This is the first detailed post in the new series about appliances for off-grid living. Today I want to start with the washing mashines, as I think they are the most interesting. Not only you can change ordinary washing mashine to one suitable for renewable energy sources, but also you can buy one suitable for our special needs.

I thought about it for some time and have a couple of ideas I want to share with you. (more…)

Living off the grid doesn’t mean you have to live like in the 15th century, doing everything with your own hands. Much of typical house work is done today by some appliances. If you want to live off-grid, you probably don’t want to get rid of those appliances. So what should you do?

If you’re building a new off-grid capable house, you must be able to supply all the energy and water used for your appliances. If you don’t want to be 100% grid-independent, you may, for example, want to make your electricity and harvest rainwater, but buy natural gas from the supply network. But in every case you need to precisely identify all your energy and water needs to fulfill those needs somehow. (more…)