July 2015

Community

Do what you love, love what you do

What is your passion? If money were no object (and just what does that actually mean anyhow???) what would you be doing right now? Now, how can you turn this passion into your living?

Something I enjoy doing is taking pictures, I fully intend on turning this passion into a living. The first thing that makes this possible is I have to take better pictures than the average person, my photos have to be of a quality that someone will want to part with their money to posses one of my photos.

Most EVERYONE has the ability to take pictures with little trouble, nearly everyone has a smartphone and some of the those phones can take some great pictures. But not everyone knows how to take really good pictures, look on most phones and you will find dozens of selfies and mediocre shots.

I did not go to school to learn how to take pictures, what I did was I looked at other photographers to see how they take fantastic pictures, I looked at how they framed their shots, I have learned about lighting (morning and evening tend to be the best times to take outdoor pictures), framing and lighting are the 2 biggies, being in the right place at the right time, I am always making note of a particular place that would make a good shot, but knowing I’ll come back at a time of day when the lighting would make for a great shot.

I have also learned about filters, color enhancing, basically taking a good picture and making it fantastic, something special. This requires a LOT of experimenting, taking lots of pictures, lots and lots. I would say that if I would take 1 picture of a scene, I actually take 20 or more shots of that same scene, using different filters, different angles, sometimes the difference between a mediocre shot and a prizewinning shot is just a matter of a slight angle change.

I also know that some days I may come home with a memory stick full of duds, and that’s OK too. I am not at a point where I can just go out merely to snap pictures, but since the job I do requires me to drive all over west Texas in some very scenic areas, and since I have a very flexible schedule, I have the opportunity to get some wonderful pictures. Honestly I would be taking these pictures anyhow, I love doing it, it’s my passion and in the year I’ve been doing this, my skills have improved greatly.

So now I have all of these pictures, how do I get money for these images? I plan on turning my photos into postcards and such for the tourists that pass through our towns. Living in such a scenic area, much of the income that comes into these towns come directly …

July 30, 2015 No Comments

Community

What are you doing?

Where do you see yourself next week, next month, next year, in a decade? Are you actively planning your life or are you merely floating through the flotsam and jetsam of your daily grind? Far too many of us are living like the latter, just trying to get to that next paycheck so you can pay your rent (or mortgage), pay your car payment, pay your utilities, pay your credit cards, for some folk just buying food can be a penny pinching challenge.

No this isn’t an infomercial, but this is guaranteed to be the first day of the rest of your life, you can spend it like you have been doing it, or you can make a change. I see so many people here on this site, posting comments, saying they are sick of the rat race, the are tired of not really living, they want to be free. Besides posting comments to strangers online, I have to wonder what else they might be doing to actually make a change for themselves…

That sounds tough hearted, even mean, but if they, or perhaps you don’t make some hard choices, then your/their life isn’t going to change. I also wonder if living free (to some) might actually mean living for free, the dream of living off the land sounds like a great thing, living without money. But the reality is, living totally without money just isn’t something that can be done IMHO, sure you can barter, and maybe you can even live off of someone else, but you still need basic necessities, food, clothes and shelter, either you are going to BUY them or someone else is going to BUY them and provide them to you.

I am not picking on those who post comments and replies here wanting to go off-grid with someone else, it’s a nice dream, a nice start, but don’t allow that to be your only action, if you truly want to do something, then it’s up to you to figure out how you are going to achieve this dream, you are the one who must make your dream a reality. It takes perseverance, hard work, and yes, it’s going to take some money.

It’s possible to get yourself setup to not have to need much money, PB and I have done that for the most part, but it wasn’t free, it wasn’t easy, it took hard work for many years, saving and planning. We purchased raw land in an area with few building codes (ie we could build our own place with little interference from the powers that be) and a place with low property taxes, we didn’t do a lot of improvements on the property so our taxes stay low. We paid for everything up front using our savings so there is no debt. We don’t do things that incur debt, no credit cards, …

July 28, 2015 2 Comments

Rainwater harvesting, and a teaser!

Shelter, food and water are the trinity of life, actually that should be in the reverse order, water absolutely comes first, without it, there would be no life for us. Water is becoming an increasingly rare and expensive commodity, fresh clean water is even more rare, there are but a few ways to get water. Where I live, many get their water from wells, fortunately our water is good water, the only reason to filter it is because of having to store it in tanks.

Another way of getting water is to collect what falls freely from the sky, I know that some states (in the USA) restrict rain water catchment, which I think is such a wrong thing to do to people. But for the states that do not restrict rain water catchment, it’s a great way to supplement your water use, it can even be used for your main water use.

