Brian McGowan says he paid about $150 (€130) for electricity last year at his home in Coatesville, Pennsylvania. After adding more solar panels last fall, he expects an even smaller bill this year.
Before going solar and electrifying much of his home, McGowan would have faced more than $2,000 a year for electricity, roughly $1,000 for gas and over $2,000 for heating oil. He now drives an EV and uses a mini-split heat pump for most heating, eliminating much of that fuel expense, the engineering technician told DW.
What began as a few panels to run a kettle, coffee machine and emergency lights during outages has grown into a full system with battery storage and a heat pump. He now operates two arrays: an off-grid setup used during long outages and a grid-tied system of about 30 rooftop panels connected to batteries.
“We get three or four outages a year, some lasting days,” he said. After his solar installation, a neighborhood blackout appeared to his wife only as a flicker; the house stayed powered. McGowan expects outages to increase as energy demand grows.
Retiree John Spezia of Steamboat Springs, Colorado, installed solar 13 years ago and recently added a heat pump, allowing him to shut off his gas supply. That saves perhaps $400–$500 a year plus the monthly base charge, he said. In some months they generate more power than they use and feed excess into the grid; net metering lets them bank credits for colder months.
The US Energy Information Administration reported that in 2024 electricity customers experienced an average of about 11 hours of interruptions — roughly double the decade-earlier annual average. A Stanford study examining how homeowners could use solar and batteries to survive outages found that about 60% of households would also see financial benefits, though that analysis included a now-scrapped federal tax credit under the Inflation Reduction Act.
How much money households can save by producing their own power depends on several factors: local solar resource and system size, installation and permitting costs, battery inclusion, retail electricity rates, and how utilities compensate exported power. Under full net metering, utilities credit exported electricity at the retail rate. Net billing credits households at a wholesale rate instead. “In California, it’s roughly 25% of the retail price,” said Stanford researcher Tao Sun, noting that in net-billing states homeowners have stronger incentives to add batteries and consume their own generation.
Payback periods vary by state, incentives and local electricity prices. Ben Delman of Solar United Neighbors said payback can be as short as 2–5 years in states with strong solar incentives and longer — 7–11 years — in states with lower prices or fewer credits. “Your payoff is very much influenced by how much you’re already paying for electricity,” he said.
Rooftop solar adoption has grown nationwide: about 5 million US households now have metered rooftop solar, roughly one in 30 residential homes, according to a report by the Environment America Research and Policy Center. Johanna Neumann, the center’s senior director for the campaign for 100% renewable energy, said the trend is a “50-state phenomenon,” driven by environmental concerns and by people seeking energy stability and control over how they get power.
For homeowners considering solar, local incentives and financing matter. Some states still offer tax credits; banks may provide loans, and leases are sometimes available. But several states have reduced compensation for exported power or added fixed fees for solar customers. McGowan noted some systems face extra charges of around $50 a month, which prompts homeowners to buy batteries and sever grid ties.
McGowan recommends pairing solar with battery storage. He’s also made his home more efficient — for example, installing a drain-water heat exchanger to recover heat from wastewater and using a heat pump for hot water — greatly reducing energy use. Spezia advises an energy audit, sealing leaks and switching appliances and heating to electric before installing solar.
Tao Sun suggests weighing both economic savings and resilience: “How much would you pay for your uninterrupted service of power?”
Edited by: Tamsin Walker