We are off grid, but our costs for cooking, heating and hot water involve the gathering of firewood to put into the woodstove which also heats the hot water tank in the roof and its an oven too.
As wood gathering involves using a chainsaw and ute there is a reasonable cost involved. we live in a forest and it produces more available wood than we can use so its well and truly sutainable.
Every 6 months we go through a gas cylinder which runs the stove rangetop and a gas powered beer fridge outside.
For pv we have a 1.4kw array@24 volts 1500ah feeding the inverter to run the house, all the usual stuff , austar, widescreen tv , sat internet, laptops etc
The ham radio gear and refrigeration run off a separate 12 volt circuit with 800 watts of panels and 1400 ah of batteries.
The system has been great and is often in float by lunchtime.
What we dont have : airconditioning, plasma tv, full sized computers on all the time, oodles of wastefull downlights spattered all over the ceiling of every room.
Its compact flouros all round, 25 watter in the kitchen, 15 and 20's elsewhere
cheers
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