What a Comox roof produces in a year
Natural Resources Canada's photovoltaic potential dataset puts Comox at 1,025 kWh a year for every kilowatt of panels installed at the optimal tilt and orientation. A 6 kW array models at roughly 6,200 kWh a year on that figure, and an 8 kW array at about 8,200 kWh. That is the output of an ideal roof, and it is the right benchmark to hold a quote against.
The gap between that and a real installation comes from a short list. Orientation matters most: a south-facing slope gets the full figure, east and west slopes give up a share of it, and a north slope is not worth the mounting hardware. Shading matters more than its footprint suggests, because one obstruction can suppress a whole string of panels rather than just the ones it covers, unless the design isolates them with optimisers or microinverters. Soiling and gradual panel degradation account for a slow, small remainder.
Output is also weighted heavily toward the long-day months, with the shortest weeks contributing very little. That is normal and already reflected in the annual figure, but it is the reason the useful comparison is modelled monthly production against your own monthly consumption rather than one annual number against another.
The order the steps happen in, and where BC Hydro sits
Start with the rate, because it is already settled. BC Hydro closed net metering, Rate Schedule 1289, to new customers on 1 July 2026. A Comox system connected now runs under Rate Schedule 2289: panels serve the house first, generation is still netted against consumption inside each billing period, and any surplus becomes a bill credit at a fixed 10 cents per kWh applied against energy charges, for systems up to 100 kW. There is no timing manoeuvre that reaches the old rate, so if a salesperson describes banked retail-value kilowatt-hours, they are describing a programme that is closed.
What you can influence is sequence. A grid-tied installation involves a Town building permit, the installation itself, the separate electrical approval for the connection, and an agreement with BC Hydro before the system starts exporting. Those steps have different owners and different clocks, and the usual cause of a delayed project is not any single one of them being slow but two of them being started in the wrong order.
So ask your installer for the sequence in writing before you sign: which application goes in first, who files each one, what triggers the next step, and what the system does in the meantime if the panels are up but the utility side is not finished. A system should not be exporting before the arrangement with BC Hydro is in place, and a good installer will already have an answer for how that is handled.
One more scheduling point is worth knowing at the outset. Taking the BC Hydro solar rebate places you on the Self-Generation Service rate, which for a new Comox connection is where you were going anyway, so the rebate decision does not have to be sequenced around the rate decision. That simplifies the paperwork more than people expect.
The Town's permit process and its two to four week target
Comox handles building permits through an online Citywide portal, and the Town's own target is to process a complete application within two to four weeks depending on the complexity of the project. That is a genuinely useful number: short enough to plan around, published by the Town rather than estimated by a contractor, and conditional in an honest way.
The important word in it is complete. A target that starts when a complete application lands is a target you can lose weeks to by submitting something partial. Ask your installer what the Town's portal requires as a submission package, and confirm the drawings, the mounting details and the structural justification for the added roof load are ready before anything is filed.
Two things the Town does not publish are also worth knowing. Solar is not called out separately from general alterations, so a roof-mounted array runs through the ordinary permit route rather than a dedicated stream. And no fee schedule appears on the permit page, so the permit cost should come to you as a written estimate with a stated basis rather than a number an installer remembers from a previous job.
The electrical portion of a grid-tied system is permitted and inspected separately from the Town's building permit. Ask which body handles it for your address and how it is sequenced against the building permit, because a connection date depends on the later of the two rather than the first one to arrive.
Two thirds of Comox homes come with a private roof
65.9% of Comox dwellings are single-detached houses, and there is no high-rise stock recorded in the town at all. For that majority the roof is yours, the parties to the project are you, your installer and the Town, and the zoning and building bylaws are the only rules in play.
Semi-detached homes are 10.4% of the stock, which is a larger share than in most towns of this size, and they are the case worth pausing on. A semi-detached roof is usually one continuous plane divided between two households, so the questions are which portion is yours, whether the roof surface is common property, and who has to consent to fasteners going through it. The strata plan and the title answer both, and neither answer is visible from the driveway.
Row houses and low-rise apartments together account for roughly 21% of dwellings, and there the roof is common property and the strata corporation holds the decision. The corporation applies, the corporation holds the account the system connects to, and any credit follows the account rather than an individual owner. That is a slower path than a detached house because it moves at the pace of council meetings, but it is a normal one.
There are no US-style homeowner associations in Comox. Where a private body has authority over your roof it is a strata corporation under the provincial Strata Property Act, which applies only if your home forms part of one.
Rebates and financing a Comox homeowner can use
BC Hydro pays up to $5,000 for residential solar, calculated at $1,000 per kW of installed generator capacity and capped at 50% of total installed cost. Both limits are applied and the smaller result is what you receive, so ask for the rebate to be shown as arithmetic against your own system rather than as the programme's maximum.
A battery paired with solar earns up to $1,500 at $500 per kWh, with a 5 kWh minimum and the same 50% cost cap, and that rises to as much as $5,000 when the battery is enrolled in Peak Saver. Storage is worth modelling rather than assuming, since its value comes from holding production for later use at home instead of exporting it at 10 cents per kWh, and that depends on how much surplus your household actually produces on a typical day.
Since 1 June 2026 rebated work must be carried out by a member of the Home Performance Contractor Network. That turns eligibility into a hiring decision, so confirm membership while you are still comparing quotes rather than at claim time.
Federal support has narrowed. The Canada Greener Homes Loan (interest-free up to $40,000) stopped accepting new applications on 2 October 2025, and only loans approved before then are still being funded. The Canada Greener Homes Affordability Program replaced it in September 2025, delivering no-cost retrofits through provincial partners to low- and median-income households, with solar federally eligible but each province setting its own technology list. Canada has no residential investment tax credit. British Columbia has at times exempted qualifying solar equipment from provincial sales tax, and the scope moves with provincial budgets, so confirm the PST treatment of your equipment at the time of purchase.