Flipping the Switch

By JM Oles | Photo by Kimberly Moa

The Shaw family has a calendar. For the most part, it’s no different from any other family’s—birthday parties, picnics, school vacations. But look closely; interspersed among life’s usual events are some Shaw family milestones other families don’t have, or at least don’t note on their calendars.

“That was huge,” Kevin Shaw says, referring to the anniversary of one such occasion, “to be able to flip on a switch and have things turn on.”

Electricity—most of us take it for granted. We flip switches on and off all the time. The day you got electricity most likely isn’t marked on your calendar, and while you may understand something about where electricity comes from—a power line connects your house to others down the street and eventually leads back to a generating plant—you probably don’t know the details. And you don’t have to. Aside from occasional outages, electricity is just, well, there. Ditto for other public utilities such as municipal water, sewer and natural gas.

But for the Shaw family and many of their neighbors in this small enclave in upstate New York, utilities aren’t just “there.” Living half a mile from the nearest power line, the Shaws would have had to pay upwards of $37,000 for the electric company to extend a line to their house. And, in any case, the Shaws wanted to take a different route: they made a commitment to generate their own power. Through a system of solar panels, batteries and backup gas-powered generators, they have electricity without a connection to a power plant.

The Shaws are among a growing number of people living “off the grid,” eschewing public utilities and instead installing and maintaining independent energy systems. While the lifestyle is not for everyone, the concrete benefits of living off the grid include not having monthly utility bills, not being subject to unpredictable price hikes and not falling prey to power outages. More intangible benefits include a sense of independence and, in many cases, enhanced eco-wellness.

Long perceived as the domain of hippies, tree-huggers and those who—by choice or by default—dwell on society’s fringes, off-grid living has become an alternative that mainstream Americans increasingly are opting to embrace. Although the off-grid way of life sometimes makes quantification difficult (some off-gridders are also off-line and sometimes even off-census), USA Today calculated that some 180,000 families were living off the grid in 2006, and Reuters quoted a 2008 figure of 350,000. Both sources estimate annual increases of 30 percent. The lifestyle takes many forms—from actor Woody Harrelson’s solar-powered existence in a Hawaiian eco-village favored by other Hollywood celebrities to the off-map, all-women cabins that dot certain parts of the Maine woods.

The lifestyle is not necessarily that of the ascetic. While the demographics (and the degree of austerity) of today’s off-gridders varies widely, many voice a common desire to maintain a certain level of material comfort while disconnected from the public-utility grid. Radio reporter Doug Fine, who lives off the grid on a forty-one-acre ranch in New Mexico, puts it this way: “I wanted to see if I could reduce my oil and carbon footprint but still enjoy the amenities that we expect as Americans. In other words, to continue driving a motorized vehicle and have power at my house—not live like Grizzly Adams.”

For the average person, the off-grid lifestyle may seem like a lot of effort. Sure, everyone complains about utility bills, but they’re a way of life. And while the costs of energy and energy delivery rise periodically, most of us take it as a matter of course. After all, the people working at the power company have to get paid, and the service is reliable. The occasional storm aside, outages are almost inconveniences of the past.

That’s why, for people living off the grid or thinking of going off the grid, the main benefit is not ease but the sense of personal accomplishment that comes from being energy independent. The Shaws hadn’t always planned to live this way, but they now say it suits them well. The ability to control their own energy supply and consumption has made this life the only way to go.

“I feel really proud to be able to say we can do this on our own,” Kevin Shaw says. “It just feels good.”

Judd Boyer, owner of the site OffTheGrid.com and a longtime advocate of off-grid living, agrees. “It’s about having control over your own life,” says Judd, whose website’s Renewable Energy Forum includes such topics as “Off the Grid in the Suburbs” and “Securing Your Panels From Theft.”

The initial costs of going off the grid, or updating an off-grid system, are undeniably high—estimates suggest the typical on-grid household would pay more than $6,000 just to install solar panels—so high that the process may be cost-prohibitive for many Americans. In comparing an off-grid system to a traditional system, it’s hard to reach a break-even point, which in a conversion situation takes about six years. For the Shaws, the additional expense of bringing electricity to their unconnected property made the decision easier; it was more cost-effective to stay off the grid. But for others already living with public utilities, such a step may not seem financially sound. Indeed, many people ask Boyer about the payback.

“What’s my payback?” he asks. “You just bought a brand-new Lexus. When are you going to [get] your payback on that?”

More than a material benefit, says Boyer, the payback is the satisfaction that comes from exercising personal choice. Such satisfaction must be a powerful motivator, because expense aside, living off the grid isn’t easy. Most people spend significant time educating themselves about and deliberating over the process. And while Boyer insists that living off the grid is relatively easy to manage and requires limited maintenance, the Shaws, at least, seem to spend a significant amount of time each day on their energy storage and usage. They check the battery bank daily to ensure they have enough power. They crank the generator, “Jenny,” when they don’t. They must maintain homeostasis within the system or else they won’t have power.

