Last week, we were excited to report that the New Jersey Solar Rebate program had reopened, providing $0.75/watt installed for residential solar photovoltaics (PV). It was amazing news, but these rebates usually get used up in a few days. New Jersey only allocated $6,650,000 for this funding period, which is relatively small given the size of their market and growing popularity of solar PV. It might sound crazy to assume a rebate would only be closed after a few days, but some states have closed programs after a day or even a few hours. Demand for solar rebates consistently exceeds supply.
Nonetheless, check out this graph showing funding available for New Jersey’s solar rebates, courtesy of the New Jersey Clean Energy Program:
That’s right. This program has been open since September 1st, and seven days later, less than half of the funds have been used up. I know it was Labor Day Weekend and solar was the last thing on anyone’s mind, but this is still odd. All of us in the GetSolar office were speculating on when this would close (that’s what you bet on when you’re a solar geek). Everyone guessed that the program would close before the end of the day today.
New Jersey residents: we know you have a great market for solar renewable energy credits (SRECs) already, but you might like having an extra rebate to bump down the cost of the PV system you’ve been coveting. Right now it’s an especially good time to get solar.
The relatively slow pace of reservations for New Jersey’s Renewable Energy Incentive Program, particularly compared to earlier cycles this year, is not at all surprising in light of the fact that commercial systems are ineligible for funding in this round. Being that they are generally larger, commercial systems take up a larger proportion of funds on a per-system basis, but they also produce more energy and often have a lower per-watt system cost, which would make New Jersey’s renewable energy dollars stretch further.