We have a few water tanks around the Sky Castle, we have two tanks directly connected to the roof to catch the rain water, we have another tank under the house that holds more water, we gravity pump the water into that tank, it’s a 1550 gallon black poly tank, the other tanks are around 1000 gallon metal tanks. I am looking at getting two 3000 gallon black poly tanks, we could fill those easily in just a few good rains, considering we use between 200-300 gallons a month (yes, I said per MONTH), that amount of water would easily hold us. I would treat this water with bleach and run it through our Berkey Light water purifier for our drinking and cooking water.

Right now we are in our monsoon season, it lasts a couple of months, we get rain nearly everyday, usually in the evening, yesterday we had a deluge, a couple of inches of rain in a couple of hours, this morning as I was going out to work, I stopped at one of our low water crossings, the water had drained away, but there were some large rocks and small boulders in the middle of the road. I had some extra time before I had to go to work, so I hopped out of my truck, donned my heavy leather work gloves and moved rock. One of them was at the extreme end of my ability to pick it up, but I endured and got the road cleared. I could drive around it in my truck, but not everyone out here could have, I don’t mind doing that, it’s part of living out here on unpaved, mountain roads. It’s amazing how powerful water is.

On a completely different subject, this is a teaser for an article I’ll write this coming weekend, PB has been busy working on a clockwork mechanism, he manufactured it using spare parts, a saw blade, all thread, various metal …

July 24, 2015 No Comments

Water

A Shower in a box

If you need a portable shower, or a way of cleaning food or dishes – or even dogs – on the move, RinseKit is a portable, pressurized water tank with a hose hidden inside.

It opens like a toolbox. The company markets the $90 unit to surfers, fishermen, campers, and anyone who needs a spout off the grid.

You can fill it up at home or on the move, connecting the RinseKit to a garden hose with an included attachment piece. Add up to two gallons of tap water to the box, which then can be squirted out for a couple minutes before the reservoir goes dry.

No batteries are required, no pumping is involved. Water pressure from the tap is essentially transferred into the RinseKit. The box has a chamber that maintains about 65 psi of water pressure, guaranteeing a healthy spray.

Users who tested it out over a month were happy with the product. The RinseKit, invented by a surfer in California, is well-built and easy to use. It has come in handy across a range of outdoor activities.

At a beach, the hose is long enough for an ad hoc car shower. For camping you can use it to wash dishes. Or spray off a dirty mountain bike after a muddy trail day.

The hose head is a garden-style sprayer with settings from a light mist to a muddy-bike-cleaning “jet” mode. You do need to conserve the water, as it drains quickly on the high-power settings.

But its banked two gallons will last for up to three minutes of constant spray when set to a shower mode.

There’s a built-in ruler to measure fish. A solid handle folds up for carrying, and the hose coils to tuck inside when not in use.

The box weighs about 24 pounds when full of water. It sits in the back of a family van pressurized and at the ready.

For its price tag ($90) the RinseKit may seem a bit much for portable water. But it’s a treat for anyone tired of dealing with sand, grit, mud and other debris that a squirt or stream of water could easily wash away.

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July 23, 2015 No Comments

Community

Off-Grid with his own personal natural gas well

Ted Baker is my kind of man, independent, sharp, knows what he wants but is also flexible to change his path when need be. As I was watching this video, there came a mention of natural gas, my first thought was how is this guy using natural gas when he’s that far away from civilization? I quickly learned that Baker has something most of us would only dream about having, a natural gas well! I have never heard of anyone having their own personal natural gas well, this was preexisting on the property before he purchased it and was able to make use of it, I’m a little jealous :)

Watch and enjoy this video

https://youtu.be/yoIuvOSRRw4

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July 22, 2015 No Comments

Arvo off-grid

Arvo Thompson went from wanting to live off-grid to actually doing it, a step that sadly, not enough people actually do. He has been living the life for 15+ years, designing and building everything on his property himself. He is truly a self made man living his dream.

I found this on YouTube and thoroughly enjoyed watching this. I will say, like some of the comments on this video, he does seem to need a woman’s touch there, but it would have to be a very special person to share a life like that, no high maintenance women need apply :) No, I’m not trying to hook Arvo up with anyone though, just making an observation.

Here is the video, the direct link is below the video, enjoy.

https://youtu.be/vI9k9_EQR3g

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July 16, 2015 No Comments

Sandfire Resources, DeGrussa Copper Mine

Energy

Huge copper mine goes off the grid

Increasingly it is big business that is taking a leaf from the off-grid philosophy.

