How could Net Energy Billing program reform impact Mainers?
A new law signed by Gov. Janet Mills in June will reform Maine’s Net Energy Billing program, which allows customers to offset their electricity bills by using power from small renewable sources like solar farms.
Customers can join a community project with others or have their own solar panels right on their roof top.
Jim asked the CBS13 I-Team:
“I saw the Legislature passed changes to Net Energy Billing. What will this do to the people who are using solar farms? What about users with their own solar system?”
It’s a complex issue and the answers varied somewhat depending on who we asked.
Public Advocate Heather Sanborn, who supported the bill, says it will save all ratepayers money.
The law aims to address high and rising costs of the community solar program, some of which are currently falling to customers who don’t participate.
Sanborn says the law doesn’t make any changes to Maine’s rooftop solar program, protecting homeowner and business investments.
But that’s not the case for community solar.
This law would change the credit structure and add a monthly fee, reducing payments to large scale community solar projects by about 20 percent.
Sanborn says it should not affect current subscribers, saying:
“Subscription agreements are contracts with the subscriber. In most of these contracts that we’ve seen, there’s no option for the community solar farm to lower the discount rate without the subscriber’s agreement to the change.”
Tony Napolitano owns Maine Community Solar, which advocates for the program. He isn’t convinced subscriber contracts will hold up.
“Yeah. I mean, you would think, right. But also, the solar farm developers and the companies that signed those contracts are having some of the terms of their agreements change because the law is changing, right? So, the fact, I think there’s going to be some litigation around it, probably,” Napolitano said.
He and others are more concerned about the future of solar in Maine.
“I think we’ll still have community solar, but it’s going to change a little bit. And there’s going to probably be less investment and there’ll be less capacity being built out,” Napolitano said.
The Public Advocate says this new law adds more consumer protections for solar subscribers, including new rules to make sure your subscription matches your energy usage and requires solar farms to issue refunds to those who have paid for more credits than they can use.
This is an issue we’ll continue to follow.