California has been a national leader in meeting solar energy targets for fighting climate change, but that could change in the near future. A key part of solar’s success has been widespread adoption of rooftop systems by forward-thinking homeowners. Given that new technologies are initially expensive, homeowners were incentivized to adopt rooftop solar through rates using net energy metering, or NEM for short. NEM allows homeowners to share their excess energy back to the utility at the same rate they pay for electricity, so they are billed based on the net energy consumed.
