Of course people are scrambling—thousands of households racing against the clock to get their solar panels installed under net metering before the deadline hits, desperate to submit applications today whilst they still can. Because net metering is financially sweeter for solar owners than the new net billing system that’s coming in.
They should’ve sorted this out ages ago. Under the Photovoltaics for All scheme, the upfront investment was zero for consumers—except in cases where installers charged a bit more than the spending cap set by the ministry. Plenty of installers respected that ceiling, and thousands got solar panels fitted without paying a penny up front. Now they’re paying the €150 bimonthly instalments.
There’s artificial chaos being whipped up by the usual energy circles—the ones who’ve already made a killing on residential and commercial solar and are now gearing up to cash in on storage, the next party being thrown.
The EAC hasn’t prepared a framework for the new regime, they say. Except there is a framework—and CERA laid it out back in ’24, embedding the legislation in a regulatory decision. Which says the following, as simply as… well, as simply as everything supposedly is in the retail competitive market:
1. Anyone who’s already got net metering solar panels carries on as if nothing’s happened, until their contract expires. They’ll keep feeding their dirt-cheap surplus energy to the EAC—treating it like a battery—and getting it back without paying the difference in generation costs, which during evening peak hours are sky-high.
2. Anyone submitting applications for rooftop solar after 1 January 2026 falls under net billing, like almost everywhere else in the EU. They’ll feed their surplus to whichever supplier they fancy and—under a bilateral contract—get paid per kilowatt-hour. And when they draw back the kilowatt-hours they need later that same day, they’ll pay for them at a price also agreed with the supplier, which—because of higher generation costs—will be considerably steeper. If they want, they can install storage to reduce the surplus they’re sending to the grid.
The usual circles are shouting: “The EAC hasn’t prepared a plan and we don’t know how much it’ll buy surplus from residential net billing!” Right—have the private suppliers prepared a plan? Have they told us whether they’ll buy our electricity and at what price? No. And they probably won’t tell us because they’re most likely not interested. They don’t care about residential consumers. They don’t sell to households. We’ll be stuck with our beloved EAC, whether we like it or not. Until further notice.
But then the EAC chairman went on Vretou and the man was baffled: All of this has been known for ages. We knew we were moving to net billing and the procedures would change—why is everyone surprised now?
And the man explained that a decision was taken for the EAC—the only regulated producer and supplier around here (the others are unregulated or, more systemically, self-regulate through the market)—to buy the surplus electricity from those WHO install net billing from 1 January 2026 onwards at 11 cents per kilowatt-hour. The avoidance cost (something like the generation cost) of conventional electricity is just over 17 cents. So the EAC will be adding cheaper energy to its mix than what it produces itself, BUT now (for the net billing crowd) it’ll charge for returned kilowatt-hours at a higher price, depending on generation costs when renewable energy isn’t being produced.
Is 11 cents a “good” price? Don’t know. But the EAC can revise the charge later, depending on the conditions that emerge. And theoretically there’s room for private producers or suppliers to buy green household electricity at slightly higher rates to attract customers for their full needs. Will they do it? Probably not, medium-term.
The new system is fairer for those who DON’T have and CAN’T install rooftop solar. For the vast majority of households, in other words. And thank goodness the government didn’t cave to pressure this time and backtrack. Because today they’re being charged more for every kilowatt-hour, so that the EAC’s energy-guzzling generators can wheeze away producing electricity for solar panel owners too—without those owners paying the true cost of the electricity they consume.
