We all know that the solar industry has grown exponentially in the last decade. Many people want to use solar energy. There are many reasons to go solar. Solar power is an advanced form of renewable energy. It is the environment-friendly, economic, great return of investment. One of the most important solar systems is net metering. If you’re considering going with solar, it’s important to understand how Net Metering works and how it can be applied.
What is net metering?
Net metering is the billing system that allows for residential and commercial customers who generate excess electricity with their solar panel systems to sell the electricity and sending it back to the grid.
With the right size solar energy system, you can produce enough electricity to match your home’s electricity use for the entire year. The utility monitors the meter on your property to hold track of how much energy you use. When your solar panels produce more electricity than your home needs, that excess power will be sent to the power grid. Your utility will then pay you for that power sent to the grid, usually in the form of energy credits on your utility bill. If you pull back more than you produce, you pay the utility for any extra usage.
In general, most homes will produce excess electricity in the summer months and will use more electricity from the grid in the winter. If you produce more power than you use in a given month, excess production is credited to your account and rolled over to future months. These credits can be “banked” for times of low production, which means credits you procure in summer can be utilized in winter session when the days are shorter and the weather is more terrible.
How net metering works
In general, solar energy systems produce more electricity in the afternoon, when many people aren’t home utilizing power. Home power use is commonly higher in the mornings and night time. Net metering helps you to track these high points and low points in your everyday electricity production and usage.
With net metering, excess electricity is fed into your electric utility’s grid when your solar system produces more than you need. At the point when this occurs, your meter really runs backward. When your system doesn’t produce enough electricity, you can draw it from your utility similarly as you did before you went solar. In this process, your system and the grid ensures that your excess production will still be utilized and your deficiencies will be met. The excess electricity your home produces covers the time when your solar system can’t produce enough electricity.
With net metering, the homeowner is only billed for the “net” energy used each month, i.e. the difference between the energy produced by the solar power system and the energy consumed by the house over the monthly billing period.
At the point when your solar system produces more electricity than you use through the span of a month, your service bill will get a credit dependent on the net number of kilowatt-hours you offered back to the network. If you produce less electricity than you use in a given month, you should purchase power from your utility to compensate for any shortfall. In these cases, you would pay for the power you use, less any excess electricity your solar panels generated.
The Benefits of Net Metering
Solar net metering has several benefits. It has various advantages from the financial to the environmental.
- Depending upon the size of your solar system and the measure of solar energy you produce every month, you can incredibly reduce your monthly electric bills, and even benefit from it.
- supports the development of renewable energy and energy savings at the level of households and firms,
- extends the period of use of electricity from its own resources without needing self-storage,
- to sell electricity to the grid it is not necessary to install an additional meter,
- it’s administratively simple,
- reduces the risk of investment,
- requires little or no support from the government,
- reduces the cost of the acquisition of self-sourced electricity
How long will it take to pay off my solar system with net metering?
Regions that offer full retail net metering will have shorter payback periods than territories that don’t offer net metering. On average, solar panel systems have a payback period in the range of four and nine years.
There are a number of factors that go into determining the payback period for your solar energy system, such as:
- The size of your system
- The amount of electricity your home consumes
- The price of electricity in your area
- The cost of installation
- Applicable tax credits or rebates
Is net metering available in Australia?
Australia uses two types of metering when paying for solar energy. Net and Gross Metering. Net Metering is when electricity is consumed in the house and only unused electricity is exported into the grid. Gross Metering is when all the solar electricity generated is exported into the grid.
