Off the grid in a cabin-- (Anchorage: low income, loft, how much)

[tigerfan3]

As many of you know, about 6 months ago I moved out to a great cabin in the woods. It's a dry cabin, meaning I don't have water and I'm not on the electrical grid. So far, I love it out here and it's truly been a learning experience. There have been some ups and downs. I was wondering, how many posters here are living a similar lifestyle? Do you love it? What don't you like? What would you say your cost of living is and how do you meet those needs?

[tigerfan3]

I could easily list two dozen things that make me love it out here, but I thought I start out with some of the things that suck--like washing dishes. It's not bad when it's just me, but I have my daughter and my 3 nieces out here about half the week during the summer!! That's a lot of water to haul up that hill!! I have started a rain collection system.

[RedJacket]

Originally Posted by tigerfan3

I was wondering, how many posters here are living a similar lifestyle?

I stayed at a hotel one time for two entire days and nights w/o any room service. You read that right; NO room service. I've never had to rough it like that before in my entire life and I'll never ever do it again.

Kudos to those who toil away on the plains of Kansas trying to make a living farming. They deserve a little something from the government for their service to all the kitchen tables in America.

Please pass the butter.

[keyman51]

I live in a dry cabin but have electricity. Dishes tend to be a problem, and I use paper plates and bowls more often. Cups get a quick rinse as it is usually coffee or tea and we will sometimes eat out of the pot or container. Water is hauled from a washeteria a half mile away. We use about 25 gallons a week. We collect rain water for our garden but also have a large water container and soaker hoses for parts of the garden. Our electricity is .40 for kwh after the subsidization, and for lights, an electric stove, fridge, freezer and videos a couple of hours at night, the electricity bill is around 60 a month. I pay around the same a month for showers and washing clothes at the washeteria. We heat with wood, less than $ 400 a year as we get it ourselves. We like the slower pace of life and knowing our neighbors.

[MissingAll4Seasons]

We live in an off-grid dry cabin at the "end of the road". We haul drinking water from the public well about 20 miles away and pump it into a 200 gallon storage tank upstairs in the loft so we have (cold) running water downstairs at the kitchen sink. Dishes, bathing, laundry are the biggest difficulties, mostly because hot water is time and fuel consuming. We also use paper plates & bowls, and eat out of the pot or can a lot to reduce how many have to be washed. We spend $30-50 every 3 months at the washeteria for laundry. We normally take bucket baths, and splurge on a $2 shower at the washeteria every month or so... usually when we're going to town and have to be "presentable". For non-potable water, we use rainwater or haul from the creek.

We have a small (2kw) generator and a battery bank (~800 amp hours) for power. We normally run a gallon of gas through the generator every 1-2 days in the summer (because of the freezer), and every 2-3 days in winter. We don't have a refrigerator, so we only eat fresh when it's in season and rely on shelf-stable food or the freezer for the rest. We go into town every 3 months to stock up on supplies; the quarterly food bill is normally $5-700 depending on how much meat we need (as opposed to hunting/fishing) and pet food is normally another $2-300. Of course, we have to tack on the cost of a full tank of gas for the round trip into town, and an overnight hotel stay if we aren't staying with friends. For many things, it's more cost-effective in the long-run to buy online and have it mailed (USPS) to our PO Box in the village (25 miles of gas is a lot less than 175!)

We heat primarily with wood we collect ourselves, and in the winter cook primarily on the woodstove. We do use propane as a heat backup, and cook on our propane range in the summer. I do most of my pressure canning on propane burners, and a lot of my BWB canning on the woodstove. Kerosene is our third heating and cooking backup, as well as our backup for electric lights. I'd say we use 5-7 cords of wood a year (around $400 in fuel for the vehicles, saws and splitter), roughly 500 gallons of propane, and about 25 gallons of kerosene. We also use about 200 lbs of charcoal for grilling in the summer and smudge pots under the truck's oil pan in the winter.

Our only other household expenses are satellite internet, since there is no cell or land line phone or cable or TV reception out here... that's about $70 a month, and is our only form of communication, education and entertainment. We also have a GoPhone which costs $100 a year so we can have an "official phone number"; but we can only use it when we're in town. We spend about $15/mo for streaming movies & TV online.

Fuel is definitely the most costly household expense, costing more than everything else combined. We do plan to drive a sandpoint well with a solar and hand pump so we don't need to spend so much fuel on hauling it in. Eventually, we're going to get solar panels to augment our summer power, and a thermal-electric generator to augment our winter power, and maybe a wind turbine. We'll also probably install a solar water heater for summer hot water, and figure out a water jacket for the woodstove for easier winter hot water. Anything to lower that fuel bill!!

