Gotta add my two cents worth here: We are located in Maryland, much south of the OP, but we still can have considerable snowfall. We installed a 3.1KW PV system about 6 years ago, not ideally situated because the panels would have benefited from more angle, (barn roof determined that) and neighboring woodlots shade the panels in the winter, when the sun is low. The two of us live with modest electrical uses, but we aren't sacrificing anything, except an electric clothes drier that sits unused. Cooking and hot water come from propane. Our annual electric bill is very nominal. Surplus in the summer, usage in the winter. I should add that my wife's car is a plug-in Prius. Ideal for her 9 mile commute, where she plugs in at work. That works out to about 150 MPG average fuel economy. Sure, all that electricity comes from generation, but power plants are incredibly more efficient and cleaner than point of usage in vehicles, and a lot of that comes from our PV system. Tax and renewable energy credits are a way to help encourage alternative power generation, and those companies that offer to install systems on your property "can" be legitimate- they get paid back on your electric usage and the credit income, you benefit from reduced rates. We thought about a battery storage system, but we have reliable electric, and no cost benefits at all beyond what we now have. I need to operate a big air compressor or table saw, and they consume power.
Anyone who thinks coal extraction companies don't get subsidies and handouts is not informed, and power plants don't get built as stand-alone profit ventures- there is massive government involvement and protections. If you follow extreme weather patterns that are affecting more and more of our country, and the world, you get an inkling of what climate change is going to be like. Talk to Miami Beach residents about sea level change, if you have the stomach. I saw NY's Sandy Beach after the destruction there, and consider that yet another example.
I have a bit of experience with electric boats, having worked for ELCO (Electric Launch Co.) in the 90's. Their main product were 30' battery powered "picnic" boats, basically the same thing that the wealthy had 100 years ago at their summer homes on Lake George in Upstate NY- ots of mahogany and polished brass. Modern controls and motors, but massive lead acid batteries. They would operate all day, so they weren't/aren't a toy, but that said, they were boats, moving not so fast in water. I doubt if an electric powered tractor would be of any use in actually doing any work on land. Diesel engines, a necessary evil, if you will, work so well I can't think of an option that makes sense. Draft animals- nope... too much trouble, feed, methane. Electric- nope. Human stoop labor- nope. A 500 gal. fuel storage tank will last a long time with the proper additives, and there you go.
