New data shows Michigan’s total solar capacity is growing rapidly, but there are fears that progress will not continue as the state prepares to replace its current net-metering incentives with a tariff system. Mark Hagerty with Michigan Solar Solutions tells us he feels the state has made good progress in the past decade and would hate to see it come to an end.
“The constant change of policy, the constant adjusting, the constant threat against net metering really makes a lot of people uncomfortable with proceeding.”
The net-metering program lets ratepayers sell surplus power back to the grid at retail prices. That program is set to be replaced with a tariff system that would result in about five cents less per kilowatt hour. Customers who install projects by 2019 will be grandfathered into the existing net-metering rates for another decade. Critics of net metering say the current decrease in the cost of wind and solar installations makes incentives obsolete.
