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Fully off-grid, central England, how?
- Thread starter WannabeOwner
- Start date
LiamPope
Member
Fun project!
For creature comforts in winter you're just gonna need alternative primary fuel source - i.e. oil, wood, wind or whatever. How about gas stove with bottled gas for the main cooking? Every holiday cabin here in Norway has a log fire for heating, even though most are on-grid - all part of the charm. With wood heating and gas cooking you really dont need much electricity. Backup generator just for the hell of it. If you're doing solar plus bat, chuck a heat pump in anyway for summer cooling and possibly spring/autumn heat.
For creature comforts in winter you're just gonna need alternative primary fuel source - i.e. oil, wood, wind or whatever. How about gas stove with bottled gas for the main cooking? Every holiday cabin here in Norway has a log fire for heating, even though most are on-grid - all part of the charm. With wood heating and gas cooking you really dont need much electricity. Backup generator just for the hell of it. If you're doing solar plus bat, chuck a heat pump in anyway for summer cooling and possibly spring/autumn heat.
You are so right. There is a house near us that a couple are using as a holiday home ... the poor bas***ds are there now as I type this, slogging away in the garden trying to keep the growth at bay ... that's all they seem to have time to do nowadays ... and the bloke is just recovered having ended up in hospital after falling off his ladder whilst doing some other DIY job!
Wow! Thanks for your input, one and all 
Things have moved on a bit
For clarification:
The location would make an absolutely stunning house, but planning permission is for a holiday let (How much occupancy is that actually? or maybe it is like the DFS sale ...)
Cost of bringing in services would be acceptable if building a country mansion, it isn't for a small holiday let. So I wanted to explore an off-grid type scenario, a comfortable rural stay with as little compromise as possible, and "a fully Eco solution".
A few people a year come to my house to see the Eco stuff that I have done, and one or two each year go on to build Passive Haus or something similar. I expect they would have done that anyway, and maybe my efforts just helped them reach the decision.
I'm contemplating investing money in Eco properties to make them more widely available and a Let would allow them to be experienced more widely.
My current thinking is not "Bring your own usb power bank for phones, and that's about all the electric you need" (but I can see the audience that would appeal to) but rather "this is what is achievable".
But it looks like planners would not allow PV on site at all. (There is plenty of land for ground mounted). It has terracotta tiles, traditional for the area, and although PV "Fake terracotta tiles" are in development as best as I know it not going to be commercial any time soon. But likely planners would allow fake slate PV tiles - that seems ridiculous to me, terracotta would be original and appropriate for area, no ground mounted PV allowed, but something completely different on the roof is fine ... sorry, gets my goat that Listing means "Original Crittall windows when we listed it in the '60s" rather that allowing restoring to original-leaded-lights.
So I think its a non-starter, and I will look for other sites that have opportunity for conversion to "fully-eco" let
So "warms you twice" isn't all its cracked up to be then?
The first Eco thing we did (2007 I think) was to replace oil boiler with wood log batch-boiler. My mates thought I was nuts ... obligingly the oil price sky rocketed - thanks very much!
But Chopping, Carting, Storing, Loading ... and if we went away having someone come in and Load and Light became too much as we aged. But my "tree trunks" fuel bill was 1/7th of [domestic central heating] oil.
Good example. I'm moving to the position that the property is too small - just 2 beds, and not much space to sit / eat / relax. For people out hiking all day I expect that would be fine, but I think I would prefer the sort of place where a slightly larger group - 3 couples maybe - could go and have enough space to relax and appreciate what Passive Haus is like .. coupled with planning restrictions on PV and doubtful they would allow anything that achieves 3-bed I sadly think this one is a non-starter - and given the services issue quite possible it will stay like that, tumbled down and rotting.
Thanks. I always admire people that decide to upsticks from the smoke and embark on self sufficiency in that way (although I suppose they did at least keep their day jobs!)
Things have moved on a bitFor clarification:
The location would make an absolutely stunning house, but planning permission is for a holiday let (How much occupancy is that actually? or maybe it is like the DFS sale ...)
Cost of bringing in services would be acceptable if building a country mansion, it isn't for a small holiday let. So I wanted to explore an off-grid type scenario, a comfortable rural stay with as little compromise as possible, and "a fully Eco solution".
A few people a year come to my house to see the Eco stuff that I have done, and one or two each year go on to build Passive Haus or something similar. I expect they would have done that anyway, and maybe my efforts just helped them reach the decision.
I'm contemplating investing money in Eco properties to make them more widely available and a Let would allow them to be experienced more widely.
My current thinking is not "Bring your own usb power bank for phones, and that's about all the electric you need" (but I can see the audience that would appeal to) but rather "this is what is achievable".
But it looks like planners would not allow PV on site at all. (There is plenty of land for ground mounted). It has terracotta tiles, traditional for the area, and although PV "Fake terracotta tiles" are in development as best as I know it not going to be commercial any time soon. But likely planners would allow fake slate PV tiles - that seems ridiculous to me, terracotta would be original and appropriate for area, no ground mounted PV allowed, but something completely different on the roof is fine ... sorry, gets my goat that Listing means "Original Crittall windows when we listed it in the '60s" rather that allowing restoring to original-leaded-lights.
So I think its a non-starter, and I will look for other sites that have opportunity for conversion to "fully-eco" let
So "warms you twice" isn't all its cracked up to be then?
The first Eco thing we did (2007 I think) was to replace oil boiler with wood log batch-boiler. My mates thought I was nuts ... obligingly the oil price sky rocketed - thanks very much!
But Chopping, Carting, Storing, Loading ... and if we went away having someone come in and Load and Light became too much as we aged. But my "tree trunks" fuel bill was 1/7th of [domestic central heating] oil.
Good example
. I'm moving to the position that the property is too small - just 2 beds, and not much space to sit / eat / relax. For people out hiking all day I expect that would be fine, but I think I would prefer the sort of place where a slightly larger group - 3 couples maybe - could go and have enough space to relax and appreciate what Passive Haus is like .. coupled with planning restrictions on PV and doubtful they would allow anything that achieves 3-bed I sadly think this one is a non-starter - and given the services issue quite possible it will stay like that, tumbled down and rotting.Thanks. I always admire people that decide to upsticks from the smoke and embark on self sufficiency in that way (although I suppose they did at least keep their day jobs!)
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And here we have the core of the planning system's problem. Building worth preserving. Someone willing to sink cash into preserving it largely in line with the rules, but the rules create an environment that you aren't going to do it. So it will continue its downward slide untill it is a listed heap of brick and terracotta.
I can see the objection to PV on the roof, but the garden?! Grrr.
Hope something else comes up!
My assumption is the concern that there could be a reflection visible to walkers on nearby hills
Planners often short sighted or stuck with whatever contemporary ruling applies. I have several acres of South facing 30 deg hillside and even 11k power lines at the bottom of the field but permission to plaster the useless hill with panels was a non starter when I looked at it 10yr ago. Now I'm too old to get a decent return in my remaining time.
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