Let’s say that you find that perfect chunk of dirt and you decide to build your modest dwelling there. It’s pretty much an ‘off grid’ situation so you’re on your own for power. The way I see it there are things that you’ll need to run:
- Generator
- Well Pump
- Lights
- Fridge/freezer
- Heat/Water heater
- Stove
- Assorted small devices (phone charging, table lamps, laptop, etc.
(Not a complete list, I know)
So now, you’ve got a choice about how to run things..you can go with propane, gasoline, diesel, or electric (from generator, hydro, PV, wind, etc.)
And, of course, you could do some combination of the various fuels/ systems….you could run your lights and accessories offa PV system, your well pump off a generator, and your generator, heat, water heater, etc. off propane.
Or you could try to do one fuel to cover all those needs…something like everything being electric and running off a generator.
So, my question is…how would you set things up? To my way of thinking, propane would cover all systems…propane to run the generator, freezer/fridge, heat, water heater, stove, and the electrical would have its needs met from the propane generator. Although, most likely, I’d just wire for DC and use 12v LED light fixtures and lamps. Laptops already charge from DC. Use propane for everything else.
There’s also nothing that says a household can’t be a multi-fuel affair. I’m thinking that for my anticipated needs, some sort of PV battery system (unless I’ve got running water for a turbine, or perhaps a windmill) to run the low-draw electric like lights, radios, etc, and then propane to do the heavy lifting of generator-driven electric well pump, propane stove, water heater, fridge/freezer, and furnace.
The drawback to propane is that you cant just walk down the road, borrow some from a neighbor, and carry it back to your home in a bucket like you could with diesel or gasoline. And theres the matter of getting a truck out to your location to refill your tank. I’m not sure of the regulations regarding transporting a large propane tank to get it refilled, but I wonder if a 250- or 500-gallon tank, permanently mounted to a trailer, hauled into town once a year to be filled, and then returned home and reconnected to the house system would work.
Yes, I’m sure I could live in a cabin with a woodstove that heats the place up and makes my hot water but I like to think that in a pre-apocalypse world I would strive for a bit more comfort and convenience than that.
So…if it were you…and you had to provide for lighting, heat, hot water, well pump. and device charging, what would be your fuel of choice? Keep in mind, we’re trying to keep as low a profile as possible…so a tanker truck of some flavor coming by twice a year is not optimum.
Embrace the power of ‘and’…
At my BOL, we have co-op provided electricity, water. Propane in a big tank out front. It’s a brick, slab on grade ranch style house, so not built with low energy use in mind.
I’ve got, or am slowly getting, dual fuel generators. Gas and propane in this case. Water heater, furnace, and kitchen are propane. The pump I need to run is the septic system, or a jet pump to move lake water into storage and treatment if the grid was down. I’ve got solar panels and inverters in the shed, ready to deploy if needed. They are good for charging stuff, radios, and running convenience items, but I don’t have much storage yet. WROL I’d be salvaging from vehicles, but currently I’m slowly buying deep cycle batteries.
I base a lot of my preps on what I can get cheap, or what shows up in the various auctions I follow. If I was doing it from scratch and new, I’d probably go for a diesel gennie as the occasional “big load” power source. Moving diesel yourself isn’t a big deal, and storage tanks (in the form of home heating oil tanks) are easy to come by. There are portable diesel heaters too as well as boiler/heater units for the house. Your gennie should be for intermittent, big draw items, like running saws, welders, or a big pump, or charging batteries if your solar falls behind.
I’d want solar and batteries for small but constant stuff like cams, networking, lighting, fridge and chest freezers, and charging.
Cooking and heating with electricity is inefficient, but if you have enough solar and storage, and your demands were small… doable and renewable.
A woodstove for heat and cooking is a good back up if there is wood available. It’s not stealthy.
Wind doesn’t generate much for the investment, but I do have a small turbine waiting for installation. I’ve got a very consistent breeze off the lake.
I like choices, and backups, and the ability to use whatever is available, so I’ve got a lot of different systems.
If I was you, and more remote, I think propane, solar with storage, passive solar for heat, and maybe active solar for hot water, and a woodstove as backup would cover most of your needs. There are big propane tanks you can move yourself, or you could get more than one big one, to limit the deliveries. We use more propane than I expected just for cooking and heat. My little 30 amp honda inverter gennie burns one BBQ bottle every 10-12 hours.
