A slow, frustrating commute to work. A day spent in front of a screen answering phone call after phone call. A trip to a painfully bright supermarket to wait in line to purchase expensive, pre-packaged food, and then the same trudge home. Perhaps there will be a mortgage bill waiting on the doormat.

It’s little wonder that this reality is prompting more and more people to forsake the norm and up sticks to an off-grid lifestyle. It’s estimated that over 25,000 people in the UK live off the grid, and nearly 200,000 individuals in America (a figure which has jumped around 33 per cent a year for nearly a decade). Opting for houses, huts, boats or campervans – static or mobile – disconnected from the electrical grid that we all depend so heavily on, people are embracing a slower-paced, more earthy way of life.

Indeed, it’s easy to associate off-gridding with environmentalism, but as Nick Rosen notes in his book How to Live Off-Grid, people are opting for this lifestyle for many reasons ranging from rising energy prices to the threat of terrorism or, increasingly, post-consumerism. ‘A kind of mentality is growing in the UK and other Western countries’, he writes. ‘Many of us feel we have too much stuff, too many gadgets, too many choices. We want to simplify our lives…’ In the same vein, rising house prices are progressively cited as a catalyst for those seeking out alternative habitats; the UK has become one of the world’s most expensive countries in which to buy a house.

But thanks to the availability of new technology, making the jump is becoming increasingly feasible; more powerful batteries and more efficient solar panels and turbines, coupled with innovations like wireless broadband, give means to, as Rosen comments, ‘live luxuriously in the middle of nowhere’.

Of course, this definition of ‘luxuriously’ is likely rather different to the widely acknowledged notion of ‘luxury’ that most would hold. Ultra-convenience and extravagance are out, but the arguably richer pleasures of self-reliance and total freedom are in.

Perhaps these are luxuries that we’ll all be privy to one day. As Rosen observes, the power grid in its present form has only existed for 80 years, and could well prove a temporary phenomenon. Water, on the other hand, has been around for longer, but advances in technology mean that anyone can install his or her own water treatment facility, essentially negating any serious dependence on the national water grid.

However, as liberating and ecofriendly as moving off-grid is, it’s not easy (unless you have a very serious bank balance and a team of labourers at your disposal) – the three people below will attest to that. But they’ll also attest to the improvement in their quality of life, and the trade-off between hard work and happiness falling consistently in their favour. We asked each of them if they ever regretted their decision to escape the rat race, and without missing a beat they all responded with a resounding ‘no’.

“I fed 150 people with waste and foraged food”

Mark Boyle lives in an off-grid caravan and gave up using cash in 2008

It was only due to a chance purchase of Gandhi on video that Mark Boyle decided that “he wanted to be the change he wanted to see in the world”. And for him, that change was consumption-orientated. “The degrees of separation between the consumer and the consumed have increased so much that it now, conveniently, means that people are completely unaware of the levels of destruction and suffering involved in the making of the ‘stuff’ they purchase”, he says. “We have no longer any idea how much embodied energy has gone into the things we consume. The main reason we have no appreciation for
this energy is because we are so disconnected from
what we buy.”

After managing a couple of organic food companies, Boyle realised that even ethical business would never be enough, and so to be the change he wanted to see in the world, he decided to give up using cash. After an initial outlay of £365, which covered the cost of an old caravan, a wood burner and basic solar power, he went off-grid in 2008, and using solar power to run his laptop, founded The Freeconomy Community (www.justfortheloveofit.org). The world’s fastest growing alternative community, Freeconomy aims to reconnect people in their communities through the simple acts of sharing skills, tools, space or just advice and help on the forums.

“The site puts you in touch with others offering skills or the loan of tools near your home”, Boyle explains. “Sharing knowledge and resources in this way eliminates a lot of waste, as well as the need for money.” The online community also acts as a hub for like-minded individuals to come together and form friendships. As Boyle notes, “Friendship, not money, is real security. Most Western poverty is of the spiritual kind.”

Boyle uses a bike and trailer to get around, and uses the local newsagent’s old papers as toilet roll. “I once wiped my arse with a story about myself”, he reveals. “It’s not double-quilted, but I quickly got used to it.” He also uses washed-up cuttlefish bone with wild fennel seeds for toothpaste, which, as a vegan, he admits is an ‘oddity’.

But despite Boyle’s honourable outlook, he claims that there’s a stigma attached to individuals living off-grid in the way that he does. “If you have a £500,000 off-grid house in the city, it’s thought to be very respectable. Otherwise, off-gridders are thought to be antisocial, or not contributing to society.”

However, he’s generous in his liberated, albeit restricted, situation. “I once fed 150 people a three course meal from waste and foraged food”, he laughs. And certainly, by reducing his environmental footprint to zero (“I don’t have money so I don’t consume anything”), Boyle is arguably contributing more to society than most. “I do miss the odd pint of organic ale”, he admits, “but if people don’t reduce their impact on the planet now, then we’re going to be in serious bother very soon.”

