The first ever Lopez Energy Challenge concluded recently with clear winners. 

Neil Hanson and Ona Blue, of “Take-it-or-Leave-It” fame, swept awards in all three main categories: “Biggest usage reduction”, “Smallest energy footprint” and “Best energy conservation story”. 

How did Neil and Ona manage to be the “Biggest”, “Smallest” and “Best” all at once? 

First, they were not big energy users to start with. The month before the challenge, they used only 298 kilowatt-hours (kWh), compared to the average of just under 1,000 kWh/month for San Juan County residents.

Then, their participation in the Challenge resulted in a 99.7 percent reduction in power consumption! Their OPALCO meter showed usage of only 1 kWh (eight cents worth) during the entire month of the contest (October – November). 

Neil and Ona accomplished this jaw-dropping feat, not by taking a holiday elsewhere, not by technological trickery. As they tell it, they took on the Challenge as “the perfect opportunity for a practical experiment that would spare [them] from another frantic reaction to a no-electricity event”.

The single kWh of electricity consumed came from the pilot light of their propane oven used only during weekly bread baking sessions. Besides that, they did not use electricity or propane. They turned off the main breaker! 

To meet energy needs for cooking, heating, cooling and lighting, they relied instead on “really low-tech existing and readily available tools”.

Cooking was done on a wood stove or a biomass cook stove, using scrap wood scavenged from a disposal burn pile and hauled by bicycle. They used a blanket box—a box with wool blankets in which partially-cooked dishes are placed—to finish off cooking. 

For refrigeration, they tried many techniques (including using cold rocks from outdoors!) but what “really worked” and was “fun” to make and use was a Nigerian Zeer pot (two nested earthen pots with moist sand between them). Lighting was challenging but they managed with the help of solar lights and kerosene lanterns.

There were of course some mishaps, like Neil “pouring a jar of Ona’s salad dressing into the nutritional yeast jar (ruining both) in a very low-light situation” or scalding himself while washing when he misjudged the temperature of the water heated by their woodstove.  

Non-electric living also brought joy to Neil and Ona’s lives. They cherished the absence of electrical background noise and having more time to read and learn to play the clarinet and accordion. 

In fact, they found the experience to be “very positive” and their lives improved such that they saw “no reason to suspend the experiment” after the Challenge ended. They instead decided to disconnect their OPALCO service! 

To me, Neil and Ona’s “experimentation” was nothing short of a courageous experiment in truth. And truth it did reveal. That we do not need to wait for technological breakthroughs to lead a low-carbon life. That solutions are already here. That it can be done and with such joy. I am very grateful for Neil and Ona for bringing us hope and inspiration. You can read their full story at islandsenergymatters.blogspot.com, for inspiration or useful technical details.