Make Your Own Electricity, Step One
The first thing I did when I decided I wanted to make my own energy was to Google like crazy. I searched for DIY Solar Panels, How to Build a Windmill, How to Harness Solar and Wind Energy… You name it, I searched for it.
And I found that there are a lot of websites out there, but not a lot of actual information. Almost everything I came across was selling something, and so, without telling the wife, I started to buy the various reports and ebooks and videos. Surprisingly, most of it was decent, not surprisingly, some of it was crap. And, after casting aside both the stuff that was crap and the stuff that was decent, I was left with a handful of truly great stuff. Since it would be a total violation of copyright, I’m not going to post the contents of the products that were useful, but I will be telling you what they were so that you won’t have to find out by trial and error like I did. That’s all for another day, though. Today, I just want to introduce myself, tell you why I’ve started this site, and write that first “Hello World” post that seems to be so very popular on sites.
So, I’m Steve. My wife and I recently moved to North Carolina after living in California for our entire married life (33 years and counting, thank you very much). My quest to make my own electricity started when my wife and I sat down to take a serious look at our finances (after that stock market crash in October… You remember the one, right?). See, up until then, we’d been doing alright, socking away a lot of money for retirement. But, now, our retirement accounts have taken a serious nose dive and we realized that it wasn’t enough to be saving money and hoping for the best.
No, we needed to take matters into our own hands. Of course, she and I had different thoughts on what exactly that would mean–she was thinking something less extreme than going completely off grid. But I think I’ll manage to convince her. And I am unbelievably excited about the day when we’ll be getting an electric bill from the electric cooperitive we use and instead of us owing them money, they’ll be saying they bought electricity FROM US that month.
If you’re feeling similarly worried about your financial future, join me in taking matters into your own hands! Together we’ll probably make some mistakes as we try to make our own electricity, but I am confident that if I stick with it, and you stick with it, together, we’ll both be celebrating that first We Owe You statement from the electric company!
So, welcome. Make yourself at home. And let’s get our hippie-dippie on.
