New Hampshire Doubles Solar Net Metering Cap

FL
Foley & Lardner

Contributor

Foley & Lardner LLP looks beyond the law to focus on the constantly evolving demands facing our clients and their industries. With over 1,100 lawyers in 24 offices across the United States, Mexico, Europe and Asia, Foley approaches client service by first understanding our clients’ priorities, objectives and challenges. We work hard to understand our clients’ issues and forge long-term relationships with them to help achieve successful outcomes and solve their legal issues through practical business advice and cutting-edge legal insight. Our clients view us as trusted business advisors because we understand that great legal service is only valuable if it is relevant, practical and beneficial to their businesses.
New Hampshire has doubled the caps on energy that both residential and commercial customer-generators of rooftop solar can sell back to the grid, raising the cap from 50 MW to 100 MW.
United States Energy and Natural Resources

New Hampshire has doubled the caps on energy that both residential and commercial customer-generators of rooftop solar can sell back to the grid, raising the cap from 50 MW to 100 MW. The governor signed H.B. 1116, which was introduced this past March, into law on May 2, 2016.

Net metering programs allow homeowners and other solar customers to sell excess power they generate back to the electrical grid in exchange for a credit. Each New Hampshire utility has a cap on the amount of large-scale projects that can receive credits in their area. Eversource Energy, a company which bills itself as New England's largest energy delivery company, announced in January that it had reached the state regulated limit on the amount of customer generation under New Hampshire's net metering laws.

"Lifting the cap on net metering is essential to the continued success of New Hampshire's solar industry, and I am proud to sign this bipartisan bill so that our clean energy industry can continue to grow and thrive," said New Hampshire's Governor, Maggie Hassan, in a statement released concurrently with the execution of the bill.

The new law also mandates that, within 3 weeks of enactment, the New Hampshire Public Utilities Commission (NHPUC) must initiate proceedings to develop new alternative net metering tariffs, which may include other regulatory mechanisms and tariffs for customer-generators, and determine whether and to what extent such tariffs should be limited in their availability within each electric distribution utility's service territory. NHPUC will have ten months to review net metering and develop a new tariff.

Additional information regarding net metering in New Hampshire can be found here and here, and a copy of the bill that was signed into law can be found here.

The content of this article is intended to provide a general guide to the subject matter. Specialist advice should be sought about your specific circumstances.

Mondaq uses cookies on this website. By using our website you agree to our use of cookies as set out in our Privacy Policy.

Learn More