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Off grid living

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  • moneyistooshorttomention
    moneyistooshorttomention Posts: 17,940 Forumite
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    Personally I think Beelzebub looks cute - aw....

    Though I'd still regard kittens as coming higher on the Cuteness Scale.
  • AG47
    AG47 Posts: 1,618 Forumite
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    Spider_In_The_Bath wrote: »
    Wood does not grow that quickly and you will not get enough wood from coppicing to burn.

    We once had a huge ash tree (it had self seeded and would have been too large for the area in which it was growing - however, we let it grow a few years so that we could use the wood from it). We logged and chopped it and left it to season. When we used it a few years later we pretty much burnt it all over the course of one winter.

    Fast growing poplar trees around the boarders of your land do indeed regrow very quickly.

    If you start at one end coposing and leaving to regrow, if it takes you about three or four years to get back to where you started then you will find many new growth spurts.

    These are perfect sizes for easy sawing off and chopping up into nice size logs to dry out.

    The very larger branches take a bit more doing, but I just love chopping wood and reg rowing trees. It's an infinitely renewable fuel.

    You get warm twice, once sawing and chopping then when you burn it
    Nothing has been fixed since 2008, it was just pushed into the future
  • spadoosh
    spadoosh Posts: 8,732 Forumite
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    DaftyDuck wrote: »
    I do have a river, and I am eyeing that up, but only for a bit of fun.

    Checkout http://www.turbulent.be/ if you havent already, looks promising, struggled to find real world examples and results but they are still early stages i think.
  • The-Joker
    The-Joker Posts: 718 Forumite
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    spadoosh wrote: »
    Checkout http://www.turbulent.be/ if you havent already, looks promising, struggled to find real world examples and results but they are still early stages i think.

    I wonder how a water wheel compares to solar and wind power generation? When you compare everything moving parts and set up costs, solar usually wins out every time.

    It may be different if you have a very fast flowing river by your house and you are allowed to set up a water wheel hydro electric
    The thing about chaos is, it's fair.
  • spadoosh
    spadoosh Posts: 8,732 Forumite
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    The-Joker wrote: »
    I wonder how a water wheel compares to solar and wind power generation? When you compare everything moving parts and set up costs, solar usually wins out every time.

    It may be different if you have a very fast flowing river by your house and you are allowed to set up a water wheel hydro electric

    That really suprises me. Id imagine a turbine would have a similar lifespan to solar and exactly the same as wind.

    24hr production over 25 years sounds a lot more economical than maybe 8hrs of production over the same time. And saying all that i think the hoover dam turbines (ok a lot more complicated and hardened than what youd get for local production) lasted 50 years before being replaced.
  • AG47
    AG47 Posts: 1,618 Forumite
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    For all those looking for advice on living off grid

    There is a brillaint company called THE LAND IS OURS
    Nothing has been fixed since 2008, it was just pushed into the future
  • John-K_3
    John-K_3 Posts: 681 Forumite
    edited 3 March 2018 at 11:41PM
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    AG47 wrote: »
    For all those looking for advice on living off grid

    There is a brillaint company called THE LAND IS OURS
    Can I ask, why do you actually want to life off grid?

    It seems sipuch a bizarre thing to want to do that it almost implies a pathology.

    Even were I not working, I would still like to fly somewhere warm on holiday, see my family, bring up children, drive a nice car, and so on. What do you actually want to do that living off-Gris will facilitate?

    We plan to buy a good sized plot of land in the Pyrenees in a couple of years, to spend the summers on, so I understand the idea of getting away from it, but we will have friends over for parties, I will want a good bike for cycling, a motorbike for touring etc.

    What!!!8217;s the big plan?
  • mrsmazza
    mrsmazza Posts: 144 Forumite
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    6k per acre ???

    If only !!
  • Davesnave
    Davesnave Posts: 34,741 Forumite
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    John-K wrote: »
    Can I ask, why do you actually want to life off grid?

    It seems sipuch a bizarre thing to want to do that it almost implies a pathology.
    The original idea behind this thread was to use the planning rules as they stand to obtain a property with land in the countryside at a price well below that of properties bought and sold in conventional ways.

    That was fine, but the 'techno-bushcraft' aspects have now taken over......
  • [Deleted User]
    [Deleted User] Posts: 0 Newbie
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    John-K wrote: »
    Can I ask, why do you actually want to life off grid?

    It seems sipuch a bizarre thing to want to do that it almost implies a pathology.

    Even were I not working, I would still like to fly somewhere warm on holiday, see my family, bring up children, drive a nice car, and so on. What do you actually want to do that living off-Gris will facilitate?

    We plan to buy a good sized plot of land in the Pyrenees in a couple of years, to spend the summers on, so I understand the idea of getting away from it, but we will have friends over for parties, I will want a good bike for cycling, a motorbike for touring etc.

    What!!!8217;s the big plan?

    Not really too odd an idea. I would be happy with a patch of land and one of these Tiny House living off grid (my husband would not though :rotfl:)

    Different people want to live in different ways. I would not want to buy a patch of land overseas, but I would love to buy a wood in the UK.

    The issue is the OP is talking about doing this with no idea of how to do it (re heat, water, building).
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