“We have a life that’s wonderful beyond compare”

Greg Seaman lives on an island off the west coast of Canada with his wife. Until recently, their cabin had no power at all

Neither money, nor land, nor technology is vital if you’re moving off-grid. Instead, the single most important thing you need, according to Greg Seaman, is optimism. “You’ve got to think, ‘Everything is going to work out just fine’, and it will”, he says.

No doubt Seaman was full of optimism when, 30 years ago, he and his then-pregnant wife left their apartment in San Francisco and moved to a small cabin on a rural, sparsely-populated island on the west coast of Canada. While the cabin itself has become a cosy home, there weren’t – and still aren’t – services of any kind on the island to serve its population of 300 individuals. “There’s no electricity, so everything has to be done by hand, which takes a little longer”, Seaman explains. “To get to the mainland, ‘the other side’, as we call it, we have to take an hour’s ferry crossing, which only runs four days a week.” Before he can even get to the ferry, he must row his own boat (which he built himself) to the small dock. “It can be hard work”, he says. “I find that in this community, for every two people that arrive, one person leaves, because it’s not what they expected. Certainly for us it took a lot of learning to adapt to this environment.”

Seaman’s attitude, however, is commendable. “For the first 28 of our 30 years here, we had no power of any kind. We relied on our wood heater and old-fashioned wood cook stove.” However, two years ago he and his wife got a solar panel, which they say has ‘revolutionised’ their life. Their octagonal cabin now houses a refrigerator, batteries and an inverter, allowing Seaman to run his business, www.eartheasy.com, from home.

Seaman prides himself on his waste system, too: their outhouse has four sites around the garden, and once a hole is filled (which takes around five to 10 years), the outhouse is dragged to another location. By the time it’s cycled back to the original spot, that first hole is full of a rich compost, which is then used in the garden.

As for other waste, any goods bought on ‘the other side’ are stripped of all their packaging before they’re brought back to the island. And what little waste the family does generate (about one bag a month) is dutifully taken back to the mainland and recycled at the nearest facility. “We tend to avoid bringing ‘stuff’ onto the island. There is a landfill site on the island, but very few people use it”, says Seaman. “There’s a lot of trading and bartering here. We also have a wonderful facility called the Free Store. Anything you don’t want, you take there. Anything you need, you take from there. It’s a huge part of our community, and highly valued.”

Indeed, factors like this are crucial to living such a low-income lifestyle, but Seaman is adamant money has never been an issue. “A lot of people wonder how they can have a good life without making tens of thousands of dollars every year. I’ve never made a lot of money, but I’m lucky to have such a rich life. It’s wonderful beyond compare.”

“I love changing my back garden every two weeks”

Fed up with paying for other people’s mortgages, 24-year-old Tim Doran moved off-grid and off land

December might not be the best time of year to move from the comforts of a centrally heated house to the comparatively cramped confines of a 45-foot steel narrow boat, but in light of an expiring tenancy agreement and a desire for a place of his own, Tim Doran did just that.

Having worked for the cycle network maintenance charity Sustrans, Doran had spent a lot of time along the canal paths, meeting and chatting to ‘boat folk’, and enjoyed the sense of community. Unable to afford a
house or flat himself, taking to the water seemed like the perfect solution.

“I’m what they call a continuous cruiser”, Doran explains. “So I have to move every two weeks, usually within the same 20-mile stretch. I pay an annual boat licence fee of £550, which covers water and waste and sewage disposal at the places I moor.” And after this, he is totally off grid, making use of the numerous recycling facilities along the canals and relying on the boat’s diesel engine as a generator. “I need to run the engine for about an hour and a half a week to generate enough charge for the batteries that see me through the week”, he says. “I also have a gizmo that allows me to run a washing machine while I’m moving the boat. But I personally don’t use much electricity – just a water pump, a radio, some lights and a phone charger. I know of people that have to run their engines every day.”

Indeed, when Doran first took to the water, he kept a fridge onboard, but that meant running the engine every other day. “This was a real pain”, he says. “If I went away for the weekend I’d come back and the battery would be totally flat, so it had to go.” This does mean, however, that he has to shop extremely carefully. “Things like milk go off really quickly, especially in summer. And I have to plan ahead for meals, to make sure nothing goes off, but I think people would be surprised at how well food lasts out of a fridge.”

Doran cites the lack of space as the biggest issue he’s encountered: “If I stretch my arms out I can touch both sides of the boat.” However, issues like repairs and maintenance, while frustrating “when your batteries have gone at half ten at night”, are, he says, quite liberating. “Being able to fix things and build things as you want them is good fun”, he says. “It’s inevitable that I’ll move back to land one day to raise a family, and I think I’ll take those skills with me.”

Until that day, however, Doran is making the most of the freedom boat-life brings. “I love living in beautiful places. I’m close to wildlife and nature, and get to change my back garden every couple of weeks. All of those things are much greater than any downside.”