MARK WAITE / PVT Gene Raquepau checks gauges which show the voltage and amps flowing into the system, in a control panel on his garage wall. RELATED STORY Stay on the grid, says Dyer resident Advertisement

The cups on the wind generators above Gene Raquepau's garage were spinning away much of the past week, during exceptionally, windy spring weather.

But Raquepau said wind energy isn't as reliable in Pahrump as solar power, so he has 30 photovoltaic modules generating electricity for his appliances and six solar panels for his hot water heater, a solar heated swimming pool and even a solar water distiller to refill his batteries.

A bank of huge batteries is included in the package for Raquepau, who went off the grid March 6.

"People say we have more wind than sun, we don't," Raquepau said. "The winds are not strong enough. These turbines won't start turning until its 7 mph and each turbine will put out 33 amps. So in order to get that 33 amps you need a constant 35 mph wind. That's what we don't have."

Instead of paying $15,300 for a large wind turbine with a local contractor, Raquepau said he bought his smaller wind generators over the Internet from Southwest Wind Power for $5,000.

"I don't see $10,300 worth of installation charges on that. It's ridiculous," he said.

The combination of wind and solar power however works well, Raquepau said.

"All they're doing is they're supplementing my power on cloudy days," Raquepau said of his four wind generators. "When it's cloudy there's no sun and normally it's windy and I found it's ideal. They work fantastic and when you're designing a system you have to consider how many cloudy days you're going to have."

That's important when it comes to powering a well, stove, running the television, a pool pump and a swamp cooler in the summertime.

The photovoltaic modules -- the proper name, not solar panels which Raquepau said only refer to panels for the hot water heater -- and the wind turbines feed into a large bank of batteries behind the garage under a tarp. He had half a dozen golf cart batteries to begin with, from his days driving an RV, to which he added 13 banks of huge, 400 ampere hour, 12 volt batteries.

The bank of batteries requires special care.

"You don't want to run them down until they're down all the way. You run them to 50 percent down and basically on a 12 volt system when a battery is fully charged it's at 12.7 volts DC. At 50 percent it's 12 volts. So I've got my system set up and I've got alarms on my inverters that just let me know at what percentage I'm at," Raquepau said.

Another device distills water from his well using solar heat, which he then uses to refill his batteries. Raquepau claims he can produce a half-gallon per day, or in the heat of summer, a gallon.

Inside the garage, a panel of inverters, manufactured by Outback Power Systems converts the electricity from direct current to alternating current.

Raquepau said when he went off the grid he had to design the system differently, because the power coming into the meter was 240 volts, two legs at 120 volts, out of phase with each other. The inverter puts out 115 volts. He plans to install a couple more inverters. A computer separates the inverters which have to be 180 degrees out of phase, or Raquepau said he'll burn up his well pump.

It all sounds pretty technical trying to go totally off grid with alternative energy and it is. Raquepau said he was an engineering technician by trade in San Diego.

Raquepau got the idea to live off the grid after living in a 35 foot fifth wheel, and later a bus, on outings in the California Desert where there were no services. He used solar modules and a wind turbine for power on his RV.

A resident on Country Place who checked out his system wants to stay on the grid after installing a $13,000 solar power system. Raquepau said it doesn't make sense to continue paying the $15 monthly fee for Valley Electric and the power cost adjustment to stay on the grid after shelling out all that money.

Raquepau didn't have a firm "green" ideology he was pursuing in buying the system to do something for mother earth.

"It's something I had to do. Being an engineer I wanted to see how feasible it was and put some of these theories to rest," Raquepau said. "I did it as a hobby and to be more self-sufficient and not rely on other people."

Since he added on his intricate system over time, he doesn't have a firm idea how much it all cost. But when pressed, he guessed it's probably a $30,000 system.

"If you're going to live in an area and stay here, it'd be worth it. The best thing I can suggest for a person right now if they ever wanted to do something like this, the first thing you do is solar hot water. That is the most cost-effective savings I have ever seen," Raquepau said.

But Raquepau doesn't like the pilot program by Valley Electric where the contractor is charging $6,000 for installing a system using German equipment. He bought a used, solar-powered hot water heater system for $500 with four solar panels on his roof. He calls it a closed loop system circulating propylene glycol from the solar panels through a heat exchanger which gives off heat to two 60 gallon water tanks.

Just in case, Raquepau has a backup generator, what he calls a necessity for going off the grid.

"I don't think I would've gone off the grid if I wouldn't have had this. Let's say I have too many cloudy days and not enough wind, I can turn on the generator for a little while and charge up my batteries," Raquepau said. "I have my wife conditioned to this, it took a while. We have never used the generator."

Being a retired engineer, Raquepau documented the layout of his whole power system on computer using AutoCad. All the wiring for the inverters is numbered and will be on the schematic drawings so if his wife is widowed, she can hire a repair man to fix something.

"Will they understand it? I doubt it," he said. "This system has to be idiot proof because if you're running a generator or an inverter, you can't have the two come on at the same time and have feedback into one or the other. If both the generators are on and the inverters on you're going to burn up the inverter."

Raquepau has a manual, interlock bypass, that bypass the inverter when he's running the generator, or the other way around.

Raquepau said he can't get any tax credits on his solar panels because he's not an accredited installer, but he can get a tax credits on his photovoltaic modules. There's no tax write-off for his wind turbines, he said.

Green energy buffs thought the price of solar panels and photovoltaic modules would go down eventually, but Raquepau said a shortage of silicone and the capacity to make them has driven up the price. The cost of batteries, inverters and other equipment have gone up too, due to the demand for copper and lead.

Then again, with the price of oil hitting $120 per barrel this week, Raquepau could realize his investment if he lives a long life.

"I mean the pay back would be 20 years. If electricity keeps going up and fuel prices keep going up it might even be shorter," he said.