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I agree with Sub that central and northern Maine are great places to go off-grid. My definition of "off-grid" means not connected to the power grid, although connections to anything - water mains, gas lines, sewer pipes - would also qualify.
We live off-grid in northern Maine. We have a well and septic, but no grid electric as the power poles are too far away to make it economical. We have a small amount of rain catchment in addition to the well, because we have livestock which needs to be watered even if the well runs dry. We have 1,000 gallon cisterns with pumps that run on 12V or generator.
It is definitely not cheap to go this route. Everybody romanticizes about being "off-grid", often not even sure about what it means. We bought a 1,000 gallon propane tank that we fill once a year, in summer, to supply cooking and hot water. We heat with wood. Our lighting and refrigeration comes from solar panels. Add up the cost of solar panels, a battery bank, a generator or two, large cisterns, a big propane tank - and that will cost you many thousands$$$.
Also, you'll be hard-pressed to do this in any city. It's rural or nothing.
Penn South in Manhattan says hello. In most cities you are required to have city water and sewer, but you can go off grid if you please.
A pontoon boat with a tent style covering could be kept on rivers and lakes in Florida. The boat could run on solar power with an electric trolling motor most of the time and on gasoline when needed. Fish and hunt for food, or garden with landowner permission. Earn money selling wild shiners to fishermen and guides. Marinas are readily available for supplies, bathrooms, showers, or the occasional indoor night's sleep. WiFi too.
A used pontoon boat, kayak, bicycle for when on shore, solar gear, water purifier, and other basic supplies could all be bought for a few grand. With that set up one could travel from north to south Florida and from the Atlantic to Gulf Coasts without ever touching land.
This. There are lots of off-grid areas in the US, OP, but some are pricey. Like the San Juan Islands, off the WA coast. There's land in there with no hookups of any kind; a friend of mine just built a house there, and had to pay to get water and a sewer line piped in, but her place is also sitting on top of a small aquifer. She grows some of her own food. There's an old cabin on her family property that's completely off-grid, off everything, with a hand-pump at the kitchen sink. But land on those islands is very expensive. Her family inherited theirs.
Last edited by Ruth4Truth; 04-06-2017 at 12:22 PM..
It's a laugh to consider any development on the San Juan Islands as environmentally friendly. It's a retreat for rich dilettantes.
Some people live there and make a living for themselves there. Not everyone has the luxury of having wealth. In fact, an "affordable housing" project was organized years ago, so the laborers and other minimum-wage workers wouldn't get priced out.
My Maternal grandparents had a farm in Oklahoma. My Paternal Grandparents had a farm in Missouri. When my parents were 6 and 8 years old the droughts got so bad in the Oklahoma, Missouri, Kansas, Arkansas, Texas area that farming stopped. Most farmers could no longer make mortgages payments, so banks foreclosed on the farms. The people had to leave. There was a huge mass migration away from that drought striken area.
A few books were written about it.
A movie was filmed called 'The Grapes of Wrath'
My parents were tweens when they migrated West to become migratory farm workers, because of that drought.
Interesting that you live in Maine, most people with a history like that live in California. A lot of Californians have a historical connection to the dust bowl events of the 1930s. It's one of Americans great migrations.
Interesting that you live in Maine, most people with a history like that live in California. A lot of Californians have a historical connection to the dust bowl events of the 1930s. It's one of Americans great migrations.
Yes, I grew-up in the San Joaquin Valley of California, farming. My earliest photo shows me in a cloth diaper tethered to a grape vine, as my elder siblings were picking grapes, I was their row-marker. My eldest sister married into one of the families that have large tracts of grapes. After a tour in the Navy, I returned and briefly operated a dairy. I heard about the effects of drought all my life, and I was fully immersed in the wet/drought cycle, flood control reservoirs, and California's massive WPA aqueduct system for crop irrigation. My siblings remain there. Most of my highschool classmates remain within a 40-mile radius of our highschool. We are called 'Okies'.
In exploring the world, I learned that much of the nation is experiencing 'municipal water-stress' and depleted aquifer levels. Yet there are places where wet/drought cycles do not control life.
My Dw and I decided that when I retired from the US Navy we would settle and farm somewhere
that is free of that nightmare.
Granted a huge portion of this state lacks access to grid power. There are many townships where grid power has never gone. Even in my township grid power is only available to a small minority of land parcels. Power that is available here is not reliable, it goes down frequently.
On the other hand, land prices are low. The COL is low. While nationwide there are fewer farms each year, in this state we are seeing more farms every year. More Farmer's Markets every year too.
Anyone interested in off-grid self-sufficient homesteading / farming is in good company if they come to this region.
The 1930's were definitely an abnormality.
The depression was on and then the drought hit.
Even green Minnesota got hit hard.
My dad ( born in 1890) talked often about those abnormal years.
In central MN, normal high temp for mid July is .........83.
Here are records from 1936 that still stand some 80 years later.....
July 6.......105
July 7.......102
July 8.......99
July 10.....106
July 11.....106
July 12.....105
July 13.....107
July 14.....105
Yes, in MN the 1930's were an abnormality and Al Gore had not even invented global warming yet.
Since 1936, MN has only had 2 droughts that I can recall........1976 and 1988....( and not as severe as 1936 )
Today central MN is green, plenty of water, and soils so great that farmers can regularly grow 180 bushel per acre corn with no irrigation.
Yes the 1930's were bad, but many areas rebounded quite nicely from that episode of 80+ years ago.
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