Facing sky-high connection fees, rural Ontarians go off the grid
I was one of those. The bigger - and hidden - advantage to me was that my homebrew power setup (16 solar panels + a 2 KW windmill with a backup generator, and 48 KWh of batteries) was much more reliable than what Ontario Hydro & Power sold.The fees are one thing, having your freezer contents spoiled a couple of times per year gets old really quickly, and in rural Ontario having a well stocked freezer is not optional. Especially in the winter the power would go out so frequently it was a serious limitation. Coming from NL, where powerfailures are so rare that they make the news when they happen this was one of those little things that I found it hard to adapt to. When the power in Canada fails you are in immediate trouble, your heater and sump pump no longer work, you risk all kinds of follow on damage.So reliable power wasn't a luxury and it was relatively easy to get that sorted out to a degree that cutting the cord was a logical next step (because a grid connected system is supposed to shut down when the power fails, the only way out is to stop being grid connected).Apropos high fees: the power company wanted some exorbitant fee for disconnecting us (the opposite of a connection fee), I asked them quite friendly what would happen if I shorted out the wires, 15 minutes later a truck came and someone pulled the road side fuses for free ;)