AR · Solar

Solar quotes in Conway, AR.

One real quote from a vetted local Conway installer, sized to your roof, your bill, and every federal + state rebate you qualify for.

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What you get

One vetted local Conway installer
Rebates checked for your exact address
No call-center spam, no lead list

7.5 kW
Average system size: $2.80/W
Average cost (USD): 11 yrs
Average payback: 55+
Local installers

Why solar in Conway

The design question that decides a new Conway solar project is how large to build it, and under the Arkansas non-legacy schedule that question has a sharper answer than it used to. Generation you consume as it is produced offsets a purchase at the full retail rate. Generation you export earns avoided cost. So the return on each additional panel falls once the design passes what your household can absorb.

Where the marginal return falls

A house always has some baseline load, so the first kilowatt hours a system produces are the ones most likely to be consumed directly. Those offset a retail purchase.

As the system grows, more of its midday output exceeds what the household is drawing, so the marginal panels produce mostly exports, compensated at avoided cost.

Both cost the same to install. So at some point an additional panel is producing electricity worth a fraction of retail while costing full price, and that is where a bigger system stops being a better one.

Ask your installer to show the return on the last kilowatt of proposed capacity separately from the return on the first. That comparison is what a sizing decision actually rests on.

Start from your bills, not your roof

Act 278 requires a proposal to state expected monthly and annual output. Ask for your own consumption alongside it, month by month, from your last twelve bills.

Those two series side by side show directly how much of the generation your household absorbs and how much leaves at avoided cost. That is the real output of the design work.

Ask what percentage of your annual usage the design covers, and ask for a smaller system modelled alongside the proposal so you can compare returns rather than assume.

A concrete planned increase in load is the good reason to size ahead: an electric vehicle, a heat pump, an addition. A general expectation of using more electricity is not.

The efficiency measures the statute makes you look at

Act 278 requires a proposal to include energy efficiency audit results and available efficiency measures. That requirement is unusual and it is genuinely useful.

Efficiency work is often cheaper per dollar saved than generation, and it reduces the consumption a solar system has to cover, which under this tariff means a smaller and better-matched array.

So read that section of the proposal rather than skipping to the panel count. If the audit identifies meaningful measures, doing them first may change what system size is right.

Ask whether the proposed system was sized before or after the efficiency measures were considered. Sizing to a consumption figure you are about to reduce is a common and expensive sequencing error.

What the number should be built from

The 30 percent federal Residential Clean Energy Credit under Section 25D expired for property placed in service after December 31, 2025, so a cash or loan purchase in Conway receives no federal tax credit, and Arkansas has no state solar tax credit.

Section 48E survives at 30 percent for third-party owners under leases and power purchase agreements, so ask what a provider claims and what reaches you in the rate.

What exists is full retail value for self-consumed generation, avoided cost for exports under the non-legacy schedule, and the electricity you stop buying at around 14.2 cents per kWh.

Ask for the design built from twelve months of your own bills, the efficiency measures considered first, and a smaller system modelled alongside the proposal.

Incentives & rebates

Net metering: Non-legacy schedule at avoided cost; pre-Sept-2024 grandfathered

Arkansas net metering changed under Act 278 of 2023, and the pivot is a date. Projects developed before September 30, 2024 were grandfathered at the one-to-one rate for a 20-year contract duration, which runs through September 2040. For those customers an exported kilowatt hour and a consumed one remain worth the same, and nothing about the change affects them for the working life of the system. Customers interconnecting after September 30, 2024, with certain exceptions, take service under a non-legacy net metering schedule instead. Under it, generation consumed on site in real time offsets electricity you would have bought at the retail rate, which remains the most valuable outcome, while excess exported to the grid is compensated at avoided cost, a wholesale-style measure well below the roughly 14.2 cent Arkansas residential average. The utilities argued in support of the change that full retail credit shifted transmission, distribution and maintenance costs onto other customers. Whatever view you take of that, the practical consequence for a new system is the same: self-consumption is worth substantially more than export, so the design should be built from your daytime load rather than from your annual total, load shifting into daylight is free value, and storage carries more weight than the national conversation suggests. Arkansas is also served extensively by electric cooperatives and municipal utilities whose terms may differ, so confirm what applies at your address.

Related Arkansas resources

Arkansas solar incentives & rebates Full breakdown of federal, provincial, and utility programs.

How payback works in Arkansas

System cost: $21,000
Estimated net cost: $21,000
Estimated payback: ~13.0 years
25-year net savings: ~$19,500

These figures are illustrative; your actual quote reflects your roof, sun exposure, and local utility rates.

Frequently asked questions

How should I size a new Arkansas solar system?

From what your household absorbs during daylight rather than from your roof. Under the non-legacy schedule the marginal panels produce mostly exports at avoided cost, so the return on capacity falls once the design passes your usable load.

What should I compare?

The return on the last kilowatt of proposed capacity against the return on the first, and a smaller system modelled alongside the proposal. Act 278 already requires expected monthly and annual output, so ask for your consumption beside it.

Why does the proposal include an efficiency audit?

Act 278 requires it, and it is genuinely useful. Efficiency work is often cheaper per dollar saved than generation, and it reduces the consumption the system has to cover, which under this tariff means a smaller, better-matched array.

Should efficiency work come first?

Often, yes. Ask whether the proposed system was sized before or after the efficiency measures were considered. Sizing to a consumption figure you are about to reduce is a common and expensive sequencing error.