Even in this day of battery-powered tools, you need power on site to build a house, if only to plug in your charger. There are four ways of getting electricity: buy it, make it, borrow it, or steal it. Stealing it is frowned upon by local utility companies and district attorneys, and shouldn't be considered as an option. Borrowing it is an excellent idea (see Borrowing Power, page 22), but it requires a cooperative neighbor within 100 yards – not always the situation. This leaves making it or buying it. If you build in rural areas where utility poles are out by the highway, you're probably used to generating your own power. But for most of us building in
