No matter what we say (in the US), we really appreciate our GRID. GRID provides us with instant electricity, clean water for our homes and natural gas for heating. It also provides us with telephone lines and cable tv. GRID is like a parent that we have a love/hate relationship with. When we dream about going 'off the grid' we are usually just wanting to conserve our use of energy and reduce our dependency on GRID. GRID understands our desire for privacy from the 'invasive' reaches into our homes. GRID likes to live in the big cities. You don't have to go too far away to experience homes with wells, septic tanks, and generators and no GRID. Actually, if governments make no change to existing policies, 1.3 billion people, or 16% of the world's population, will still lack access to electricity in 2030. (Did you ever experience Ray Anderson's Global Village presentation? If so, you remember the shock of how few people have clean drinking water in the world.)
GRID understands our struggle for independence. GRID helps us break away by providing energy to factories that make solar panels, hydro pumps and cell phones. Ironically, it is the power of new technology (powered by GRID) that allows developing nations leapfrog GRID. In countries like Niger, where expensive infrastructures like telephone lines are lacking, cell phones are changing and improving lives. In the past, farmers would travel from market to market to learn prices, wasting time. Now, they call around on cell phones and obtain prevailing prices for their harvest. In the case of emergencies, people can call for help from neighboring villages. There is even a new form of commerce, called mobile money that allows rural people without access to banks to transfer money across long distances by phone. The local cell phone provider began allowing people to transfer phone time that they had purchased to other customers. This has become a de facto form of currency; people transfer phone time to pay their debts.
So, GRID, I thank you for making our lives easier and safer, but I've been thinking that I would try to break a couple ties and try promoting housing with net zero energy use. It's been nice, and believe me, it is me, not you.
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