From what I have read, the underground house is often considered the holy grail of off-grid living, it’s known to be warm in winter, cool in summer, making life more self sufficient for the occupants of the home. I ran across this video recently about a family creating an underground home, taking advantage of a former sandstone quarry, most of the “hole” their home would go in was already there.…
A family’s dream of living off-grid is in tatters after they lost a four-year planning battle.
Daniel and Lora Newman, of Trelowen, Carharrack bid to become self sufficient. But last week they have been forced to demolish thei home in order to avoid jail.
At a hearing at Truro Magistrates Court, the couple were given a 12-month conditional discharge and ordered to pay £1,500 towards Cornwall Council’s court costs.
Ahead of the court date, Mr Newman, with the help of family and friends, pulled down the house.which was built in a field in open countryside without planning permission.…
Off-gridders come in all shapes and sizes. Its not the job of this web site to say that one kind is better than another. So millionaires looking to control their own destiny could covet this Florida private island when Melody Key, the 2-acre island off the southern edge of Summerland Key, is put on the auction block.
Bidding starts at $3.5 million. The owner of Melody Key, formerly named Money Key, posted the island and its 3,000-square-foot estate on an online auction block…
I just listened to a Coast to Coast am show featuring Marjory Wildcraft as a guest, I have heard her name before and probably watched a YouTube video or two about her, but after listening to her interview, I’m so much more impressed with her, if you aren’t familiar with her, I think you will be impressed too… When I first heard about her, I thought she must be some kind of hippy tree hugger, not that there’s anything wrong with that :) it just wasn’t my cup of tea. Turns out I was way wrong, well she may be a hippy tree hugger, but she is so much more than that!…
The National Park Service(NPS) issued a warning last week to all people residing in its parks and campgrounds, in RVs in the backcountry, or on houseboats in government owned marinas — that they will be required to leave the parks by 3 p.m. last Thursday and find other accommodations due to the federal government shutdown.
At Lake Mohave, for example, part of the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, the park is closed to the general public. The Lake Mead NRA is operated by the National Park Service, part of the U.S. Department of the Interior.
When Lake Mohave facilities are on a holiday schedule such as Thanksgiving, Christmas and New Year’s Day, the entrance station is closed, but visitors are still permitted to enter the park. That was not the case Tuesday, as the entrance was barricaded and a park ranger was posted there to determine who enters and who gets turned away.…
How to get off-grid with not a lot of money… that is the holy grail, right? I see many people posting messages here and on other websites, all saying very much the same thing, they want to be independent, to have a piece of land, to have a small place to live, to be off-grid, but they don’t have the money to do it, they often want to join other people in hopes of pooling resources, or just jumping on someone else’s bandwagon.
I am here to tell you it is possible to do this without resorting to illegal means and without having to join with other people or a group to get off-grid.…
We are looking for people who have the skills and the resources and want to make the move from their existing lives inside mainstream society, leave their jobs and their mortgages and their high=spending consumer lives, and move to a low-stress, low-consumption life off the grid.
Of course they will still be a need to work and make money, still a need to generate power, wash, cook, have shelter. But we want to show the world all these things are possible in total comfort, with no stress, off the grid, if you arrange yourself cleverly.
There are many reasons why I have been trying to make a film or a web series about people who are making the move to live off-grid. The first is that the masses of material on TV at the moment never seems to reflect real people and their real lives.…
A young couple have been left heartbroken after planners ordered their unique ‘hobbit home’ to be bulldozed, effectively leaving them homeless.
Charlie Hague and Megan Williams, both 25, built the roundhouse from scratch with their own hands, using only natural materials.
But the couple lost their appeal today against a planning enforcement notice telling them to tear their pride and joy home down.
Charlie and Megan, who have a one-year-old son Eli, built the house on private land in Glandwr, North Pembrokeshire, UK, last summer.…
Over at https://expatforum, they have been debating the possibility of starting an off-grid ecolodge. Remember this is a country which is on it knees financially – only its links with Brazil are keeping it afloat.
But the welcome given to entrepreneurial, frontiersmen types is, shall we say, frosty?
“I am currently looking at property in the South West and hoping to start up a small scale Eco lodge,” said a newbie poster called Speago.
“We have seen a few suitable property’s with land and would like to put 2/3 Yurts, caravans or log cabin’s on the land with regards to starting up a small tourist business.
We would like to be as self sufficient & Eco friendly as possible. Would love to hear from anyone that could give any advice or helpful information with regard to starting this type of business.”
But a regular poster called Canoeman poured cold water on the idea
“Many people want to dodo this, but if you want to be legal then it is not an easy matter, the big stumbling block is land designation, this type of project by it’s nature requires Rustica or farm land and it is extremely difficult to get the correct permissions for yurts etc, also virtually impossible to legally run services like water, electricity and drainage.
Reserve/Ecological & Agro Florastal land very very unlikely to get permission for anything
Urban land or building land can be built but also attracts a premium because you can build – but yurts still difficult.
So it comes down to people doing it under the radar or going through the bureaucracy of a full blown “project for tourism”
The Government has stated this year that it is actively going to enforce current laws on “AL” licencing (holiday let licences) and the Algarve is always in the spotlight for this type of thing.
I suggest you speak to the Regional Tourist Authorities and get some idea on what type of project would be likely to succeed, costs and how you go about it before committing yourself to a purchase
Speago replied
Hi canoeman
Thanks very much for the reply. The property’s we are currently interested in are near Algarve’s West coast. They are not farmland but not sure if they will be classed as rustica. I know there are a couple of similar ventures near buy, and also a couple of campsites in the area. The property’s are both habitable and come with several acres of land. We want to keep is as low impact as possible and do what we can to improve the land.
We want to do everything by the book and get all relevant permission. So I guess the regional Tourist authorities will be my first port of call.
I have also read there are E.U grants available for sustainable living projects, which is also something I need to look …
The entire Alaskan village of Kivalina is off-grid, or “unserved” as the official jargon puts it, by water or power utilities. It clings to a narrow spit of sand on the edge of the Bering Sea, far too small to feature on maps of Alaska, never mind the United States.
Which is perhaps just as well, because within a decade Kivalina is likely to be under water. Gone, forever. Remembered – if at all – as the birthplace of America’s first climate change refugees.
Four hundred indigenous Inuit people currently live in Kivalina’s collection of single-storey cabins. Their livelihoods depend on hunting and fishing.
In June, the United States Supreme Court denied the Native Village of Kivalina the right to sue Exxon Mobil for the climate damage which has caused them to be endangered by the sea level.…
Trying to Get Away? A new season of “Buying Alaska” starts August 3 on cable TV Station Destination America. Each episode will follow a couple as they examine three different properties and look to buy a piece of the untamed north.
[via press release from Destination America]…
MAJORCA, AUSTRALIA – Barking Owl Creek Farm in the central Victorian goldfields is powered by a solar unit and there is bottled gas for cooking and heating.
There is a Coonara wood heater and ducted gas heating as well as evaporative cooling.
There should be a new term called “extreme gardening” to describe the way the current owners had to confront every challenge nature could throw at them, beginning with the drought, bone dry soil and blazing heat, before having to cope with hail storms, tornadoes, flooding, rabbits and kangaroos.…
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