What Is Off-Grid? — Choosing to Be “Jizai”

I. What Is Off-Grid?

What is off-grid? It is not merely a matter of electricity. For us, off-grid is both a design philosophy and a guiding axis for how we live and make decisions.

We use the word “jizai” to capture this concept in a single term. In Japanese, jizai means “to act as you wish,” a state in which nothing gets in your way and things move as you intend. It is no coincidence that this word appears in the model codes of our products.

Instead of entrusting the entire foundational infrastructure of electricity entirely to someone else, we keep as much of it as realistically possible under our own control.

This does not mean shutting yourself off from society or rejecting the existing grid. On the contrary, it assumes that you will combine multiple options: public grids, your own systems, and shared resources in your community.

You may connect to the grid when it is convenient. You may disconnect when circumstances require it. You may decide which source to prioritize under which conditions.

In other words, our understanding of off-grid is not “permanent disconnection” from the utility grid. Rather, it is a structure in which you always have the option to cut that connection when you need to.

There is no need to deny interconnection with the grid. What truly matters is to avoid dependence on a single, monolithic system that you cannot control.

Being able to disconnect.
Being able to choose.
Being able to control.

That state is what we call jizai, and it is the essence of off-grid.

We will continue to develop and refine systems that embody this philosophy in real, working infrastructure. Off-grid, in this sense, is the inevitable choice to bring energy back into a sphere where your own will can truly reach it.