My security software also flagged this, so I didn’t go in.

Have spent the past couple of years building our house and getting us positioned for a more self sufficient and sustainable lifestyle.

It has been a slow journey, but luckily I have had some time to get the vegie garden up and running. It is now time to start putting the theory into practice. I read so much, but I am still just a novice learning…[Read more]

What a great article. :tup:

There should be more of that in our media

Reality check for the sheeple please :ohmy:

Hello and welcome,

We are on stand alone power, and our oven is below bench. It is a westinghouse and uses LPG (for oven/electricity for grill). We had similar problem with regard to the grill, and ended up giving up. We got the Westinghouse and run it from LPG, but we don’t use the Grill (which uses electricity). The fan Wattage use is…[Read more]

:laugh: I was going to do similar, but you beat me to it. :whistle:

RW Wrote:
Oil is down now because most of the world is going into recession again, just like it did in 2008/9.

All this is a symptom of peak oil. If oil wasn’t becoming more scarce or more expensive to pump out of harder to reach places, then the global economy would continue to boom. The price would probably still gradually go up but we would…

[Read more]

I think that if the population in general (ie the ‘sheeple’) all simultaneously new what many on ALS understand about Peak Oil and Resource Depletion, and what the implications are likely to be and the fact that western society is perilously skating on thin ice already, then it would only contribute to a SHTF situation or indeed cause it to…[Read more]

Hello and welcome. :wave:

Hello and welcome.

I’m with Airgead on this one.

We have a smallish system, which is only just enough for us (family of 4). It is a 2.1KW system made up of 12x 1770amp Sonnenshein batteries, Outback 3kw inverter, Outback MX60 controller and 12 BP 185w panels and a 9KVA Honda generator as backup.

This, for us anyway, is the bare minimum. We have been seriously…[Read more]

Greentrees,

We used a private certifier for the shed and internal plumbing. It was all legal and relatively easy. Unfortunately, our shed was not big enough to live in as well as store much of the gear we had, so we had to rent, which was a bummer and hurt our finances at the time.

With hindsight, I would have built a bigger shed, which in turn…[Read more]

Hello and welcome.

Sounds like you are starting an interesting adventure.

We have gone through similar, and are still on our way working towards a simpler life.

Some points that I learnt:
Get somebody on council onside (I don’t mean bribe…. :laugh: ), but I mean you need a knowledgeable person in the planning world to ensure, all your…[Read more]

Certainly not for me.

We did 4 years in Sydney, and all I will say is: NEVER AGAIN. I was never so depressed and unhappy.

I look back on our time in lego land and I am very thankful that my family and I have a few acres and my kids can grow up on a bit of land.

Not knocking lego land, just saying it is not for me. That photo reminds me of why…[Read more]

I have not had the best experience with Eco Smart or Dux, and hence, would recommend to stay well clear of them.

We have LPG Gas Boosted Solar Hot Water and the theory of it all was excellent, yet the in practice is another matter.

PM me if you want the details.

Phil,

Welcome.

I certainly don’t believe there is anything wrong with some optimism around this subject, but I suspect the optimistic view point would be in the minority.

When did you become aware of Peak Oil? Only reason I ask is that most people appear to have an initially optimistic view when learning about Peak Oil. The more you learn, and…[Read more]

Whilst it is ‘not real’ so to speak, the financial system we (in the west) rely on is completely interlinked into having a globalised ‘never ending growth’ system which is based on the assumption that continual consumption and continual population growth equals economic growth. This theory sounds reasonable in an economic sense, but from a…[Read more]

Yep. Keep up the preps. It is why I love this site.

I only wonder what Wikileaks has in store for us next?

Depends where you live obviously, but wood is actually fairly easy. Get a small pot belly for heat and a small wood stove (inside or outside) for cooking.

Wood is work and the time to do it is painful, but in my instance transport is not a big issue and the physical work, is certainly good for me.

Solar PV is only as good as the batteries last,…[Read more]

I am no expert either, but I wouldn’t get to close to gold. At the end of the day, gold is just money to trade/barter for. Who realy wants it? It is only worth what people say it is, in effect, it is just another ‘fake’ currency, no different to paper money.

If the deck of cards do go over, I don’t want gold; I want a couple of wheelbarrows, good…[Read more]

Get a wood stove