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What you are paid for export
Three regimes we hold data for: the Smart Export Guarantee in Great Britain, the end of Dutch net metering, and California's net billing tariff. Nothing else, because a plausible summary of a rule we have not checked is the one mistake this site cannot afford.
What the Smart Export Guarantee actually pays
The Smart Export Guarantee replaced the Feed-in Tariff in 2020, but it works nothing like it. Suppliers set their own SEG rates, there is no minimum worth the name, and the gap between the best and worst export tariff is the whole story.
Read the guide- EconomicsWhy a unit you use is worth more than a unit you exportSelf-consumed solar is paid at the retail price you avoid. Exported solar is paid at your SEG rate, a fraction of it. That gap decides what your panels earn, and it is what home battery storage is actually buying.7 min
- RulesWhich SEG export rate is actually the best for youThe supplier at the top of an export league table is usually not the one that will pay you the most. Four conditions sit between the advertised rate and the money that reaches your account, and three of them are invisible on a comparison page.9 min
- RulesDutch net metering ends on 1 January 2027The salderingsregeling is abolished by a law that passed both chambers in 2024. There is no grandfathering: an array commissioned in 2019 and one commissioned in December 2026 both lose net metering on the same day. What replaces it is a supplier-set payment with a statutory floor until 2030.8 min
- RulesHow US solar export payment works, state by stateThere is no national answer, because net metering is set by states and utilities rather than by Washington. There are only three shapes a regime can take, and once you know which one covers you, your own tariff sheet becomes readable.10 min
- RulesWhat California NEM 3.0 pays for exported solarUnder the Net Billing Tariff, an exported kilowatt-hour is no longer worth the retail rate. It is worth whatever the Avoided Cost Calculator says it is worth in that specific hour of that specific month, and those values are lowest in the middle of a sunny day.8 min