“A lot of our energy is focused around the energy of the house,” Cena Shaw admits.

In the Shaws’ case, the fact that they are outgrowing their current system probably contributes to the amount of time they must spend on it every day. When Kevin Shaw built the house, he thought he’d be living as a bachelor. Little did he know that shortly after he finished he’d fall in love, marry and have two children. Currently the family is planning an addition to the house and an upgrade of their solar-power system, but the cost of the upgrade is a concern. Either way, the family plans to remain living off the grid until, Shaw says, he “can’t do it anymore.”

Many off-gridders chafe against the preconceptions they sense others have of their choice. Off-gridders are loners, the stereotype goes, living a solitary life away from others. They’re anarchists, existing so far from civilization that law enforcement becomes futile. They’re ignorant, living a life devoid of culture, news, art and music.

While people fitting these stereotypes probably do exist—this is America—Boyer says they do not represent the norm.

“People say, ‘Oh, you’re one of those,’” he says. “One cabin, one lightbulb, writing a manifesto and living a mountain-man lifestyle.”

But most modern off-gridders are less occupied with living against the grain than with enjoying the best of both worlds, Boyer says. This means being utility-independent while still enjoying modern conveniences, the company of others, the protection of the law and access to news and pop culture.

That description fits the Shaws. They live in a small house, but it’s certainly no one-room cabin. They have far more than a single light-bulb, there are no visible manifestos and they certainly don’t dress like mountain men. The family is anything but antisocial—they attend monthly community dinners and events held at the community-supported agricultural program to which they belong. They appear to be good, even conventional, citizens. Kevin volunteers as an EMS technician and Cena helps organize a preschool program. And they keep up on current events in the news and in their fields: Kevin is working on his master’s degree, and Cena already has hers.

Even so, the Shaws are selective about what “bests” they take from each of their worlds. They don’t have a lot of things that plug in: They don’t have a television or an electric coffeepot; they don’t even have illumination in their refrigerator.

“I never thought about [that],” Shaw says of the lack of a fridge light, which surely makes midnight raids more difficult.

But the Shaws do embrace some modern conveniences that help them stay connected to current events and to pop culture. They read the news and watch Netflix DVDs on their laptop. They have a boom box to access radio broadcasts, especially NPR. And they have an electric coffee grinder.

Wait a minute.

“I guess the [hand grinder] doesn’t grind fine enough,” Cena Shaw observes wryly, as her husband pours beans into the grinder. There are some things that even off-gridders can’t live without.

Boyer says that what’s deemed essential and what isn’t often changes with time, as people grow more comfortable with the lifestyle. Once people have become utility-independent, for instance, they often opt for other kinds of self-sufficiency. Many choose to produce their own food by keeping gardens and livestock. Some go so far as to make their own fuel to power their cars. Many pare down their spending and reduce the amount of “stuff” they have. It becomes a lifestyle of simplicity, of recognizing what’s important and cleaving closer to those values, Boyer says.

For another family in the Shaws’ community, the Connors, living off the grid also means respecting the environment and living closer to the land.

“It is getting that chance to [exist] as close to nature as possible,” Tate Connor says. “I still use the Internet, watch movies, use regular toilet paper and drive a gas car, but each morning and night or whenever I want to, I can hear nature.”

In the Connors’ backyard, raised vegetable beds await warmer weather. By midsummer the family hopes to be relying on their own fruits and vegetables. One of the family’s goals, says Connor, is to buy less than 10 percent of their food from outside the community. Andrea Arnold, Connor’s wife, says she hopes to grow enough strawberries to sell pies and jam to their neighbors.

From these simple pleasures—taking care of their own needs, and contributing to the well-being of the community—the Connor family derives satisfaction. Indeed, a certain thoughtfulness pervades the household. Typical measures of success or achievement do not interest them. Arnold, in fact, doesn’t even have an engagement ring or wedding band. When asked about it, Connor said that when he proposed, Arnold said she’d rather have a painting by an artist she favors. The painting sits in their bedroom, soon to be hung in an honored place above the bed.

The Connors say they would never again want to live on the grid. The same is true for the Shaws. In keeping with Boyer’s observation, both families agree that, if anything, they want to move further off the grid—to become more energy-independent, more conscious of their environment, more distant from the tangible and intangible costs of the mainstream world. They want to keep marking milestones. And if it’s true that the number of off-gridders is increasing by 30 percent each year, then many more families may soon be marking their calendars with milestones of their own.

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