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I have been researching this for several months now (for my parents) and now for my self. Right now the only places that are really making the idea of Solar power attractive are out west. The east coast is kind of short on companies that are specializing in the equipment. I have also found that to be totally off the grid would take roughly $50,000 to $60,000 dollars in equipment and that does not account for maintenance and upkeep. Basicly it would cost too much for my parents to see a return on their investment. I think it worked out to taking roughly 25 or 30 years to pay for itself...longer than either of them most likely has to live.
A partial setup costing roughly $20,000 to $30,000 and I would still depend on the grid for half my power. True self sufficiency is really very expensive if you are going to live a "normal" life.
Some people can go out in the boonies and live like old time frontiersmen...but I like my hot showers, big screen TV and multiple computers [img]smile.gif[/img]
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