On living happily ever after...

[canadageorges]

So, yeah, certain things in my life have been crappy lately.
But...

We're moving up north.  The house and land have been transferred in the boy's name (some day I'm gonna remember to ask him if I'm supposed to refer to him by name on the interweb).  It's his.  His asset, and, until we get some work done on it, his liability.  Bonus: unlike an

Comments

[drjamez]

This is awesome!

Another piece of potentially good news... over time, that is... there's a company that is (or has already started at this point, perhaps) selling do-it-yourself solar panels to cut down on one's electric bill, and it is a "kit" that can be expanded upon in the future once you get more money saved up. I believe the panels are going to retail through Home Despot and/or Lowes for $825/panel, which is pricy *but* I expect the prices to drop over the next year, and it is still cheaper than paying for a whole system installed up-front. (Two panels alone might be enough to connect a home hot water heater, cutting down and/or eliminating home heating costs, depending on the size of the home, the batteries connected for overnight use, etc.)

I think they're starting in California as a pilot, but should roll out the DIY kits to other states in 2010. A little cost and sweat equity up front, coupled with some more earnest savings toward more panels over the next few years, and you might be able to drop your electric bill quite a bit. (Maine, as I understand it, has a "zero sum" regulation in place so that even if you are 100% off the grid, any extra power that gets fed back to CMP does not grant you income - it's a bit protectionist of the Maine PUC, but maybe that regulation will change in the coming years, too, once more people go off-the-grid.)

In any event, this is great news! Congrats!

- James -

DIY solar = excitement!

[canadageorges]

We are definitely looking into solar energy, probably in the form of the insulated vacuum tubes to heat water (especially if radiant floor heating is feasible. And pretty much everything that we can do with sweat equity, we will. The current entry price is about 8k to 10k for that type of system (installed, I haven't found pricing for materials only), before any tax advantages, though, so $825/panel might win me over to photovoltaic technology instead...

I was under the impression that the zero-sum clause was new-ish (within the last few years), so even though I think it is repugnant and wrong, I don't think it will be going away anytime soon. :( I doubt that we would ever make more electricity than we would use, though. If we offset the lights, heat, and hot water for the house, we would probably look into heating and/or lighting a greenhouse. Locally grown plants from a zone or two south of us would be nice, if it were done with "free" energy. (Or we could just extend the growing season into the winter a bit further with a hothouse.)

We'll be looking into wind if we can ever get the data we need, too. Most of the anti-wind info out there is based on the lack of info on wind speed. Let me rephrase that... Most of the people who have had failure with wind power knew an average wind speed for "their area" but that is not a useful number, and I'm not sure how hard it will be to find out the distribution of [wind speed vs. time] for the tiny microclimate in which we would consider building a windmill.