There are a lot of great advantages of hydroponics but just like any other good thing, there are also disadvantages of hydroponics that growers or gardeners who are interested in hydroponics should know about.

The good thing is that you can avoid these pitfalls as you develop your hydroponic projects when you recognize these disadvantages early. See some of these shortcomings of hydroponics below:

Capital Intensive

One of the most common disadvantages of hydroponic farming or gardening for many people is the high cost involved in starting up. This may not be a serious issue if you are just considering a small gardening unit you want to setup on your patio or in your backyard to grow a garden as a hobby.

However, the costs can really be huge if you’re considering setting up a large scale hydroponic farm. For instance, setting up or scaling up to a large-scale hydroponic farm will entail investments in equipment like HVAC systems, fans, ventilation, irrigation systems, control systems, lights etc. You will also need to have significant resources like land, manpower, expertise etc.

All these can quickly drive costs through the roof. This raises the barrier of entry and scares most farmers from making big decisions to scale up their hydroponic farms.

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: Farmers or growers can develop effective plans for growing their business or farms by taking a phased approach to scaling up their business. Expansion should be done strategically in phases. This will reduce the need for a huge upfront investment.

Also, produce or yields from hydroponic farms can be marketed as premium products with higher price points. This will allow the grower to achieve healthy profit margins and a reasonable return on investment. Farmers can also develop great relationships with financial institutions that can give them access to capital with very reasonable conditions.

High Technical Knowledge Requirement for Large Scale Operations

The high risk of losses as a result of mistakes or inadequate knowledge is sometimes a hindrance for people who are interested in hydroponic farming but tend to be risk averse. When you are doing hydroponic farming or gardening as a hobby, you can afford to do trial and error or make mistakes while learning. However, you cannot afford mistakes when you are operating a large scale hydroponics farm. Mistakes may cause you to incur loses you may not be able to afford, which may force you to close the farm all together.

This means you should acquire some knowledge and expertise in hydroponics to be able to manage a large-scale farm successfully. It doesn’t have to be very specialized highly technical skills; even basic skill sets like understanding the basics about the plants you plan to grow, the hydroponic systems to want to use and how to manage the systems and processes effectively can be very important to succeed.

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: Taking specific trainings in areas of hydroponic farming where you have deficient knowledge can significantly reduce the likelihood of errors. This can improve your chances of success and reduce your costs sometimes very significantly. Partnerships, networking and willingness to try new methods or technologies can really help in way that may amaze us. 

Risk of Water Borne Diseases and Algae Bloom

Another disadvantage that often poses a high risk and threat to hydroponic farms is the risk of waterborne diseases and algae in closed hydroponic systems. Most hydroponic systems are closed units in which all the plants may share the same water or nutrient solution through recirculation.

The risk with this system is that any waterborne pathogen that infects one plant can easily spread to all the other plants at once. This can destroy entire batch of plants if it’s not handled properly. Algae bloom can also occur in hydroponic systems taking away nutrients from the plants and clogging the hydroponic unit or system. All these can cause plant failures or death if it is not managed properly.

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: Hydroponic farmers or growers can space out their plants to prevent them from getting overcrowded. You can also screen filters or paper filters in addition to filtration system to prevent any spread of waterborne diseases in the hydroponic unit.

Environment that is Susceptible to Quick Changes

Environmental factors are very important to the growth and survival of plants in general but this may be more critical for hydroponic plants because they react or respond quickly to these changes. Quick changes in nutrient solution or atmospheric conditions can inflict irreversible damage to plants which can lead to plant death, loses and hydroponic farm failure. For instance, poor oxygenation of plant roots can lead to death, abnormal nutrient solution PH levels can also cause plant death.

All these are significant risks that that tend to be downsides of hydroponic farming.    

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: A good investment in smart hydroponic monitoring systems will help in solving these kinds of issues and it can go a long way to prevent them from happening. Monitoring equipment like PH meters, Light intensity meters, floating thermometers etc.