Of course, add a dual fuel gennie for backup, kero for heat and light, and cooking in a pinch, and an electric chainsaw so you can use the solar to cut wood when all the gasoline is gone…
n
I put a 6′ LED strip under one of my cabinets & was amazed at the light output. It plugs into 120VAC & steps it down to 12VDC. So I had an epiphany: I got another one, left off the adaptor, & put it in my truck topper, running straight off 12V. Presto! Plenty of light in the topper.
Added– just re-read my comment and I wasn’t clear about the diesel thing.
If you have home heating oil available in your area, then building the house around oil heat, and hot water, maybe with hot water radiant heat might be a good base. You can have extra tanks, and store diesel for your truck, backup gennie, etc.
I’d still do solar with storage, and make the system big enough to cook and clean with electricity.
If you are just doing a small cabin, you have more flexibility than if you are doing a modern house with all the mod cons…
n
In my neck of the woods, 100 pound canisters can be hauled in for refilling. I cannot speak to the larger sizes. Propane checks a lot of boxes.
We have grid power (buried lines), 22 kw Generac, 1000 gallon propane tank, and a wood stove. Plus a few solar “generators.” Ideally, we’d have a land-mounted solar array, inverter, and batteries, plus a second1000 gallon propane tank. From everything I’ve watched and read, the ideal is solar and a fuel-powered generator to charge the batteries on cloudy days, or to use during the day and switch to silent solar power at night. Only problem there is cost (and we’d have to pay someone to install it, since we have zero electrical knowledge/experience).
Propane can go a long way, when it’s limited to stove and hot water (and my husband takes loooonng hot showers). We’ve had power outages from a few hours to 4 days, and still haven’t had to fill the propane tank more than once a year, and it was nowhere near empty (and they will only fill it to 80%). But using it for heat generation, especially in a cold climate, would be s different story. We have a minisplit (and have not had to forgo AC even when on Generac power), but it just doesn’t work as well for heat, especially when the temp drops below 20. Besides, the wood stove is simple to use and cozy, and can be cooked on as well. Granted, having many wooded acres (as we do) helps; you’d have to factor buying firewood in to your cost/benefit analysis.
Yes, we have a propane truck come out once a year – but since almost everyone for miles also uses propane, it does not attract any notice. We are a few miles off the paved road and on a ridge; closest neighbor is half a mile away. I suppose if you really want a place that no one can ever find, you won’t want a propane delivery. As it is, even locals cannot find us without my giving them directions, and that’s good enough for us.
I think we used to haul anhydrous ammonia around in tanks mounted on a wagon carriage. Not sure how much propane would go in one but it would be no less of a bomb than those things.
That better said I think propane for backup and maybe heat. Every thing else can be run via solar. If you have some running water you could do hydro or if you have a ridge near by maybe wind.
Sure you can figure it out.
I think the combination of PV with a battery bank, air (small wind turbine), and a propane/gasoline powered generator offer a diversified options plan. I am with one of the anonymous users regarding the 100 lb propane bottles. These are transportable, inconvenient, but still able to be moved. The problem with a large stationary tank is that it is more likely to be seen from a distance and doesn’t check the OPSEC box. I would say a wind turbine may fall under bad OPSEC, but it is a somewhat reliable renewable energy source. And of course the PV with battery bank can be tied in with the wind turbine. Given that you’d likely have few thousand KW of power need, this is completely doable. You won’t need a high number of panels, especially if you get the higher wattage panel (325 W panels is what I have seen). I think the battery bank will be the largest cost sink.
SOmething to consider though with a propane/gasoline generator is the sound. If you went with a solar generator then sound would be far less of an issue. The propane/gasoline could be an emergency backup if you had days of without sufficient solar exposure. Just my two cents.
Fwiw, we cannot hear our Generac by the time we get to the top of our driveway. While we can hear it while inside the house, it’s actually not that loud – doesn’t keep us from sleeping. And I don’t think it’s just ‘lost’ among ambient noise – we live very close to a wilderness area and it is generally very quiet – especially since we are at the end of the dead-end road. No cars, ATVs, planes, etc.
