How and where can I learn to set up an off the grid system. I'm talking small scale---just enough to run my pellet stove and or my propane furnace. Pellet stove is 200-400 watts and propane furnace should be less than 1000W. Thanks, Mark.

Tons of information on the Internet & numerous magazine articles & books at your library. Backwoodsman & Backswoods Home Magazines are two to start with.

Read the fine print on the wind turbines. I looked at a small one a while back. In tiny lettering they said that to get the rated wattage you needed a 24 mph sustained wind. That's a lot of wind.

How do you pump your Water ?

GTC

Unless you live in the plains states, solar-12v battery system would probably be the best. What about a refrigerator? A lot of people buy 12 volt RV stuff. You can store propane for a long time, so a propane generator (I have one 10,000 watts) can almost run your entire house.

Here's a good place to get info from, the guy knows his stuff.

A combination of the two is usually best.

link

Solar isnt worth a dang here in the winter. A month or more of inversion, which also brings little to no wind would have a guy hurtin if he was dependent on it.

I agree with a combination of the two being best, but I'd still want a generator option. 12vdc stuff for RV's and switching lighting to led's is key to keeping load down but some stuff has a big draw.

If you set up a battery bank, inverter, and split loads 12vdc and 110 you'll be better off than running all 110vac. In my area a outdoor furnance with radiant heat floors is highly thought of. I've been wondering how hard it would be to set up a steam generator with the condensate being used to heat before returning to process.

We seem to have a regional "energy fair" on an annual basis here in the PNW. Folks show up and discuss/present designs and equipment with a ton of vendors around too.

Well, you need four sources of power, a generator, batteries windmill and solar panels. You set it up to charge your storage batteries and the batteries powers your home. How big a system you will need will depend where you are and how big your home is going to be? The place I lived in when I worked in AK, was set up that way. but it was a 180sf cabin- that was purposely built to not need much to heat, I heated with wood. The Battery house had just six lead acid batteries and it ran the place well most weeks the generator would run for maybe 4 to 6 hours in Winter and maybe 2 hours in summer. Making your own power is not cheap on a KWH basis. There are people that build these sort of systems. Plan on spending some money.

I have propane (extra tanks) and a generator. I just want something to run the low wattage heat stoves without firing up a generator and burning up my propane just to run a 300 watt pellet stove. Thanks to all replies.

Big Nate,
The condensate needs to be fairly hot before it is returned to the boiler or you'll end up with thermal shock to your boiler.