2021’s Best and Worst States for Living Off the Grid

What are the most important considerations for anyone contemplating living off-grid?

To live off grid you must be ready to live oft times without modern conveniences.

Besides adequate natural resources, what else is crucial to a successful off-grid lifestyle?

Availability of solar techs, people with off grid expertise in the neighborhood.

Philip: You also need a power backup plan that often involves another physical system, like storage batteries or a fossil-fuel-powered electrical generator. And for all of it, you need to have the budget to afford these systems.

What types of people are best suited to off-grid living?

I would say adaptability and attitude are the most important traits you need to thrive in this environment.

What unexpected challenges should people considering living off the grid be aware of?

Just when you think you have everything covered . . . you find another glitch in your system!  We have solar coverage but during winter have such a limited window with the southern sun.  We then depend on hydro and our generator backup.

Is living off the grid sustainable long-term? Why or why not?

Absolutely!  We are thrilled not to depend on the electric grid for our power needs!

What are the most important considerations for anyone contemplating living off-grid?

Culture Shock. I say this because it is a big umbrella term that captures a lot of issues to this major change in lifestyle.

While human life has some immutable qualities like eating, chores, bathroom, etc., every single one of these things is different off the grid.

Washing clothes takes longer, making food takes longer, everything takes longer, and you have to be ready to live with those shocks safely both physically and mentally.

Eventually it becomes routine as all things, do but this first period can be a huge shock and a lot of work.

In short be ready to devote 100% of your days to your lifestyle. Video games become farming, work commutes become hand-washing laundry, going out to see people becomes chopping firewood.

Consider just how much you are willing to change before you make the jump.

Besides adequate natural resources, what else is crucial to a successful off-grid lifestyle?

Support and preparation for change. For example, if you have all the natural resources in the world but you break a toe, will you have someone to be sure the crops get watered while you recover?

If not, you lose all of your food for the coming months over a simple injury.

If your tiny house, teepee, or whatever dwelling is burned in a fire, do you have someone you know who could rebuild it? Can you rebuild it yourself? Who will water the crops while you rebuild the house?

So many people think that if they can just save up to buy a few things, they can go off grid, never thinking about what to do if the wonder gadgets break.

It is vital to point out that it is very rare to find even ancient peoples living fully disconnected from a large society. Even the mountain men of early America traded with society for supplies and medicine. They traded furs to fund these needs, so even off the grid, you will likely need some form of livelihood and friends to cover disaster or unexpected expenses.

What types of people are best suited to off-grid living?

This is a dangerous question as it makes pride enter into the situation. Everyone takes risks living this way, even the best trained Navy SEALs.

Regardless, I will say that to best UNDERSTAND what you are about to undertake, it is best if you start small. Spend a week primitive camping, then two weeks if it works.

Live in an off-the-grid monastery or commune for a month. Give yourself a safe time frame to sample the lifestyle in either individual or group ways before totally diving in.

Be realistic with your limitations and discomforts as you go to see if these are lifestyle risks you are willing to live with.

What unexpected challenges should people considering living off the grid be aware of?

I mention a lot of these above: injury, genetic disorders flaring up in later life, natural disaster, hunger, things breaking that you didn’t build yourself, animal issues, and on and on.

In short, most people I encounter like to “prep” to live off the grid, but don’t follow through. You have to be OK with the dark side of off-the-grid living just as much as the dream of independence and nature.

Is living off the grid sustainable long-term? Why or why not?

Depends on how you define sustainable. Sustainable for an individual long term, yes. Sustainable for society long term, not now.

A few people living off grid is a great way to diversify lifestyles and reduce demand on already taxed systems, making these systems more sustainable for those that keep using them.

However, if everyone went off the grid at once we would forage the land barren and likely ruin water systems. There are just too many of us now due to modern agriculture and clean water.

Ironically, to make off-the-grid living sustainable long term we would have to build a new kind of green grid to support and interconnect homesteads’ resources.