Off-Grid Living in Union County, Illinois

I dig into county-level off-grid rules across the country for Live Off The Grid, and Union County, Illinois turned out to be one of the harder ones to pin down. I'll be upfront: my searches of the county's own government site (unioncountyil.gov) and its code host (code.unioncountyil.gov) did not turn up a standalone zoning ordinance, a building-permit page, or a health department septic page. That gap matters, so I want to walk through what I did and didn't find, level by level.

Zoning. A third-party zoning-tracking database lists Union County as "unzoned," which fits the general pattern in Illinois where counties aren't required to adopt zoning. But I could not confirm this directly from an official Union County planning or zoning page, so I'm marking it "not confirmed" rather than assuming it's true. If it is accurate, any land-use restrictions in the county would come from individual towns, not county government.

Dwellings, tiny homes, RVs. No county ordinance on minimum dwelling size or RV residency turned up in my research, and Illinois has no statewide statute on this either. That leaves it genuinely unclear.

Building permits. Illinois adopted a statewide building code (administered through the Capital Development Board) effective January 1, 2025. Whether Union County itself issues building permits, versus leaving that to towns, is not something I could confirm from an official county page.

Septic systems. This one has a clearer state-level anchor: the Illinois Department of Public Health (IDPH) sets minimum standards for private sewage disposal design, siting, and construction under state administrative rule. Counties are authorized to adopt and enforce their own septic ordinances that meet or exceed those state minimums, and in practice county health departments are usually the ones issuing septic permits. I could not locate Union County Health Department's own septic page, so I can't confirm local specifics like forms or contacts, only that the IDPH baseline applies and the county health department is the likely place to ask.

Wells. Similarly, IDPH and the Illinois Water Well Construction Code set the statewide framework, with well permits typically issued by the county health department in comparable Illinois counties I looked at. Union County's own well-permitting office wasn't confirmed in my search.

Greywater and rainwater harvesting. I found no state or Union County rule addressing either one specifically, so both are unclear rather than clearly permitted or restricted.

Utility disconnection. I didn't find any statute or ordinance prohibiting living off-grid without utility hookups, but with zoning and building code status themselves unconfirmed, I can't say this is settled either.

My honest bottom line: Union County's own official web presence just doesn't have much published on these topics yet, at least not that I could find. The state provides a floor through IDPH for septic and wells, but for zoning, dwellings, building permits, greywater, rainwater, and utility disconnection, you really need to call the county directly before you build anything.