Living off the Grid

I'm not there yet, but it's my goal to be completely energy independent with the next house I have.  

I'm slowly transitioning to solar. Right now I'm still in the RV with at least two dogs.  It gets warm in there for them, so I have realized that they are better off either outside while I'm at work, or I get an AC unit set to a timer for the hottest hours of the day, from 1pm-6pm.  I tie them up outside when I get home so that they don't get too warm

The solar cooker I got two weeks ago works beautifully.  I can have steamed chicken legs with stir-fry veggies within an hour.  This is much healthier eating than having Taco Bell three times a week, switched off to JackInTheBox on the other days.  I have to watch my sodium.  I also found our SunOven, still in the box it was shipped in and totally damage-free despite being in the living room corner during the fire.

Today I finally broke down and purchased an EcoFlow Delta Pro power station with a Lithium Iron Phosphate battery.  It's the most powerful power station I've purchased, with 3600KWh expandable power.  I've been focused on either EcoFlow or Bluetti for a powerful battery and I couldn't turn down a decent sale via CostCo.  I will buy expandable batteries later this year.

So how much is all this costing me so far?  Adding the three Jackerys and three of their solar panels, an AlPowers 200W solar panel ($247.40) and a 200W FlexSolar solar panel ($347) and my latest purchase, this all comes to $7711.83.  Granted, the two 200W panels are not hooked up yet, but they will go to the EcoFlow Delta when that arrives next week.  I'm not planning on getting any more solar panels until the new house gets built.  I will have to do with what I have for now.   

Is all this worth the steep start-up price? The one purchase I could have gone without is the Jackery 1000 ($1590.44) as it's just not powerful enough for a coffee maker, heater or fan.  It works well as a cellphone charger by my bed, though. Only time (like a few years) will tell if everything else will pay off.

https://www.costco.com/ecoflow-delta-pro-ev-recharge-bundle.product.100972938.html

My next purchases will be a small air conditioning unit for the summer, and a small heater for the winter if I can't get the internal AC or heater in the RV to work efficiently.

The only utility I pay for is water, and I appreciate having running water in the RV. Our electric bill was around $70 a month.