Even seed must be bought, thanks to the Bush administration, genetically modified DNA can be patented so even though the DNA spreads from DNA modified farms to other plants, you can be sued for using their DNA without a license to do so hence you can't just keep seeds from each crop to seed the next, you must buy seeds guaranteed to not be GMO'd and Monsanto has been buying the seed companies so you can only buy their seeds further perpetrating their monopoly on our food.
The entire concept of money is to standardize a unit of resource whether that be a good or service. In theory, efficient market forces assign the appropriate value to the resource and in theory the price should reflect all consequences of the resource. Petroleum is only as cheap as it is because the environmental costs are not included and neither are the efforts of nature in accumulating the fossil reserves.
As you can see, what you want in living off the grid is really financial independence and certainly a modest passive heated home, windmill generated power and fertile land are all "investments" that can give you that independence. However, this also means that you must not overlook principles of personal finance and investing to reach your goals, there are good investments and there are bad investments and the difference is in risk proportional to the reward but it's not a linear association, a $100 to you is worth a lot more than $100 to Warren Buffet. There is no clear way to determine actual value so choosing the appropriate risk is difficult but the general pattern is if you have few resource, a little more is a lot, if you have many resources, a little more isn't a lot and this behaviour can be approximated mathematically by the logarithmic utility of wealth hence an approximation of appropriate risk can be calculated, the calculations are often called the Kelly Criterion or Bernoulli risk or Latane's logarithmic analysis.
There's a lot to learn about finance and risk, but that's the best and quickest way to financial freedom which is what you want from "living off the grid". Many of the off the grid websites and magazines have personal finance advertisements because that's the path to living off the grid. Study finance and max out your IRA ( of TFSA in Canada ) and try to max out your 401k ( RRSP in Canada ) at the very least.
Pick an area with some hills. Build an earth bermed house facing south. Have a windmill built at the top of the hill. You will have to drill a water well and install a septic system. Living off the grid is way too expensive.
n Green Living -
Go to a village...
I'm 18, and the thought of living off the grid, on the land and such sounds like a great idea. I want to know how i would go about it, like what actions would i need to take to finally get where i wanna be? I live in Illinois so i was wondering if there were any areas around here. Thanks in advance