Australia’s largest integrated off-the-grid solar power system will be up and running in 2016 at a copper mine in remote Western Australia.

The 10.6 million megawatt station, which is part financed by Government green loans, is expected to provide Sandfire Resource’s DeGrussa mine with 80 per cent of its daytime energy needs and slash carbon emissions by 12,000 tonnes a year.

Construction work on what will be one of the world’s largest integrated solar installations used to power a mine is due to begin in late July.

Sandfire’s chief operating officer Mike Spreadborough said the power station will reduce the mine’s reliance on diesel fuel.

“By integrating diesel with solar power we’re significantly saving, it’s much cheaper than the historical costs of other fuels,” Spreadborough said.

“It’s a double-whammy result in lowering energy costs with significant environmental benefits.”

More than half the A$40 million ($44.6 million) solar power and battery storage facility’s cost was funded by federal Government loans, with the Australian Renewable Energy Agency (ARENA) putting up nearly A$21 million.

The federal Government’s other green lender, the Clean Energy Finance Corporation (CEFC), committed up to A$15 million while French renewable energy firm Neon, which will own the power plant, made up most of the difference.

Details about the project follow the federal Government’s decision to redirect wind farm funding to bolster large-scale solar projects.

The decision to direct the CEFC to pull funding for wind farms in favour of large-scale solar projects and new technologies drew criticism from the Greens, opposition and the Victorian state Government.

ARENA was also instructed to refocus on larger-scale solar and thermal energy products.

Sandfire’s sprawling project will feature 34,080 solar panels spread over 20ha.

The company hopes the solar plant, which will be about 900km northeast of Perth, will set new benchmarks for mines around the world using renewable power.

Spreadborough acknowledged without Government finance, the renewable energy project would have had trouble getting off the ground.

However, he was adamant Sandfire didn’t receive a free kick.

“CEFC and ARENA are expecting a return, with ARENA expecting to use the product to refund,” he said.

Spreadborough hoped once the solar farm proved successful, Sandfire would attract other financiers for future projects.

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July 15, 2015 No Comments

Budget solar install

I love seeing how other people do their solar systems, especially those who create and maintain their systems on a shoestring budget, which is how we do things around here.

A quick search on YouTube for solar power netted this video called “Solar Power on a Budget”, sounds like my kind of system. This is a good way for most folk to start out, learning as you go, building and enlarging as needed, replacing what isn’t working with something that works better.

These 4 videos show the transformation from a very simple starter system, so a more expansive system.

https://youtu.be/MksP1SnBr5M

https://youtu.be/GRayQpxpzsg

https://youtu.be/1hjmjQeqyy4

https://youtu.be/AvcgW8uz6js

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July 14, 2015 1 Comment

Community

Going tiny with a family

You take one ratty camper, tear it down to the frame, then rebuild it, now it’s transformed into a home, and not just for one or two, but a family with young but growing boys. As I watched the tear down stages, it didn’t look like it was going to really turn into anything useful, that’s what we call the “ugly” stage, and ugly it was, I couldn’t figure out why he even bothered. Then I saw the finished home, and this can truly be called a home, it is quite magnificent.

Here are two videos showing the beginning and finished stages. He did this with very little building knowledge, he just did it. Much of what he used was either free or near free, recycled, Craigslist and getting chummy with the manager at his local Lowes. Altogether, it cost less than $5000.

https://youtu.be/6XTPM5IQo2Y

https://youtu.be/70o4anfivRo

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July 9, 2015 No Comments

Community

Freezers and fridges in Africa

One of South Africa’s largest producers of household appliances has announced plans to offer solar powered fridges and freezers to 600 million low-income African families.

Let’s hope they also manage to export a few hundred thousand in our direction.

The Defy group in Durban has signed a joint development deal with Specialised Solar Systems. Defy was the first company – way back in 1932 – to manufacture electric stoves in South Africa, and the company launched its solar-powered appliances, revealing it had spent R500 million since 2012 on upgrades to the East London and Durban plants, with another R450m set aside for plant and equipment investments by 2018.

Defy was acquired by the Turkish-based group Arcelik in 2011. Arcelik chief executive Hajan Kozan, who was in Durban for the company’s 110th celebrations, said the Defy acquisition was motivated by South Africa’s potential as a gateway to the continent.

He said the latest products were environmentally aligned with global best practice.

“When you open a tap in your house, in one minute you can use six litres of water. Our washing machines can do a full wash using just six litres of water.”

He added that new designs on the machines had also cut electricity usage by 25%.

“What we have to do now is educate the consumer on the importance of buying appliances that use less energy and water.”

