The net billing tariff does not apply to LADWP customers
Since April 15, 2023, California customers applying for interconnection have taken service on the net billing tariff, pursuant to CPUC decision D.22-12-056. That tariff applies in the territories of Pacific Gas and Electric, Southern California Edison and San Diego Gas and Electric.
LADWP is a publicly owned utility. It is not subject to the Commission's net metering decisions and sets its own terms for customer generation. So the entire body of NEM 3.0 commentary, the export rate comparisons, the battery-is-now-essential arguments, describes a regime you are not in.
This is worth being deliberate about, because the volume of NEM 3.0 content is enormous and almost none of it carries a caveat. A calculator, a guide or a neighbour in a PG&E or SCE city is describing a different arrangement, and applying their numbers to an LADWP address will give you the wrong answer.
So the first step is to read the name on your bill, and the second is to get LADWP's own current customer generation terms directly from LADWP. Ask what arrangement a new residential solar customer is placed on, how exported energy is credited, whether there is a size limit, and what the interconnection process involves. Get it in writing.
A fast way to test an installer
Ask any installer, early in the first conversation, whether the net billing tariff applies to your address. Someone who works Los Angeles regularly will say immediately that it does not because LADWP is a publicly owned utility. Someone who launches into an NEM 3.0 explanation has not done a project on your side of the line.
The Los Angeles area is served by more than one utility, so this is not a rhetorical test. Neighbouring cities sit in Southern California Edison territory and are firmly under the net billing tariff, which means advice travels badly across relatively short distances here.
Ask which specific rate and arrangement their savings projection assumes, and ask to see it in writing. A projection that names no tariff is not a projection about your house, and in a market this large that is a meaningful filter.
Ask what happens to the projection if LADWP changes its terms. Publicly owned utilities set their own arrangements and can revise them, so a twenty-five year model is making an assumption you are entitled to see stated rather than buried.
Storage, outages and whether you qualify for help with it
A grid-tied solar array without battery storage shuts down during an outage. It is a safety requirement, so that crews are not working on lines a rooftop system is energising, and it applies whatever your utility. If resilience is part of why you are considering solar, storage has to be designed in rather than added later.
California's Self-Generation Incentive Program provides incentives for battery storage installed on the customer's side of the meter, including systems that can function during a power outage. Its Equity and Equity Resiliency categories are aimed at lower-income, medically vulnerable and at-risk for fire communities.
The incentive is $850 per kilowatt hour under the Equity category or $1,000 per kilowatt-hour under Equity Resiliency, depending on which a customer qualifies for. Those are substantial figures, and a household that qualifies and never asks is leaving a great deal on the table.
Ask an installer whether you might be eligible, then confirm with the programme rather than taking the sales answer as final. Eligibility criteria and performance requirements are set out in the SGIP Handbook, and applicants have one year after reserving funds to meet them, including enrollment in a qualified Demand Response program.
What changed federally, and what California still offers
The 30 percent federal Residential Clean Energy Credit under Section 25D expired for property placed in service after December 31, 2025. A cash or loan purchase made now receives no federal credit, and a quote that still applies it is overstating your return substantially. Check any projection line by line rather than trusting a summary figure.
Section 48E survives at 30 percent and is available to third-party owners of residential systems under leases and power purchase agreements. So the credit still exists, it simply no longer flows to a homeowner who buys the system, and you should expect lease providers to lead with that. Ask what they claim and what of that value actually reaches you in the rate offered, then confirm with a tax advisor rather than with the sales material.
California's Self-Generation Incentive Program continues to provide incentives for battery storage installed on the customer's side of the meter, including systems that can function during a power outage. Its Equity and Equity Resiliency categories are aimed at lower-income, medically vulnerable and at-risk for fire communities.
Depending on the category a customer qualifies for, the incentive is $850 per kilowatt hour under the Equity category or $1,000 per kilowatt-hour under Equity Resiliency. Eligibility criteria and performance requirements are set out in the SGIP Handbook, and applicants have one year after reserving funds to meet them, including enrollment in a qualified Demand Response program. Ask an installer whether you might qualify, and check with the programme rather than taking a sales answer as final.