Photovoltaics: Net metering broke all records in 2023

High energy costs drove households and businesses toward self-consumption. Notably, within 2023, as many net-metering systems (energy offsetting) were installed as in all the previous years combined.

Specifically, as Stelios Psomas, adviser to the Hellenic Association of Photovoltaic Companies, told OT, a further 209,4 MW (megawatts) of self-consumption systems using net metering were connected to the electricity grid from early January to the end of November 2023. Of these, 6.067 were residential systems with a total capacity of 42,6 MW. In fact, estimates suggest that, including December, the total will exceed 50 MW.

Of the residential systems installed in 2023, 1.233 also included a battery (the total capacity of systems with batteries was 8,8 MW). These were included in the “Photovoltaics on Roofs” program (although the subsidy has not yet been paid). The remaining 166 MW were commercial self-consumption systems.

The figures show that 2023 was a record year for self-consumption, with 209,4 MW installed, compared with a total of 222 MW of net-metering systems installed over the previous eight years. Specifically, a total of 119,1 MW was installed in 2022, 47,6 MW in 2021, 20,2 MW in 2020, and 35,2 MW from 2015 through 2019.

Systems installed by businesses made a major contribution to this net-metering “boom,” as businesses rushed to act before the self-generation rules changed. 

As a reminder, under the new regulations passed last March (Law 5037/2023), a limit was set on the capacity of photovoltaic systems installed to cover some of the energy needs of industrial and manufacturing businesses: 100 kW (kilowatts), down from the previous limit of 3 MW.

However, businesses had until 30 June 2023 to submit applications to DEDDIE for net metering under the old rules (up to 3 MW).

Since then, however, everything has been “on hold,” as the ministerial decision required to implement the new self-generation rules has not yet been issued by the Ministry of Environment and Energy (YPEN). This decision will also bring net billing into effect.

Law 5037/2023 allows self-generators to sell surplus “green” energy that they produce but do not consume in real time (net billing): either to the electricity system, if the amount is up to 1.500 MWh (megawatt-hours) per year, at 0,065 euros per kilowatt-hour (kWh); or on the Energy Exchange through an Aggregator of Renewable Energy Sources (FOSE), or through bilateral electricity purchase agreements, if the amount exceeds 1.500 megawatt-hours.

Source: Oikonomikos Tachydromos