Here’s a quick look at what I found about transporting big propane tanks.
https://www.hazmatschool.com/blog/how-to-safely-transport-propane-tanks/
Of course a quick call to your state DoT would stop you from getting a ticket.
Here at Rancho Snakebit we use propane for cooking and heating. The almost 80 year old farmhouse (with no insulation besides two layers of shiplap) is heated by vent free propane heaters quite well. I think the radiant (without glass) works better than the blue flame, but YMMV.
CDL holder with tanker and hazmat endorsements,would need to see the specific section in CFR that excludes “noncommercial” from the regulations. Normal exceptions are for #1000 nonnuclear/ORMD noncompressed gas in less than 100gal containers. Larger containers and tanks require not only CDL but tank and Hazmat endorsements with also insurance,etc. Ideal system would be multiple #100 tanks with a loading system for the p/u. This is only going to work preSHTF. Other option is if available a small output oil/gas well and refining capability. Road Warrior set up on personal level.
You might look at adding exterior insulation. A blanket of Rockwool Comfortboard would add quite a bit. Easy to DIY. Strip the siding, screw the semi rigid insulation to the house, add back some lathe and reinstall siding. The most complex bit is building out the window boxes for the added thickness of the insulation.
For me, it’s gotta be diesel, which means JP4, #1, #2, home heating oil, or kerosene in a pinch. It can also be siphoned out of trucks, school busses, semis, and occupational force vehicles after the balloon goes up. Solar should be secondary/ incidental/non- critical power.
One of my hobby vehicles is a Mercedes 300D, which around the world has run on vegetable oil (I’ve never tried it, but in a pinch….).
Now, it’s a nice car, I bought it with 100k on it and it now has 458k miles, on the original engine, trans, etc. I put a new injection pump in, along with new injectors at 400k, but it was still quite drivable. The only other replaced parts are normal maint: tires, brakes, battery, wipers
Comments – so far – seem to be pointing toward “multi-faceted solution.”
Some PV for *a specified amount* of electricity; some wind to *sometimes* supplement the PV; propane for some uses – cooking, regular hot water, *maybe* backup heat (the propane mantle lights originally created for RVs are quite bright and use very little propane per lumen); some K1 for a little localized heat and light (think: Aladdin, especially the older ones, but Plain Jane wick lamps are better than candles); some gasoline/diesel for nackup power; wood for main backup heat/cooking.
Big thing is the Planning Cycle; my house has an open floorplan so a single 7 ft high wall-mounted Aladdin lamp provides adequate light for the kitchen, dining area and living room, and light scatter (white walls and ceiling) include the front and back doors. Directly under the light one can read a book, 15 feet away not so much, so multiples are needed. If I had built it myself I’d put propane piping in the walls for those lamps and, maybe, a small room heater; I’d also have built it double-wall with 2-4″ of 2-part, closed cell spray in insulation in the outer wall and mineral wool batts in the rest of the wall, the better insulated and more air tight the house is the less fuel it takes to heat (FYI, a house like that will probably require some sort of outside air source for a wood stove (which, also, can be much smaller), see the Swedes and Jotul stoves for more info).
I have multiple generators, all but one are ultra quiet RV gennies, during Helene the neighbor across the street said he couldn’t hear the 3000 at night with his windows open, and inverter gennies sip fuel, especially in Eco Mode; to run the fridge and a 7 cu ft chest freezer was just over 2 gallons over 2 1/2 days. I could convert it to propane – I have a 250 gallon tank – but that’s for hot water (tankless wall-mounted water heater) and cooking, and it needs “topping off” only every 3rd year. I’d use the 100 lb propane tanks for the gennies if I converted, but it’s easy to keep 100 gallons of Pri-G treated non-ethanol on hand. I could have used one of the 2000s for the fridge and freezer, but the 3K holds 3.4 gallons and the 2K only 1.2, and I wasn’t sure of consumption rates. There are ways to provide more fuel capacity to the 2Ks, the serious RV people have doped it out, see the RV forums for the solution. I do have that capacity but didn’t want to use it if I didn’t have to, and the 3K is quieter than the 2K. Opsec and all that.
