Connecticut solar rebates and incentives: 2026 guide

Going solar in Connecticut is more affordable than most people realize. While your state may not have the flashiest incentive programs in the country, there are still meaningful ways to reduce your system costs—and more importantly, solar's real value comes from decades of electricity savings, not just upfront rebates.

Connecticut homeowners have access to some incentives that can help offset installation costs. But the biggest financial advantage of going solar? Dramatically lowering your electric bills for 25-30 years, especially as utility rates keep climbing. Here's what you need to know about solar incentives in Connecticut.

Connecticut offers some solar incentives, which can help lower the price. Here are the ones to know about:

Smart E-Loan program

Choosing the best financing solution for your solar panel system can be tricky. Connecticut Green Bank's Smart-E Loan program makes it easier. As long as you live in your home and it doesn't include more than four residential units, you should be eligible. This loan program covers many different types of energy home improvements, including solar, heat pumps, insulation, and more. You'll also need to have a qualifying credit score and debt-to-income ratio.

As of 2025, loan terms range from 5 to 12 years with interest rates between 4.49% and 6.99% standard APR.

One other benefit of choosing a Smart-E Loan is that you can use up to 25% of it for non-energy-related home improvements. For example, if you need to replace or repair your roof before going solar, you can use the loan to cover at least part of it.

In addition to the great rebates and incentives above, Connecticut also offers tax exemptions for solar panel systems. The solar sales tax exemption ensures that you won't have to pay a sales tax on your system, while the solar property tax exemption means you don't need to pay a higher property tax for adding solar panels to your house.

Connecticut no longer offers net metering, but if your solar panel system is less than or equal to 25 kW and connected to the grid, you can benefit from its Residential Renewable Energy Solutions (RRES) program.

Under the RRES program, there are two different types of tariffs you can sign up for, the Netting Tariff and the Buy-All Tariff. You're locked into either tariff for 20 years, at which point you'll be put on whatever tariff exists at that time.

Netting Tariff

The Netting Tariff is the best option for homeowners. It's very similar to net metering in that you earn credits when you send excess electricity from your solar panels to the grid. When the sun isn't shining and you need to pull electricity from the grid, your utility will apply the credits to your bill. 

Under the former net metering program, your credits were valued at the retail electricity rate if you used them by March 1. After that date, they were paid out at the lower wholesale electricity rate. But with Connecticut's Netting Tariff, your credits now roll over indefinitely, making it better than net metering.

Buy-All Tariff

With the Buy-All Tariff, instead of powering your home with solar panels, you send all that electricity directly to the grid and purchase all your power from your utility company. The value of the credits you earn remains the same throughout the 20 years at $0.3189 per kWh. You can choose to receive the credits to offset your monthly bill or earn a cash payment every quarter–or you can do a combination of both. A the end of the year, you'll receive a payout for any credits you didn't use to offset your bill. 

The Buy-All Tariff makes the most sense for companies that offer power purchase agreements (PPAs) and want to ensure a guaranteed return on investment. 

Learn more about the RRES programs available in Connecticut:

In addition to solar incentives, Connecticut also offers a great battery incentive program to bring down the price of energy storage, including an upfront incentive and a performance incentive. 

If you participate in Connecticut's Energy Storage Solutions program, you grant your utility company (Eversource or United Illuminating) access to your battery when the grid is stressed to reduce peak electricity demand. In exchange, you earn an upfront incentive to reduce the cost of your battery and money for every kW your battery dispatches to the grid, which are paid twice a year for 10 years. 

The amount of the upfront incentive depends on the capacity of your battery (measured in kWh), your income, and your home's location, with a maximum amount of $16,000. Low-income customers and households in underserved communities will earn more. Also, if you're a Grid Edge customer, meaning you experience frequent or long-duration outages, you'll get an additional 50% of your incentive amount. It's a declining incentive for standard customers, which means the faster the program fills up, the lower the incentive amount.

The performance incentive amount depends on the amount of energy your battery sends to the grid (measured in kW), how many years you've been in the program, and whether the energy is dispatched in the summer or winter. Unlike the upfront incentive, it isn't based on your income or your home's location.