Last year, I went on vacation to Alaska. Me and my friends airbnb'd an off-grid home/cabin in Talkeetna, about several hundred miles north of Anchorage. It was powered entirely on solar panels on the roof and right by the house. Water from the rivers. Granted, it had a wood stove, like most cabin/homes are in the north. Just want to chime in and say that renewables are absolutely very prevalent in colder, remote climates.

Miles north of anchorage? How many hours of sun were you getting? 3? 1?

I was curious so I used sunrisesunset.com to see.

Looks like at June 21 (picking a day around the summer solstice) sunrise is at 4:04 am and sunset is midnight. That's a nice 20 hours of sunshine.

On the flip and dark side, Dec 21 it is sunrise at ~10:30 am and sunset at ~3:30 pm. A sadly short 5 hours of sun. Ouch.

it isn't that big a deal to run a fridge and some led lights on solar pAnels. As you identified heating and cooling are the big energy users.