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energy the building uses.
Koral has wanted to leave the grid ever since he moved to Rappahannock County in 1979. At the time, the Virginia Electric and Power Company was erecting steel towers for 500,000-volt power lines across Koral’s farm.
“I thought there’s got to be a better way than to run wires everywhere,” he said.
Now that Dominion Virginia Power is planning to double the capacity of that corridor, the location of Koral’s off-the-grid house is even more ironic.
Koral designed the power system for his house to meet the needs of a family of four. In hindsight, that was overkill, he says.
He has so much surplus power that he was able to install an air-conditioning unit.
Koral could have hooked into the electric grid and sold his surplus power to the utility. But he decided against that.
“I didn’t do this to make money or save money” he said.
Besides, he explained, it doesn’t make financial sense to sell solar power, which costs roughly $1.20 per kilowatt-hour to produce, to a power company that credits producers 8 cents per kilowatt-hour.
What’s ahead
Koral’s house is livable, but
87.2%