Georgia · Policy
Georgia net metering in 2026
Georgia does not have one-for-one net metering for new customers. Georgia Power’s monthly netting programme was a 5,000-customer pilot that filled in 2021 and is closed. New residential customers go onto instantaneous netting, which for 2026 credits exported power at a 3.2188 cent solar avoided cost rate plus a 4 cent adder, roughly 7.22 cents per kilowatt-hour, against a standard residential retail rate near 13 cents. Residential systems are capped at 10 kW AC.
Instantaneous netting is not monthly netting, and the difference is the point
Under the closed monthly-netting pilot, a kilowatt-hour exported at noon could offset one bought at eight in the evening. Under instantaneous netting it cannot. Each exported kilowatt-hour is credited the moment it leaves your meter, at the export rate, and each kilowatt-hour you buy back later is bought at retail. The two are simply not the same transaction any more.
The credits are then summed monthly and applied against your bill, and for customers on instantaneous netting the avoided-cost component and the adder are tracked as two separate credits. None of that changes the underlying arithmetic: power you send out earns roughly 7.2 cents while power you draw back costs roughly 13, so every kilowatt-hour you can use at the moment you make it is worth close to twice one you export.
That single fact should drive the whole design of a Georgia system. Load shifting, timed water heating, running the pool pump and the dishwasher in daylight, and in many households a battery, stop being optional refinements and become the main lever on payback.
The numbers, and the one that moves every year
For 2026 the Solar Avoided Cost Rate is 3.2188 cents per kilowatt-hour, with an additional 4 cents per kilowatt-hour approved by the Public Service Commission during the 2022 rate case, giving roughly 7.2188 cents in total. The avoided-cost calculations sit in Commission dockets 4822 and 16573.
The critical caveat is that the avoided-cost component is reset annually. It is a 2026 figure, not a twenty-five year assumption, and any projection that holds it flat for the life of the system is telling you something it cannot know. We model a range and say which part of the number is fixed and which is not, because the alternative is false precision dressed up as analysis.
Availability is not unlimited either. Instantaneous netting is offered first come, first served until the cumulative generating capacity of all renewable sources reaches 0.2 per cent of the company’s annual peak demand in the previous year. Residential systems must be 10 kW AC or smaller. On the commercial side, projects up to 250 kW AC may use the programme with an interconnection fee, and larger projects take a different route.
Georgia Power is not the only utility, and territory is assigned by law
About four and a half million Georgians are served not by Georgia Power but by one of the state’s 41 electric membership cooperatives, and there are also 52 municipal electric utilities. Cooperatives set their own export terms through their elected boards and municipal systems set theirs locally, and neither is bound by the Commission decisions that govern Georgia Power. Published cooperative export figures we have seen sit between roughly 2.8 and 5.2 cents, and some carry a monthly net-metering charge on top.
This is where most national pages about Georgia solar go wrong. They quote Georgia Power’s rate and present it as the Georgia rate. For a homeowner in a cooperative territory, or in one of the cities that runs its own electric utility, the number on that page is not the number on their bill.
You also do not get to choose. Under the 1973 Territorial Service Act every parcel in Georgia is assigned to a franchised supplier for loads under 900 kW, so your provider follows your street address rather than your preference. That is why we read it off your bill before we model anything, and why we will not quote a Georgia export rate from a postcode.
What a 7.2 cent export credit does to a system design
A Georgia Power customer exporting to the grid earns roughly 7.2 cents per kilowatt-hour under the avoided-cost structure, while buying back at a retail rate near 13 cents. Every kilowatt-hour generated and used on site is therefore worth close to double one that is exported, and that single ratio should drive the entire design.
The first consequence is sizing. Oversizing an array to bank credits works badly when credits are worth a little over half of retail: the surplus is sold at a discount you cannot recover. Sizing closer to daytime load, rather than to annual consumption, is usually the better answer in Georgia and is the opposite of the right answer in Virginia.
The second is load shifting. Anything that can be moved into daylight (water heating, pool pumps, EV charging, laundry) converts at the higher value. These are unglamorous changes with a real effect, and they cost nothing.
