Orlando Utilities rekindles solar panel controversy – Orlando Sentinel

Orlando’s electric utility is resurrecting its quest to do away with a longstanding practice — known as net metering — in which it pays retail rates to buy surplus power coming from its customers’ rooftop solar panels.

This summer, the municipally owned Orlando Utilities Commission proposed phasing out the practice within seven years, and then paying a lower, wholesale rate for surplus solar energy. That was met with widespread opposition, including from Orlando’s mayor, Buddy Dyer, who is a permanent member of the utility’s board.

OUC’s revised proposal unveiled Tuesday is to grandfather the retail rate – currently 10.7 cents for a kilowatt-hour of electricity – for the nearly 10,000 customers who have rooftop solar panels for a period of 20 years.

A kilowatt-hour is enough electricity to turn on ten 100-watt bulbs for an hour. An average OUC home uses about 1,000 kilowatt-hours in a month.

After that, the utility would pay a rate of 4.6 cents per kilowatt-hour. The 20-year grandfathering period would begin in July 2025. Customers erecting solar panels on their rooftops after that date would be paid 4.6 cents per kilowatt-hour from the first.

OUC leaders say the change is needed for fiscal fairness for all customers, especially those who do not have solar panels.

Those opposed to OUC’s efforts to end net metering include homeowners with solar panels, a growing industry that installs and maintains solar panels, people and groups fighting climate change, Dyer, and Orlando city council member Patty Sheehan, an OUC customer and has solar panels on her home.

Many worry that ending net metering will undermine homeowners’ investments in solar energy, and slow OUC’s progress toward ending its reliance on coal and natural gas.

OUC officials acknowledged that the revised proposal offering a 20-year grandfathering period would not win over a significant share of those opposed to ending net metering.

At an OUC meeting Tuesday, Dyer gave no indication of whether he supports the revised proposal for ending net metering.

The municipally owned utility will take public comments on the proposal until next month when it meets for a decision.