Maximizing Solar ROI: How POSH’s Battery Solutions Help Solar Owners Beat NEM 3.0 and Rising Tariffs
With California’s shift to NEM 3.0, solar customers face new challenges as they now receive credits based on wholesale rates, extending ROI timelines. POSH offers a strategic solution through battery leasing and DC coupling, allowing customers to store excess solar energy, optimize energy use, and avoid the need to switch to NEM 3.0. POSH’s system lets existing NEM 2.0 users expand their solar capacity by up to 20% without exceeding grid backfeed limits, helping mitigate rising tariffs while enhancing self-consumption. This approach allows customers to maximize solar ROI and empowers EPCs to deliver optimized, scalable energy solutions
When the Net Energy Metering (NEM) 3.0 officially became the Net Billing Tariff (NBT) tariff in 2024, it created significant challenges for potential customers. No longer would customers who installed solar receive the retail rate based on their solar energy production, which would help reduce the time to ROI for their solar installation. Now, customers would receive a credit for solar production that was based on an Avoided Cost Calculator, which mimics the wholesale costs.
This major change in NEM created two major inflections. One is that new customers on NBT would require a battery installation to help with energy arbitrage, improving the ROI of solar installation. The other is the tsunami of newly registered customers and existing PV owners who implemented solar under NEM 2.0 or NEM 1.0 before April 15th of 2023, when all new customers would be forced to NBT. In many cases, the solar may not have been perfectly sized, which left customers frustrated with poor outcomes. The other action is the recent regulatory approvals for tariff changes. In this year alone, business and agricultural tariffs have skyrocketed to between 17-24% from 2023 and have increased 85-150% in the last three years. These recent tariff increases not only impact recent NEM 2.0 solar installs but also hurt original NEM 1.0 customers. Customers no longer see the value of their original solar installs as their planned ROI has evaporated due to the enormous tariff increases. Customers and EPCs need ways to respond and provide a stronger ROI. POSH can help mitigate this and improve outcomes through DC coupling of solar directly with a POSH BESS system.
DC coupling refers to connecting a solar system's solar panels directly to a battery's energy storage system without using a solar inverter. This can offer increased efficiency and flexibility for energy management, especially when using a battery for backup power or load shifting. Now, the battery will store the PV when wanted or needed with the assurance of non-export generation thanks to POSH’s battery management system. Having the battery act as the overall management of the back feed for the added DC-coupled solar panels creates a new opportunity for customers and EPCs. With POSH’s DC coupling and non-exporting of generation with the existing rules under Rule 21, EPCs can add up to 20% more PV to their existing site. This 20% limit fits within the existing Rule 21 guidelines for the California IOUs, which means the customer will not need to change from a NEM 2.0 to NEM 3.0, as the back feed to the grid has not increased thanks to POSH’s DC coupling and energy management system that can optimize for the over-generation of solar into the battery. This unique approach allows a customer to take advantage of a POSH battery through our unique leasing terms or direct procurement to help offset the evening peak hours by storing energy when costs are low and using it when costs are high. It also allows the customer to increase on-site energy production, which helps reduce the impact of continued rate increases.
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