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July 8, 2015 No Comments

Water issues

Living in our little rural community in the mountains, we don’t have many choices for over the air radio stations, the mountains block most if not all of any potential signals we might receive, in fact for us, our only choice is Marfa Public Radio, it’s in the next town over and the only reason we can receive the signal is they installed a repeater tower on the edge of our neighborhood a few years ago.

Over the weekend I heard a story about California’s drought and folk running out of water, their wells are going dry and many in those communities, especially in the outlying areas are not on city water services. They are receiving 2500 gallon water tanks to get them through this terrible time. What really caught my attention though was the statement that this amount of water would last an average family 2 weeks, 2 WEEKS! I was shocked to hear that stat, it is a testament to how much water is apparently wasted by the people in their ordinary day to day usage.

One guy they interviewed stated that his well would run dry after 15 minutes, he was watering his lawn when he discovered this, well I’d say if you only have 15 minutes of water at a time, stop watering your lawn, it seems like a no brainer to me.

We live in a desert climate here in far west Texas, we have a rainy season which we are in now, it lasts a few months, we get random rain the rest of the year but it’s not much. Some of the people in my neighborhood have wells, but the vast majority of the people out here use tanks and haul their water. Most of us use a 1550 gallon water tank, one single tank, a few have 2 or more tanks, but most have just one. On average, those tanks are filled about once a month, our local water delivery guy has an 1100 gallon tank on his truck, so the tanks aren’t filled 100%, they try to not let their tank get down to empty before calling for a refill, so you could say that the average family out here uses about 1000 gallons per month (+/-).

What is the difference here? Are we going without to save water? I’d say no, what we are doing is living with the amount of water we have, we don’t water lawns, we don’t take long showers, many of us don’t take daily showers, we don’t leave the water running when we aren’t using it, we stop leaks as soon as possible after discovering them, some of us have composting toilets so we aren’t flushing water down the toilet. Many of us use our water more than once, ie we have grey water systems that at the very least water trees, gardens and …

July 7, 2015 No Comments

Transitioning to the Off-Grid Mindset

So you’ve picked out the perfect land for your needs. You’ve looked at the climate over the last few years; you are aware of all covenants, restrictions, and local hurdles you will encounter. You know the political temperament both of the local area, the greater area, and your immediate neighbors. You know how you will get water, how far to the nearest hospital and store. You are ready to make that next step.

You are ready to start roughing it in the wild, right?

Not quite.

The more you bring the off-grid mindset into your life before you move, the easier the move will come. You will begin to live cheaper, healthier, and happier before you build a single thing. One day at a time. One step at a time.

While some people can easily just jump right in and embrace all the changes that come with a new lifestyle, the rest of us would like some sort of transition period to wade into before learning to swim.

Welcome to the Kiddie Pool where I will teach you the basic strokes that will keep you from drowning. So what is the key to transitioning from Linked-in living to Off-grid and the great outdoors?

In a word: Downsizing. If you want to be successful in living off the sweat of your brow, you’re going to have to make a few adjustments. For example: if you no longer rely on the power grid for electricity, you are going to be limited on how many appliances, and devices you can use each day. Maybe you’ll have to cook more things by hand. Maybe you can’t have all the new video game consoles and the big screen TV. Maybe you’ll just have to buy more solar panels. You have to weigh your own situation and separate everything all your dreams into needs and wants.

Do I need cable? Do I need central air? Can I live off 5-10 gallons of water per day instead of the US average of 100+? Can I switch to cooking only foods that I grow myself and only while they are in season?

When your goal is to provide everything for yourself, the most important question is: can I provide this for myself? If not and you need it, how else can you get it?

My rules are:

Rule #1: If it is non-essential, I can ditch it.

Rule #2: Everything is non-essential.

Obviously this is an exaggeration but if you think about the things you feel you need in your life, you don’t need nearly as many, or as frequently as you’ve convinced yourself that you do.

Living off-grid is a mindset. If you can’t provide for yourself while you are living connected to the grid with the supermarket available, how can you expect to provide for yourself when you live in the middle of nowhere and …

July 6, 2015 3 Comments

Do what you love, love what you do

What are you doing?

Rainwater harvesting, and a teaser!

A Shower in a box

Off-Grid with his own personal natural gas well

Arvo off-grid

Huge copper mine goes off the grid

Budget solar install

Going tiny with a family

Freezers and fridges in Africa

Water issues

Transitioning to the Off-Grid Mindset

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July 2015

OFF-GRID.NET

For films about individuals and technologies for living off the grid

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