With rising electricity prices and large upfront connection costs, choosing to go off-grid for your electricity is increasingly more attractive. When deciding on an Off-Grid system or paying to connect your property to the grid, looking at the full system life cycle will help you to understand the total cost of each option over the long term, not just the initial upfront cost. There are a couple of things to consider;

Firstly, find out what the cost would be to get grid connection. Beside this initial connection cost, the other cost factor is your projected total cost for grid power in total over the next 5, 10, 15 years with an expected 5% price increase per year.

An off-grid system requires a backup power source for times of high usage or bad weather. When you don’t have a grid connection, then this backup power is most commonly sourced from a petrol/diesel generator.

An off-grid system needs to include extra battery capacity to give you a few days’ worth of storage, just in case there’s a few days of bad weather.

Find out the expected lifetime of your Off Grid system, ongoing costs (generator fuel, maintenance) and equipment replacement over their useful life.

Off-Grid Power

• No ongoing power bills
• No connection fees
• Protected from rising power prices
• Independent and sustainable electricity
• The equipment you pay for, you own
• Green and renewable source of electricity
• 85% total efficiency (95% during the day)
• Limited to the amount of power a system can provide
• User interaction required

Grid Connection

• Quarterly power bill
• Quarterly supply fee
• Yearly price rises
• Dependent on corporation’s for electricity
• Pay to upgrade equipment that you don’t own
• Power generated from non-renewable, polluting sources
• 30% power transmission efficiency (70% losses)
• Unlimited amount of power available
• No user interaction
• No idea of power cost until the bill arrives
• Zero maintenance

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