If you’re on-grid, and it makes sense to be, that’s an Opsec issue because the power company will have your name and addy and any idiot can follow the poles and wire to your house. But, poles/wires are “normal” and expected, the weak point is dot gov access to consumption data (and they do look at it, esp. for remote properties that might be Grow Houses); extremely low consumption draws almost as much attention as extremely high – “what is he trying to hide?”
If I were building I’d be tempted to: 1) go smaller; less volume to heat/cool (FYI, ductless split systems are the way to go – for a regular AC or heat pump you’ll need about 50 amps from the gennie, small very high efficiency splits can be under 10); 2) build severely “open floor plan” to the point of being able to move walls out of the way so it’s easier to heat/cool the entire structure without requiring forced air; 3) build very extremely energy efficient (which will require mechanical filtered air exchange, aka “heat recovery ventilator system”) and by extremely energy efficient I mean a max ACH of 1.0 at 50 pascals, and I’ve seen a couple houses under .5, minimum R30 for walls and R70 ceiling, very low U windows (“U Factor” is the insulation factor for windows, “E” is the solar (IR) heat gain measurement), higher ceilings (min of 9 ft and 10 is better, high ceilings makes the house feel larger, but heat rises so 10 ft is more gooder in summer, less gooder in winter unless there’s a mechanism to recover heat at the ceiling and pump it to the floor, small PV systems can do that), high efficiency/low maintenance plumbing fixtures (the less water you use the less energy you need to pump it, and multiple large well tanks in the basement are a good idea – instead of powering the well pump every time you need water, 4X 60 gallon pressure tanks means powering it for 25-30 minutes every other day.
Opsec is a separate issue, as in “laundry drying on a clothesline is proof someone is living there” just like having lights on at night when no one else does (if there’s a “barn” that’s “very well ventilated” an indoor clothesline can help conceal the evidence) but it needs to be considered as well. A buried propane tank is less obvious than one just sitting there, etc.
Re Laundry: I’ve been considering a dehumidifier for drying indoors during the winter: quiet, low-cost (compared to a tumble-dryer) and, reportedly, quiet efficient.
Should have added this: heating could be solved with a hydronic heating system – water tubes on top of the subfloor but under the finish floor. Hot water solar panels for the heat source, small PV panels for pumping the water around. If I were building, had the land and money, I’d do an underground vault, put 3-4X 1000 gallon tanks in the vault, closed-cell insulate it to R120 (don’t forget to include maintenance access, and extra points for a removable concete lid that’s about 36″ below grade for tank install/replacement) so there’s a large hot water reserve for cloudy spells. It would need a backup, but since it’s capable of “batch” processing rather than “continuous”, a wood burning boiler would work – burn a lot of wood for 18-24 hours to get a week’s worth of heat.
You might research cascade systems and see if you can cascade several 100# propane tanks. Thats the only way I can think of to go with large amounts of propane and avoid deliveries.
I’m guessing you want to avoid the prying eyes of the delivery man. If you’re going to build there will be 100 people who dig, nail, drill, wire and inspect.
I live have a 30×50 metal building that I use for a shop. It is insulated with closed cell foam. I bought a pre wired soar system that was designed for use in a tiny house. It uses six 300-watt panels and AGM batteries for overnight storage. A Honda 3kw generator fills the gap on cloudy periods. I have plenty of 110v power for lights, tools, and a small compressor. Something like that should do you nicely.
We just went through Helene, so we had a real world exercise to test out our setup. We have a rack of 48V, 100Ah batteries, with solar and a generator to keep the batteries charged. We ran off of the batteries at night. It took me a couple of days to get the charging sequence down, due to not having all of the batteries in the same charged state to begin with. I thought that I did, but clearly I was wrong. Lessons learned: (1) I need an additional battery. Before I got the battery charging straightened out we were too close to 0% charged on a couple of occasions. Once I worked through it, we never got below 50% charged. (2) I need a multi-fuel generator. I have 25, 20 liter jerry cans of treated, non-ethanol gasoline. Sounds like a lot, but it’s not. One jerry can per day and I can only go for 25 days. Propane is so much easier to store. The largest propane tank we can get put in the ground here is 250 lbs. I haven’t investigated that yet, but it’s on my phone call list. A duel fuel generator is in our future.
