February 2007

Being off the power grid generally also means that we are off the
telephone
grid. In my way of thinking, lack of phone is a much more serious
problem
because power is easier to fix than phone. Today let’s take a look at
the
various options that exist for getting off-grid phone service.

Normally (that means city) phone service runs along wires buried in the
ground
or suspended on telephone poles. These wires will typically enter your
property
in a skinny green metal box where a lineman can then run one or more
telephone
lines to a connector on the side of your house. The green box is put on
your
property by the developer before the house is built.

Off-grid is a different matter. There is no developer to pay to have
the phone
company install wiring, so if you want wires, you will have to foot the
bill
yourself. Prices vary from one region to the next but in all cases the
cost
will be impressive. It will not benefit the phone company to run wire
for a
single customer, so you must pay for the project yourself.

In some places you can run the wire yourself and the phone company will
even
give you the wire. They only need to specify the depth of wire
placement and
will need to inspect

the work before the wire is covered. You will need to get permission
and have
easements established along the path that the wire will follow and a
power
trencher is a virtual necessity so you will need to rent or purchase
equipment
to do the job. Crossing a black-top road will require a professional
help and
more permissions than I would care to undertake. A county gravel road
might be
as bad. A private gravel road is less of a technical issue, but
permissions
from owners must still be secured. Any overhead run on poles is
likewise out of
the question for the “do-it-yourselfer” for primarily liability and
maintenance
reasons. If all of this sounds like a lot of work and a bunch or money,
you’re
right on both counts. Which is the reason there are some alternatives.

The first alternative most people will consider is cellular telephone
service.
Since cellular radio does not depend on wires to the customer’s site,
there is
no big up-front investment in bringing an off-grid customer on line.
The
standard rate plans, with fairly high costs for each minute of use,
have given
way to plans that might even be affordable as the primary phone service
to a
rural property.

Naturally, there are drawbacks to cellular. In some cases the special
rate plan
may only apply to digital calls. Calls that originate in an (older)
analog only
service area may not be

covered. Since the digital system is only in metropolitan areas, it is
likely
that your service will be …