Off the grid - research project

[sungam]

Dear Off griders!

We (Mike Bode & Staffan Schmidt) are presently doing a joint PhD, as visual artists, at the Valand School of Fine Arts, the Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts, at Goteborg University, Sweden. The PhD is both practical and theoretical in its nature. We have about two and a half years left until our examination. Our area of research has to do with the production of space: concretely and socially. Since 2000 we have been working on several exhibition projects which revolve around spatial production and politics. We have been working, together with the inhabitants, in, for example, the suburbs of Minsk, Belarus, on the industrial closures in Japan, Danish modernisation and centralisation in Greenland and situations of immigration and the critique of modernity in Sweden.

During a period as visiting tutors at the Maine College of Art in Portland last year we came across the term "Off the grid", and subsequently we have become more and more interested in the way in which this seemingly silent and non-organized movement as started to grow in the USA. We see this as a situation where well-educated Americans have made the conscious decision to move "up state", away from both the big cities and sprawls, and have begun living their daily lives independently and self-sufficiently producing their own energy. We feel that this can be seen as a tacit protest against ecology's diminutive role as a sign of the lack of far-sightedness in the political agenda in America today.

We now hope to come into contact with individuals which have for different reasons chosen to go "Off the grid", to visit and conduct short and informal interviews and to document the local surroundings. We calculate that the project will take around two years to complete and will be presented in public in the form of an art exhibition and a publication and our intention is that the work will be shown in parallel both in Sweden and in the USA. Our first visit will be in September 2006. Geographically our research will be based on the northeast in the states of Maine and New York.

We very much hope you might consider taking part in our project and that we could meet you during our research trip in September this year. We would also be very grateful to you for any suggestions about places where we might stay during our tour of the north east or other people (Off griders) you feel we should meet, as this would be of great help to our planning.

Please do not hesitiate to get in touch should you have any further questions about the project. You can find documentation of our other projects described in detail on our website: www.valand.gu.se/spatial_expectations/se/index.html

With kind regards from Sweden and with the hope of meeting you this fall,

Mike & Staffan

[RogerAS]

Hi,

You are welcome to see how my wife and I manage to live off grid. Contact me by email for more info.

Roger Stephenson

[wdyasq]

"We feel that this can be seen as a tacit protest against ecology's diminutive role as a sign of the lack of far-sightedness in the political agenda in America today."

I guess with this statement you are going to start with that political agenda? Or, is it to be a true research project?

A quick overview of your PDF file on the mentioned website leads me to believe this  project is to promote a particular political and social agenda as opposed to seek the truth. By careful selection of folks you interview, in a closely defined regional and political area,  you will not get a true picture of why people do move off-grid but  agreement with your self aggrandizing hypothesis.

In the last paragraph of your "Starting Points" you clearly redefine "liberty" as you see it as well as "freedom" and "Independence". You make blanket statements that may or may not be supported by historical fact.  Clearly, your hope is not what is stated but to bolster a view and make political statements.

The rest of the document seems to bolster my quick review.

Ron

[ghurd]

I am a little confused by the dual use of the term "Off the Grid".

We use it related to Electrical Power. The Pentagon has different meanings.

Just to skew the data...

A complete look at US off-grid people would have to include the Amish.  Numbering over 200,000 people, they are certainly the majority of US citizens living off-grid.

The first 6 questions do not apply to them.

The last question, #7, I can answer on their behalf.  "Yes".

So the questions are meaningless related to over 50% of the off grid people.

Or the data will relate to less than 50% of the off grid people.

G-

[kitno455]

it should be clear by now that these are art students and not sociologists. political statements are marginally more 'creative' than soft science, hence their focus

allan

[asheets]

In terms of electical power in the US, the two main groups of people that are "off the grid" fall under these terms:

1. "can't be on the grid" because of high cost, distance, or non availability of resources.  The hosts of this site fall under this catagory, for the most part.
   
2. "won't be on the grid".  This may be a bit tougher to explain, as there are a myriad of reasons.  Some of them are religous (US Amish, for example).  Some are just "fed up" with "the man" (you'll find a lot of those on this board -- some of the more stringent types might even be classified as political extremists.  The Unibomber was an off-the-grid person).  Some just want to be different.  Some do it because of a strong belief in using renewable/flow resources or avoiding pollution wherever possible.  Some do it for the challenge (I fall into this catagory, though I'm not off the grid yet).  Some are trying to supplement income or save money.
   
   

I believe that your implied subthesis that there is no organization for off-the-grid types is inherently wrong.  This board is sufficient proof that there is plenty of organization in the "species", and there are more web sites, forums, discussion groups, books, fairs, etc., than I can count.