My plan has always been to get my Internet and power from orbit. Elon covered Internet, but he doesnt seem interested in beamable microwave power.
Bezo’s just a tool.
And we’ll all be dead and mumified before .gov does anything productive.
Beamable microwave power is fantasy. All electromagnetic energy follows what is known as the inverse square law. Double the distance, the power is a quarter. Triple the distance, the power drops to a ninth. The only reason that solar works is because the amount of energy put out by the sun is so huge, that despite the losses over the distance there’s still enough left to do something useful with.
Lots of good advice above from the folks who made different choices based on where they live and what was available to them at the time. Speaking only about the propane issue, knowing you use and store other fuels and may also opt for a wood stove since you are remote and have very cold winters out in the mountain west, here in the eastern US, we opted for a 500 gallon propane tank – buy a new one outright so you can shop around for the best price on propane from local suppliers (also avoiding older tank rust issues). Keep in mind what the lady above said that regs. state the delivery person can/should only fill to 80% capacity (400 gallons in 500 tank and 800 gallons in a 1K tank) to allow for gas expansion on warmer days. Also keep in mind that although buying a larger 1K gallon propane tank cuts back on tank truck deliveries (probably once a year depending on your use) you can figure, say, depending on propane prices at the time on about $1K+ for a first fillup and depending on how empty your tank is, the larger the tank the more expensive the refill. In our area, it is not worth it for the propane company to deliver less than 200 gallons, which is, with our 500 gallon tank, minus the safety factor, I have to wait until our propane is down to 40% full before I can have more delivered. Our propane tank has supplied our hot water heater, gas stoves and gas fireplace for the past 25 years filling up only every 10 mos. or so. Our HVAC takes care of the A/C and we don’t use the heat feature with the HVAC unit. Hope that gives you some perspectives on propane. redclay7
FYI – last propane delivery was a hair shy of 303 gallons (with a 1000 gallon owned above-ground tank) in June (so summer rate) for $655. We’re in the Ozarks; don’t know what propane costs elsewhere.
I just had mine refilled yesterday. In northern Middle Tennessee, 376 gallons was $807 ($2.09/gal).
Pardon – I forgot to add that early this year, after years of numerous power outages of varying length year ’round, we finally got our whole house standby Kohler 27K generator which is also powered by propane – same 500 gallon tank. In our later years, this has already paid for itself in our minds. It has used very little propane so far during as much as day-long outages. redclay7
First off. Being in Montana how much propane would you use monthly? If it’s a reasonable about to go use the vehicular mounted trailer then go that way.
I’d think something like a hobbit hole (earthen dome) house with pretty thick walls & good windows would really negate the need for excessive heating & cooling- which would be your biggest use.
I’d definitely wire up lighting to run solely off a solar setup with a way to also tie a small generator into it if the weather gets bad, keep your batteries juiced at least.
At the end of the try fry go rough out your energy needs then look at what you want to use.
Propane is the near ideal fuel and with a RV fridge/freezer that will run with it plus 12V DC or 120V AC makes it pretty easy to keep stuff cold with a multi fuel unit.
A tank mounted on a trailer makes it portable which eliminates the need for delivery, brilliant.
Back up would be a gas or diesel generator, same fuel as the vehicle. Throw in some 12V PV lighting and comms to round out a simple battery system. Wind driven well pumps are a proven technology and can be backed up with the genset.
Each day when I go take care of our chickens, I gather eggs. One day I use the scrap pot. Another day I use an actual basket. Sometimes I just bring in handfuls. The point is I’m not locked into any one method. Household energy is the same.
My thought, begin with a pyramid of guidelines.
1) When possible, go passive. More insulation, gravity fed water, a cold cellar, solar heating, etc.
2) When possible, multiple methods. Primary, secondary (should be on par), auxiliary, tertiary, and oh-shit-now-what. Do this for anything everything that matters. If you need it to live and live comfortably, diversify reliance.
3) Speaking of reliance, don’t. Don’t rely on anyone or anything outside unless you have to. Chose a time period that you expect to be without, and plan for that plus X% on top.
And… you know what… I’ve blogged all this before and I’m pretty sure ComZero has as well. A dozen smart people have, and I’m not even on that list. Why am I doing this?
