The net-metering scheme for solar panels will be ended definitively from 1 January 2027. The law regulating the termination of net-metering was passed by a majority in the Senate.
Not only government parties PVV, VVD and BoerBurgerBeweging (BBB) voted in favour of ending net-metering, but also CDA, ChristenUnie and D66, among others, voted in favour of the bill regulating the termination of the successful incentive measure.
Upper House
Last week it already became clear that Climate and Green Growth Minister Hermans seemed to have found a majority in the Upper House. For a majority, the ruling parties BBB, VVD, PVV and NSC - which has no seats in the Upper House - still needed the votes of at least eight senators.
The bill ending the balancing scheme from 2027 finally received the support of over two-thirds of the 75 senators in the vote. Besides the 30 votes in favour from the governing parties, CDA (6 seats), D66 (5 seats), ChristenUnie (3 seats), Volt (2 seats), Forum for Democracy (2 seats) and 50PLUS (1 seat) also voted in favour of Minister Hermans' bill.
11 years of political debate
With the final ending of the net-metering scheme, the political debate on net-metering comes to an end after more than a decade. Initial talks on ending the balancing scheme already took place in November 2013.
‘We are happy that there is now finally clarity for solar panel owners and the solar industry,’ Nold Jaeger of Holland Solar let it be known after the vote in the Upper House. The head of public affairs at industry association stresses that political ping-pong has never been good for the solar sector. ‘That there is now finally clarity gives companies in our sector peace of mind. The sights can now be set on the future and the focus should be shifted to encouraging them to increase their own consumption of solar power. Research by CE Delft and TNO shows that consumers who use twice as much solar power themselves pay back their solar panels twice as fast. The government should get to work to encourage self-consumption.’
Flexbonus
To increase that own consumption, Holland Solar advocates adding a flex bonus to the Sustainable Energy Investment Subsidy (ISDE). That is a stacked subsidy that rewards combining the purchase or ownership of solar panels with a measure to increase self-consumption.
The industry association points to Germany, for example, which introduced such a flex bonus earlier. Jaeger: ‘And with results, as 75 per cent of solar installations here now include a home battery or heat pump. Since the ISDE scheme is accessible not only to consumers, but also to housing associations, municipalities and SMEs, it also offers opportunities for tenants and homeowners with limited investment capacity to structurally reduce their energy bills.’
What will change for solar panel owners from 1 January 2027?
From 1 January 2027, solar panel owners will now definitely no longer be allowed to net up. This removes the possibility of offsetting the ‘returned’ power from, say, the summer against power ‘taken’ in the winter.
From 2027, consumers with solar panels will receive reasonable compensation from their energy supplier for every kilowatt-hour of electricity from their solar panels that they feed back. The amount of this so-called feed-in compensation is fixed until 1 January 2030 at at least 50 per cent of the bare delivery price.
In addition, from 2027, energy suppliers will no longer be allowed to charge feed-in costs related to the balancing scheme. However, they will still be allowed to charge, for instance, feed-in costs for the imbalance costs that solar panel owners cause for energy companies. So while this will reduce feed-in costs, it will not completely disappear.
At the request of the VVD and Christian Union, 3 years after the abolition of the energy-saving scheme conducted an evaluation, to find out, among other things, whether solar panel owners actually have an incentive to increase self-consumption due to the removal of net-metering.
Source: https://solarmagazine.nl/