Also, there are many of us here who dream about going offgrid, but due to costs, efficiency, and creature comforts -- we never will be completely offgrid.

In terms of electronic data/knowledge and the Internet (and being off-grid) -- from my own graduate research I've pretty much determined that the effort to be "off the grid" is not worth the effort.  It is much easier (and more fun) to manipulate the data so that the databases don't have a clear/accurate picture about you.  Some of my favorites are:

1. Pay a few cents too much on your bills.  Make the biller either keep/account for the extra money, or have them send it back to you at a much higher cost than what is owed.
   
2. Don't use credit if you have cash
   
3. Transpose digits in identification (addresses, phone numbers, tax ids, etc)
   
4. Use those "prefered shopper cards" to purchase random crap outside of your normal purchasing habits.
   
5. use foreign proxy servers while using the Internet.
   

[Phil Timmons]

Yeah, un-huh, okay --  Mr. Sheets.  If that is your real name?

Admiral Poindexter and the Total Information Awareness program (TIA) is watching for guys just like you.

For my part, I am hoping for a beach view at Gitmo.  See you there?

[asheets]

I'm a former USAF officer, and am the 5th generation of my family to be a military officer.  I used to have a Top Secret security rating.  My mother is from the Phillipines, and my father was involved in the 1981 PATCO strike. I teach classes at a local community college.  I know how to build a nuke, got good grades in chemistry, and  know how to fly a plane.  I have registered firearms at home.  I vote Democrat, and I regularly write "letters to the editor".  I drive a fuel efficient car, and I own a library card. I've been known to take box knives with me onto planes.  And I'm behind on my taxes.

I figure my files at the FBI, CIA, and DoHS are about a foot thick apiece.  If I haven't yet earned a 1-way plane ticket to Gitmo by now, I probably never will.

[dinges]

gasp

You own a LIBRARY CARD?!

OMG! You're a dangerous intellectual.

No wait, make that 'wanna-be intellectual'. Real intellectuals buy their own books.

Peter.

[stop4stuff]

I'm a wanna-be off grider in the UK, finacially not viable for me currently tho.

Peter... you still buy books?

Libraries are great for free books... i've borrowed books for 9-12 months at a time, i can reserve books via the internet, and collect them from my local library.

The internet is another source of free info too.

Information is information no matter what the source, why pay for it?

[JW]

Hi Alan,

 I really don't think, it is what you know, that can get you a one way tiket to gitmo, so much as what an individual's intentions are...

 I just cant see you leaving your whatever(what-a-burger) swinging in the wind. At time's like these, I think about NTL. Basically some of us who never signed on, just dont get it. But for whatever reason, we try to imagion, how we could possibly hear, no-evil, and see no evil. I look at it like keeping the trains on time...

 anyhow, I just wanted to share this famous quote.

- those of us who are in-volved with RE like to think of ourselves as part of the solution, not the problem--- TomW-

 This is from Tom someime ago in a post, I think I called him Mr.Mom...

JW  

[Hoskald]

We live in Cental Oklahoma, and are not currently off-grid. However, we are in the process of buying some land and designing a house that will be 90% off-grid that should be build next year. Our reasons are not as clear cut as you make them sound.  We are not making a "political statement" nor are we doing so in an effort to simplify

our lives...we are doing simply because we don't like others (the power utilities, etc) being in charge of how we live...we want that choice.  We would be 100% off-grid if the summer temps here were less that 100F.  The grid will supply power to our geo-thermal A/C unti to keep the home live-able.

We are certainly not "typical" (whatever typical means) off-griders. We are individualist in the strict sense, not out to intentional make a political statement but out to make our own way.  That way, we know that no matter happens in the greater geo-political sense we will be able to take care of our own.

BTW, see the rest of you guys at Gitmo!

Cheers,

Hos

[Instinctz]

What the hell is gitmo? Someone inform me!

[ghurd]

http://www.globalsecurity.org/military/facility/guantanamo-bay.htm

G-

[sungam]

Hi Roger,

thanks for your kind offer, what part of the us do you live in?

Mike & Staffan

[DamonHD]

At the risk of SPAMming with my URL...

Solar PV in London (UK) is not cost-effective by about 5:1 by my calculations:

http://www.earth.org.uk/solar-PV-pilot-summer-2007.html

but just thinking about the power efficiency for a little while has helped me save vast amounts of electricity already, and I really am hoping to take all my home Internet servers (Web, mail, etc) off-grid if at all possible!

Rgds

Damon