I've found when you're off-grid in the bush, you sort of start seeing everything as costing fuel rather than money.

[Sabinerose]

If I may ask...without getting too personal into your business...how do you earn the income to cover the costs you listed?

[MissingAll4Seasons]

Most folks in the bush have some combination of multiple revenue streams to cover the cash costs... trapping & selling furs, processing firewood, selling eggs & vegetables, handyman services, technical/computer support, housekeeping, animal boarding, house/cabin sitting or caretaking, selling arts & crafts, equipment & labor rental, etc. One or more members of the household may also have seasonal work outside or away from home. Depending on location & circumstances, income may be supplemented with state/federal assistance programs or community programs. Some expenses are shared between neighbors in order to get bulk pricing discounts or a large enough order to qualify for delivery. Lots of things are also bartered, so don't necessarily cost cash... one person pays/owns something, and others trade goods/services to use it, etc.

The more self-sufficient your homestead becomes and the more resources you conserve, the less you have to rely on large and consistent amounts of cash income to cover the normal costs of living. Maybe this is why bush-dwellers start thinking of things in terms of fuel, because fuel is normally a cash expense (unless you make your own bio-fuel).

[Dakster]

Very interesting, it looks like alot of your expenses are paid for by manual labor and ingenuity. Also doing without seems to save a lot of money.

Also, Do a lot of people make BioFuels in AK?

[keyman51]

We have a few people here that use waste oil and burn it. there is a waste oil collection place here. Bartering is popular here. We do not live as remote or primitive as you. I live in the village and everything here is just over a mile from one end of town to the other. At the local store here, things are double the cost of Anchorage, so we usually buy mostly perishable stuff and the rest online, or when we fly to Anch, (a couple times a year) we do a marathon shopping trip and mail it home, frozen items come back on the plane. Shipping costs around $25 for a 70 lb box in the mail or .69 a lb for items that can't be mailed back, unless you need it soon, then it is around 1.10 a lb. Most people in town are friendly enough to take something into Anch. to hand off to a person (moosemeat) or bring back small items. One of the hardest things about living here is you only try to buy things you know you can fix yourself. Getting parts for autos, ect is a challenge. Vehicles don't last as long because it is dirt everywhere. We drove our truck about 1000 the first year, got 10 miles to the gallon when it got 17 in Anch. and the constant vibration of driving on the road is a lot of wear and tear. Husband is retired and both of us work a little. We are not native or low income, so we have less options open to us, but are very careful with our money. Surprising how many around here have less money, but spend it on things we do without (cigarettes, bars, restaurants, junk food ect)

[MissingAll4Seasons]

I can't speak to whether many Alaskans produce their own bio-fuels or not. I do know from my own research that there are a few hurdles for a small-scale producer that make some bio-fuels a bit difficult in our climate.

Ethanol (gasoline replacement) does require a feedcrop, typically grains or sugar beets, neither of which grow well here. But potatoes grow wonderfully if you have the space. I suspect the initial outlay for distillation equipment and the hassle of getting the BATFE permit is a detractant.

Bio-diesel also requires a supply of used vegetable oil (limiting it to larger population centers) or an oilseed feedstock, most of which do not grow well here. Sunflowers and flax grow reasonably well, but I suspect the lower oil yield, the need to process the seed into oil and then process it into biodiesel, along with the initial outlay for that equipment is a detractant.

Methane/bio-gas (propane replacement) via anaerobic digester is rather difficult during the winter when temperatures drop way too low to maintain bacterial decomposition. You would need a large enough tank and feedstock to produce your yearly needs only during summer and some way to pressurize and bottle it. I suspect this, coupled with the lack of affordable scrubbing and bottling solutions is a detractant.

Methanol/wood-gas (gasoline or propane replace) via gasifier is probably the most affordable and efficient method in any of the forested areas. Liquid-form storage is less problematic, but gaseous-form pressurization and storage has the same difficulties as bio-gas. The main detractor for liquid-form use would be the skills and parts necessary for mechanical modifications of existing equipment to run on wood-gas rather than gasoline.

So, all these methods can be done by a small-scale producer for homestead use depending on your location and skillset. The initial cash (or craftiness) outlay for processing equipment and the degree of inefficiency of the process and the resulting fuel when compared to fossil fuels are probably the largest deterrents. However, once you had the processing equipment online and a reliable & sustainable feedstock, it's totally doable for most homestead needs (although maybe not enough for frequent long distance travel). Another stumbling block is that many homestead tools are 2-stroke gasoline, and there currently is no additive that will hold up to ethanol/methanol... however, this can be worked around in many cases by having a bio-fuel generator and using electric equipment rather than gas-powered.