, we'll look for land. I figure once we are there, have some land, and he's comfortable living in a more rural setting, we can start camping out a lot and building some cob structures, or something. Eventually, I think he'll wake up to living more naturally and my goal is to one day live off the grid.

I think it's awesome when people accomplish that goal and then share their stories with others! It's so inspiring.

Lots of love to you,

Wendi
XOXOXO

I read "Better Off" also. It was a good read.

I did some calcs on my ecological footprint and found I could save the most by not reproducing, going vegan and not driving. So I chose to get a conventional home that didn't require driving and to minimize (but not eliminate) the need for conventional utilities. Also I can't grow my own food, too shady.

I really do hate supporting the utility company.

So I'll probably move at some point.

Wendi, you can tell your husband that depending on the location, even off the grid, you can still a relatively high tech life. To give you a few examples, even if we live 3 miles away from the first paved road, in the middle of a cork oak forest, with a large orchard and veggie garden, we still have high speed internet and a video projector for our private movie nights. Just need to put enough solar panels and batteries to do it.
A lot of people don't know, but you can be connected to the electrical grid and still run your electricity with solar panels. It's even cheaper than when you are completely off the grid, since you are still connected to the grid and don't need batteries. You don't have to store energy because you still get energy from the grid, only you sell the energy you produce with your panels to the utility company during the day (in most countries at a higher price than you buy from them). So if you produce more electricity than you consume, you can make money and reimburse your installation in a few years time.

Raw Fruit Festival
[www.raw-fruit-festival.net]
Health, Fitness and Fasting Retreats in Spain
[www.fit-in-nature.net]

off the grid ?

fry me up on a griddle

or get me off the grid

but it must be soon

or i'll turn into griddle cakes and be tarnished from this urban stove

cuz this is what livin in the city is like for me

i have a strawberry soul that is on a burner

its turning the sweet sensitivity into charcoal

my instincts have gone awry

get me off the grid!! i say

before its too late

sebzzz has an extraordinary idea

EXTREMELY worthy of GREAT attention

I think it's a great idea, too!

SGC, can you tell me more about how you sell your energy back to the company? How did you get started, and where do you live?

My boyfriend and I happened to have a "hypothetical house" conversation today, and I mentioned how I read what you were doing (I told him I want solar panels and he was down!).

But then he started asking me all of these technical questions about the process you mentioned, and all I could do was blink my eyes and be like, "Uhh... strawberry smoothie...?" So, I said I would ask for more information! >8) Any details would be appreciated. Thanks!

hey phantom

i'm going to do that

for anything i'm not sure of, i'm just goin to say "STRAWBERRY SMOOTHIE!!!!!"

with as much conviction and sureness i can possibly muster

STRAWBERRY SMOOTHIE!!! and SOLAR PANELS!!!! I SAY!!!

STRAWBERRY SOLAR PANELS!! AND gimme a smoothie too!!

okay.. yeah.. don't worry phantom

there are people all around you

ask them.. visit them... look at the panels... feel them.. ask them more questions.. take notes... and repeat

til you are satisfied

do that for anything you are not sure of

phantom Wrote:
-------------------------------------------------------
> SGC, can you tell me more about how you sell your
> energy back to the company? How did you get
> started, and where do you live?
>
I live in Spain, and here, the energy you generate can compensate your bill down to 0, but the utility company does not pay the extra. I know in the US they do, and in France too (I'm French, and I lived for 6 years in CA, that's why I know about there).
The basics: you have your solar panels on your roof, generating a continuous electricity that you run in an inverter to convert to alternating current, like what's in the grid. Then, you need 2 meters. The classic one that counts what goes in your house from the grid, and a second one connected to your inverter and the grid that counts what comes from your system/house to the grid. Then, your bill is based on the difference from the two. Some utility companies use only one meter that can go backwards, but usually there are two.
I got started into it by interest, and by necessity. Where I live there are no cables of any sort (electricity, phone or TV). So, if you want some lighting at night, you have to have some solar panels, and in Andalucia, South of Spain, it's worth it.
Where do you live?

> My boyfriend and I happened to have a
> "hypothetical house" conversation today, and I
> mentioned how I read what you were doing (I told
> him I want solar panels and he was down!).
>
> But then he started asking me all of these
> technical questions about the process you
> mentioned, and all I could do was blink my eyes
> and be like, "Uhh... strawberry smoothie...?" So,
> I said I would ask for more information! >8) Any
> details would be appreciated. Thanks!

Basically, tell your boyfriend what I wrote above. There are several companies that offer you a package with installation of the panels and connection to the grid to compensate your consumption. So you don't have to worry to get on your roof and connect everything. Of course, you can. I did it for my house, and installed some systems as a part job for people I know, but you need to know some basics in low voltage DC power, which drains high intensity, and can be hazardous if not setup properly.
But to give you an example, in south of France, a typical installation worth 10000 euros (~15000 dollars) is paid back in 5 to 8 years, knowing that during that time, you don't pay any electricity bills.

That's wicked. Thank you!

We live in Canada... so we'll have to see how that works here.

If you live in Canada, you may want to look into wind generators because your sun exposure may not be great (short days in winter time). And if you are in an urban area, or with turbulent/turning winds, look for vertical axis wind generators, they would be more interesting.

Raw Fruit Festival
[www.raw-fruit-festival.net]
Health, Fitness and Fasting Retreats in Spain
[www.fit-in-nature.net]

La_veronique

It's never too late!

Your plea has been heard and considered

A team has been dispatched on your behalf

3 nights from now a green helicopter will be found hovering above you at 9:00 pm

they will lower a containder to the ground

to open the door on the containder say the code "good bye grid"

You will then have 3 minutes to load yourself and 100 pounds of gear

once inside to clos the door say the code "strawberry hearts forever"

once the door is closed say the code "let the adventure begin"

you will be brought up to the green express and debriefed

you will be taken to your new off grid paradise

where

all your drinks will be green

your coutanance always happy

and your heart forever strawberry



off grid relocator services

Make sure you swing by my place! <3

no problem phantom be ready.........

off grid relocation services

Groovy!

My husband has been wanting to manifest this idea for several years now. In fact that is our main life goal. Our village would consist of our pagan friends and we were thinking of calling it "paganopolis". No seriously! That is part of the reason we are back in college, because with the jobs we have now we cannot afford to make this happen. If we have higher paying jobs (which we will) we will be off the grid in no time. I don't know that you need alot of money to go off the grid but I think it will make things easier. He was thinking of a village of dome houses, because apparently they are more energy efficient But I don't see why we can't just have a village of teepees!

And here I thought my goofy husband was the only one thinking of this!



River Willow

la veronique fantastic poem!!!

take away the walls and you will find an electrified metal cage!