I am amazed at the responses here. Preppers seem to be stuck in the 1990s when it comes to solar.
You can get a professionally installed, commercial grade, UL certified, EMP hardened 15-20kw solar system with panels, LFP server-rack batteries, and Solark Inverter for $30-40k that will easily run all of those things, assuming you use a heat pump and minisplits. Expensive, yes – but relative to the cost of setting up a whole off-grid homestead, not really.
(before everyone says heatpumps dont work below freezing – again you are stuck in the 90s)
IMO hauling in fuel of any sort is the same as being grid-tied for everything, it’s just a little slower to fail.
If you aren’t aiming for self-contained self-sufficiency what is the point?
Agree re utility and self-reliability of solar – but $30-40k is not a small chunk of change. When we find we have $ to do so, solar is definitely on the list. There is also the issue of spares and maintenance – in inclement weather, when one is older, and degree (or lack thereof) of electrical experience.
All goes back to an earlier comment of mine – there is no such thing (unless you have unlimited funds) as the ‘perfect’ property and it’s best to regard rural living/a bugout location as a step-by-step journey.
I had a cabin in the Idaho panhandle that was completely off-grid (the power company wanted over $100k in 1980 dollars, and a perpetual right of way to run power to me). I did have good road access.
My solution was a ChinaDiesel lister diesel generator, battery bank, a small wind turbine (300 watt), propane cooking and water heating (500 gal pig), and a wood stove for room heating, which could also be used for cooking.
Oh, and backup portable generators running on gas, propane and diesel. I still have the portable generators, they still run. The China Diesel stayed with the house, as did the wind turbine (which didn’t do much at all).
Redundancy is good.
Now I live on Flathead Lake, I have commercial power, a whole-house propane generator (4 1000 gal pigs), a 15kva diesel generator, and the portable generators. No solar, no wind. Still redundant in that I have a wood stove that is not just decorative, and wood burning fireplaces.
This is my area of expertise. I have designed and installed multiple systems for off grid properties. My retirement location is fully planned and will be 100% off grid.
Most of your questions are known quantities. Only solar provides enough reliable and efficient energy to make it work. Quality panels with low degradation will produce a substantial percentage of their original rating for 25 years. Nothing stops you from storing spares for weather damage, and they are tougher than people give them credit for. Lithium Ion Phosphate batteries are incapable of generating enough heat to reach the point of ignition, the chemistry doesn’t allow it. If they are kept between 20% and 80% state of charge, their lifetime discharge cycles can reach 30,000. That’s 84 years of discharging to 20% and charging back to 80% every day.
The ideal system uses solar panels, batteries, and a small propane powered auto start generator that is controlled by the solar system and runs only when the battery state of charge falls to critical levels. Add some small wind turbines (around 600W vertical turbines are efficient and don’t need a tower) for some additional generation in bad weather, if you like. Properties lucky enough to have moving surface water for many days of the year can add water turbines.
The well should lift water to a cistern at or near the surface and is programmed to only run when there is excess solar power and the cistern isn’t full. A much smaller secondary pump provides water pressure on demand. The cistern effectively becomes a secondary method of energy storage.
There are a lot more people already living off grid than most people realize. It’s actually not hard nor inconvenient, and if you buy remote property with difficult access it is often cheaper than bringing grid power in.
Yes, yes, and yes. Buried cistern is definitely the way to go and at the top of our list. We have the 5 and 50 gallon water containers but insufficient room in the cabin/house. Temperature range in non-climate controlled garage is less than ideal. Old-timer here with generations of family in the well business strongly recommended cistern to me. Solar pump for well head would not work for us because well is among the trees, a significant distance from flatter, cleared area where we would put solar array. I’ve heard and read mixed reviews of hand pumps for deep wells, and would prefer not to go that route.
With most of the best design improvements in solar/battery systems coming in 48V batteries and AC inverter systems, there can be a strong argument to just go ahead and have limited 240V power available for things like well pumps. Increasing the wire size to account for voltage drop can do wonders for long circuits. Buck/boost transformer banks can even be built to deal with extreme cases. You just need an electrician that really knows what he is doing, not an electrical parts installer. There is a wide range of knowledge and skill, even among those with a license.