The third is storage. Georgia is where home batteries make the most economic sense of anywhere we work, precisely because the export gap is widest. A battery that keeps a kilowatt-hour on site instead of exporting it captures most of that 5.8 cent difference every time it cycles.
Territorial service: you cannot shop your way out of this
Georgia’s 1973 Territorial Service Act assigns electric service territory geographically, so for most addresses there is one provider and no choice. Georgia Power serves a large share of the metro areas we work in; elsewhere an electric membership corporation or a municipal utility holds the territory and sets its own terms.
This is why comparison shopping in Georgia is about the installer and the design, never the utility. You cannot switch provider to improve your export rate, so the only variables you control are how large the system is and how much of its output you consume yourself.
It also means two Georgia homes twenty miles apart with identical roofs can have materially different economics purely because of which utility holds the territory. There is no version of a competent Georgia quote that skips confirming which one yours is.
How these rules change, and what that means for a 25-year decision
Export arrangements are set through processes that can be revisited, and in our three states they have been. That is not a reason to avoid solar; it is a reason to size a system that makes sense on today’s terms rather than one that only works if favourable terms hold for decades.
It is also a reason to be careful with any projection running twenty-five years on a single escalation assumption. Small differences in assumed rate rises compound into very large differences in a headline total, which is why two quotes for near-identical hardware can show totals tens of thousands of pounds apart. The assumption, not the equipment, is doing the work.
Where a system is grandfathered under earlier terms, that status usually attaches to the installation and its interconnection date rather than to the homeowner. If you are buying a house with an existing array, what applies to it is a question worth asking before closing rather than after.
We date the facts on these pages for the same reason. A policy page without a date is asking to be trusted indefinitely, and none of this is stable enough to deserve that.
The federal credit, and why so much of what you have read is wrong
The 30% federal residential clean energy credit expired for systems placed in service on or after 1 January 2026. Not reduced, not deferred: expired. Any article, calculator or quote that still subtracts it is describing a position that is no longer available, and the error is usually worth several thousand dollars on a typical residential system.
This matters more than a normal content-freshness problem because of how solar is researched. Most homeowners read two or three national comparison sites before speaking to anyone, and a large share of that material has not been revised. Arriving at a quote with a net cost already in mind that is thousands of dollars too low makes every subsequent conversation harder, and it is not the installer’s error.
The practical advice is narrow and useful: before you compare anything, check whether a federal credit has been applied. If it has, the comparison is not valid and the figures need redoing rather than adjusting.
Georgia FAQ
Common questions about solar in Georgia
Does Georgia have net metering in 2026?
Not in the one-for-one sense. Georgia Power’s monthly netting programme was capped at 5,000 customers, filled in 2021 and is closed to new participants. New residential customers receive instantaneous netting, crediting exports at roughly 7.22 cents per kilowatt-hour for 2026 against a retail rate near 13 cents. Cooperatives and municipal utilities set their own terms.
How much does Georgia Power pay for exported solar?
For 2026, a Solar Avoided Cost Rate of 3.2188 cents per kilowatt-hour plus a 4 cent adder approved in the 2022 rate case, roughly 7.2188 cents in total. The avoided-cost portion is reset annually, so it should not be assumed flat across the life of a system.
How big can a residential solar system be in Georgia?
Georgia Power caps residential systems on its renewable programme at 10 kW AC. That is a real design constraint on a larger home, and it is one of the reasons a Georgia system is usually sized to daytime consumption rather than to the roof.
Is solar still worth it in Georgia?
For some homes, genuinely yes; for others, honestly no. With exports worth roughly half of retail and a 10 kW AC cap, the households that do well are the ones home during the day, or willing to shift load, or adding storage. A household out from eight to six that exports most of its production has a much weaker case, and we will say so rather than sell around it.
Do Georgia EMCs and city utilities work the same way?
No. Georgia has 41 electric membership cooperatives and 52 municipal electric utilities, each setting its own export terms outside Public Service Commission ratemaking. Published cooperative figures we have seen range from roughly 2.8 to 5.2 cents, some with a monthly charge. Territory is assigned by law under the 1973 Territorial Service Act, so your address decides your supplier.
The other half of the Georgia picture
Export terms decide most of the outcome, but they are not the whole of it. What you can claim back, and where we work, are the other two pieces.
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