Some large scale farms have gone further to implement smart technologies that are programmed to take measurements from all these equipment and monitor them over time to trigger specific actions when certain conditions are met. For example, smart irrigation systems that are programmed to switch on sprinklers at specific intervals or monitor PH and electrical conductivity (EC) readings from nutrient solution to alert when solution change or water addition is required. 

Constant Monitoring Required

Spending a lot of time checking and monitoring conditions and performance of hydroponic plants can be time consuming and it is one thing many people don’t like to do. Unfortunately, our observations may even be wrong sometimes which can lead us to make the wrong decisions. It is also not feasible to do some of these monitoring tasks effectively if you plan to scale up your hydroponic farm or do it as a large scale venture. Can you imagine what it will be like to check the nutrient solution PH, EC etc. on an hourly interval for a large farm?

This is one of the cons of hydroponics that discourages many people from doing it on a large scale.

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: The best way to mitigate or eliminate this disadvantage is to automate your farm or plant monitoring systems. Although this can be expensive if you are working on a large-scale hydroponic farm, the long-term benefits will outweigh the initial cost of investment. This approach (automation) may not be necessary if you are doing hydroponics gardening as a hobby or on a very small scale. 

Risk of Power Outages

Electric power is a requirement for hydroponic farms to be effective. You need electricity to power the various growers lights, different smart systems like sprinklers, air pumps, etc. in addition to powering other operational and maintenance activities on the farm. 

Power outages may not be an issue for most growers in developed countries with reliable power supply except during disasters like hurricanes, tornadoes, etc. where power supply can be disrupted. However, the cost of power bills can easily add to your production and operational expenses which tend to affect your profits.

This disadvantage of hydroponic farming may not be a very serious one for casual hobbyist, but it can be quite serious for people doing this as a business.  

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: One of the options to consider in mitigating this risk maybe to have a standby generator for emergency situations, but even this option has a downside because you will have to spend money on fuel and maintenance.

The ideal option may be to invest in renewable energy like solar panels where you make the initial investment and spend little or nothing on maintenance. You can even move your farm off-grid eventually (if you want) after building a robust alternative renewable power supply infrastructure for your farm. This will significantly cut down your running cost because there will little or no expenses on electricity bills.

Production Maybe Limited by Availability of Resources

You definitely need some sizeable land or space to carryout large scale hydroponic farming. Depending on your geographical location, this may or may not be a strong disadvantage for hydroponic farming. Imagine what land or space acquisition will be like for someone who wants to setup a hydroponic farm in a place like New York City or London and what it will also be like for someone who wants to do so in a surburb or small town.

The cost and hurdles you will have to cross will be much more for the big city locations than for the small town or village locations. Of course, there are various strategic implications to consider before making such decisions, but choosing a small town or village may (or may not) be a better decision in terms of cost. 

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: There is no clear cut solution for this since different situations may vary. You may have to review various factors that are relevant to your situation before making a decision.

High Cost of Hydroponic Produce

The high cost of hydroponic produce can become a disadvantage in terms of market competitiveness because it may be difficult to compete with conventional farm produce based on price and volume. Again, this is not a serious disadvantage or risk for small growers or hobbyists; it is a challenge that large-scale commercial growers will have to figure out.

Hydroponically grown produce or vegetables and fruits may not be very cheap (when compared to conventional farm grown produce) because of the high cost of inputs. This can pose some challenges with sales and promotions of hydroponically grown produce in a competitive market. 

How to Overcome/Mitigate this Disadvantage: Hydroponic farms may have to develop a good marketing strategy that will lead to increased demand for its produce. A high demand may diminish the effect of price sensitivity in customers. This will also bring about increased production which may eventually bring down the prices. This may be a more theoretical solution than a real solution, you will have to evaluate your situation to come up with a unique strategy for your hydroponic business.