Solar Panel Cost in North Dakota (2026)

Net metering: Required to 100 kW, excess at avoided cost

North Dakota requires utilities to offer net metering for renewable energy systems up to 100 kW, and that requirement is real and worth having. What it does not guarantee is the value. Utilities usually credit excess generation at avoided cost rather than at the retail rate, and against a North Dakota retail rate around 11 to 12 cents per kWh, exports have been credited at roughly 2 to 4 cents. So the arrangement resembles Georgia, Louisiana or Tennessee more than it resembles Kentucky or Maine: electricity you consume at the moment it is generated displaces a purchase at the full retail rate, while everything else earns a fraction of that. Two things follow. First, the system should be sized to what your household actually uses during daylight rather than to your annual total, because the marginal panels produce mostly exports at the low rate while costing full price. A design covering less than your full annual consumption frequently returns better. Second, shifting flexible loads into daylight converts low-value exports into full-value avoided purchases at no cost, and is worth more here than the effort suggests. North Dakota also has a genuinely northern seasonal profile, with short winter days and snow cover, so ask for the production estimate month by month rather than as an annual figure, with a stated snow allowance. Terms are set per utility, so confirm what applies at your address.