Dive Brief:
- Californians with solar power systems on their homes under the state’s current net metering program will be able to stay under the program’s terms for 20 years, the Public Utilities Commission (PUC) ruled. That’s much longer than the six years the state’s big-three utilities had sought and not as long as solar interests would like, but longer than might have been under a state law enacted last year.
- Enrollment in the current net metering program will end when utilities’ 5% participation caps are reached or by July 1, 2017, whichever comes first. In the meantime, customers in the current program will continue to be paid full retail price for the megawatt-hours they don’t use at their own homes and flow into the utility’s system.
- Last year’s law, AB 327, required an end date for customer net metering and directed the PUC to set terms for a new program to start in 2017. The PUC is to issue final rules for that program by the end of 2015.
Dive Insight:
This decision is huge for California, which has more than 2 GW of installed rooftop solar, according to the Vote Solar Initiative. Utilities, unsuccessful in getting a short cutoff time for the current program, might try even harder now to get favorable terms in the net metering policy the commission plans to develop for the post-July 2017 era.
California’s utilities, like others throughout the country, call full-price net metering policies business model killers that also shift costs to other customers. But it’s hard to imagine that the state would stifle expansion of rooftop solar, though, especially with the growth of third-party installers and the recent launch of the country’s biggest Property Assessed Clean Energy (PACE) program, under which homeowners can repay solar costs through their property tax bills.