Northern Star, I know you deal with the solar. How feasible would it be for some regular folk to go off grid in a situation like this? Obviously storage is not there yet.
This country may have 330m people but a ton of them are in like 50 cities, there is a lot of remote area to self isolate.
Patsfan to answer your question. Where you are determines how easy it is to go off grid. The technology is already available. The problem is the output looks like a bell shaped curve for Minnesota or Boston. If your load was the exact same every month for example then you have to design a system for your worst month. That is probably going to be December or January when the days are the shortest. You would in effect need to build an array that produces 3 times the total amount of power than you use just to account for the lower production December, January and February. We only produce 15% of the total power.
People call all the time wanting to go off grid or they are building a new house and the electric company wants $40,000 to bring power back to their house. Not one has ever gone off grid. I have done off grid systems on islands on Rainy Lake or Lake of the Woods where there is no power. They usually used just in the summer and even they will install: solar, batteries and a back up generator in case their is not enough sun for a period while they are at their cabin.
If you were in a location like Arizona or Texas I would think it would not be that impractical.
I saw someone on TV today that study past outbreaks like we are experience and the thing he said that struck me is how poorly people treat others in the case of an emergency. Those with wealth will use their money to get supplies and things they want while those that are not as fortunate will not fair as well. Kind of sad.
We are not going to have our cleaning lady come for a period of time. She needs the money to live on and losing that income would be an added hardship for her and her two kids.
We are just going to pay her even though she won't be cleaning.
