How to unplug from the grid with Hydroponics

Survivalists, eco-activists, hermits and anybody else who might live in a remote place may find themselves driving a long way to market to get food. These grocery trips are a necessity. Unless you can grow 100% of what you eat, you’re tethered to that system of food distribution that determines where we live and how we move around the country.

With that said, hydroponic gardens can be a huge stepping stone in untethering us from that system, going off the grid, and being more self-reliant in places where big business doesn't necessarily go.

How does this work?

First of all, just like the soil-based gardeners of past centuries, people who have a workable system of agriculture are much more free to ignore everything that's happening in the big cities and other populated places where we buy everything from bread to broccoli. Whether the garden is hydroponic or soil-based, it allows individuals and households to stay where they are, rather than going to rub shoulders with society in order to get fed.

But the ability of a hydroponic garden to keep people off the grid goes a little further than that. Being in small, remote communities, like-minded people trade and barter services in order to increase their self-reliance and limit their interactions with outsiders.

For example, instead of building a small victory garden, someone in a remote area can build a massive hydroponic operation to turn out a lot of fresh fruits and vegetables. Maybe they have some livestock on the side. Then they can barter with their closest neighbors for all kinds of other specialty products, and really minimize the number of times they need to go into town in a given year.

For much more about hydroponics and how it works, check out what manufacturers and retailers offer. It can be completely feasible to create a system where an individual or small family grows much more than what they need to survive -- and that's one of the most promising options for those of us who just don't want to rub shoulders with new technology and big populations of people.