Off-Grid Living in Roane County, Tennessee

I've been digging into off-grid rules county by county, and Roane County, Tennessee is a useful reminder that "rural Tennessee" doesn't automatically mean "no zoning." Unlike a lot of nearby counties that have no zoning at all, Roane County actually adopted a countywide Regional Zoning Resolution that covers unincorporated land, dividing the county into Agricultural, Residential, Manufactured Home Park, Commercial, Industrial, and Floodway districts. That resolution, plus the Minimum Subdivision Regulations and Flood Damage Prevention Resolution, is administered by the Roane County Planning Department and the Building Codes and Zoning Department. If you're eyeing raw land here, check which district it sits in before assuming you can just build or camp on it. Also worth noting: the towns of Harriman, Kingston, Rockwood, Oliver Springs, and Oakdale run their own separate codes departments, so anything inside those town limits is a different conversation entirely.

On building, the county enforces the 2024 International Building Codes alongside its zoning ordinances, and permits can be applied for and paid through the county's online Self Service Portal. I did not find a Roane County page specifically addressing tiny homes under Appendix Q, RVs as permanent residences, or mobile/manufactured home siting beyond the general zoning districts (there is a Manufactured Home Park district, and any mobile home park use change needs a permit). So if you're planning a tiny house or RV as your primary dwelling, that's a "call the Building Codes and Zoning Department and ask directly" situation, not something I can confirm from the public documents.

Septic is handled at the state level in Tennessee: applications now go through TDEC's online portal rather than a local health department, and this appears to be true for Roane County as it is elsewhere in the state, though I couldn't find a Roane-specific confirmation page. One thing that surprised me: I found a reference (from a non-official legal Q&A source, not an ordinance) suggesting a septic permit was denied locally because county sewer access was deemed available, forcing a sewer connection instead. I can't verify that as official policy, but it lines up with the state's general rule that mandatory sewer connection can override septic options where sewer is accessible, so it's worth asking the county's Wastewater Plant/RC Public Utility office directly if your parcel is anywhere near a service area.

Greywater and rainwater harvesting don't have Roane-specific rules that I could find, so the state baseline applies: rainwater collection is unrestricted, and greywater reuse is technically allowed under the state plumbing code with conditions, though enforcement clarity is thin. Private wells fall under the state's Water Well Act with TDEC-licensed drillers; I didn't find any added county permit layer. Going off-grid on electricity is unrestricted, but because Roane County has an actual public utility board and multiple utility providers with defined service areas, some parcels may fall under mandatory-connection rules, so don't assume full utility independence without checking.