Having said all of that, the most bombproof systems are DC primary with an AC inverter available on demand. Almost everything you have in your house is already DC powered except for fan, pump, and refrigeration motors and all of those things are available in DC versions if you go looking; DC motors are more efficient than comparable AC motors anyway. Such systems are much simpler and use cheaper component parts that can easily be duplicated and stored for long term viability, and simpler is more robust to begin with.
Commander- In my youth in West Texas, we pulled 250 or 500 gallon tanks of propane all of the time. A lot of the tractors back them ran on propane, so farmers had to have a means of getting propane out to the tractor in the fields. I think we rented our tank from the propane dealer. So, it has been done and probably can still be done.
I’m in the KISS camp with multiple redundancies when it comes to building my Off-Grid home. Build small and double the insulation requirements for your area.
Solar is cheap and getting cheaper every day, and very DIY easy when installing. Heat with wood if possible. If you find an old Lister or Listeroid diesel engine at a good price buy it. They are very easy to rebuild and retrofit to a generator. My old Lister came mounted on a dolly so it can be towed around the farm to service many locations.
Re OPSEC
Technology today is such that if you use significant amount of energy (not much in actual terms) you >canthey< use.
The technology you know about is amazing. The technology you don't know about is scary. I once made my living designing such toys from "inside the fence".
What saves you is no one is really interested in you. Until they are.
A wood boiler works well for heating and hot water. You can either use a forced air hot water coil that can be retrofit into an existing HVAC system, or if you are building from scratch, radiant floor heat works very well. If you add an extra heat exchanger to your water heater, then you have hot water as well. Unless it gets really cold, I only have to put wood in my boiler once a day. Even when it gets below 0, it only needs fed twice a day.
You could get four or five 2500# propane tanks and bury them (cost to buy is about $5,000 each). Then you only need filling every five or ten, maybe even 20 years. But know this: if you have ANY fuel delivered, whether to a 250 gallon diesel tank on your farm or a 250# propane tank to your cabin, the location is submitted to the U.S. government. It’s been that way since 9-11. Even acetylene tanks in farm shops are kept track of.
Propane is great because because it can be a cooking fuel, heating fuel, and run an electrical generator. Hard to beat that.
The 100# propane tank is as big as you can haul to town and get filled and still be semi-anonymous. They are a son-of-bitch to handle when full. A two-man job really.
Just my 2-cents. I’m grid-tied with enough solar in two ground-mounted banks to offset my normal usage and the $40/month it takes here just to be connected. One bank is tied to an Outback inverter/charger with a battery bank big enough to run fridge/freezer/LED lights/ceiling fans/etc. When the off-site power is unavailable, the solar will charge the batteries, otherwise it just helps keep the meter running backwards. Bank is sized to run critical loads for 48-hours with no recharge due to cloudy skies. A couple small gas and propane generators are available if needed (they can also recharge the batteries if needed). Cooking is a regular gas stove with 3-100# propane cylinders. Each will last 9-12 months. I maintain 2 full in standby and one in use. I’m 75+ but putting one on and off a trailer for refilling isn’t a problem with the right dolly and a ramp. We are in Florida so I haven’t really considered hot water to be that much of an issue – electric instant-on now but in a grid-down situation, we’d just do without (shhh- don’t tell the wife). If I really needed hot water, I’d think about a propane instant-on – only uses energy when you are actually using hot water. We can get by without A/C by having fans during TEOTWAKI and keep a fireplace for backup heat if needed. Cut down a big oak a couple years ago, all split and dried if needed. Plenty of rich pine for starter. 450-gallon diesel farm tank for my tractor and truck. These, along with freeze died food, water, meds, boomsticks and all the other usual survival implements take most of the worry out of most thing like hurricanes, etc.
Grid down 250 gal propane tanks would be a lot easier to move and hide than 500 or 1000 gal
The problem with the tank on a trailer is that you’d need a CDL with a hazmat endorsement even if you weren’t using it for business. You can’t transport that much propane on the public roadways without jumping through a large number of hoops. Just getting the 5 year hydrostatic testing done on the tank will cost you a small fortune. The insurance coverage on a bulk propane container for transport will also be rather obscene.
It’s a great idea, but I’m pretty sure the obstacles would render it too costly to be realistic.