Power surge: law changes could soon bring balcony solar to millions across US
Source: The Guardian
Sun 30 Nov 2025 07.00 EST
Last modified on Sun 30 Nov 2025 07.02 EST
Acquiring solar panels at home can be an expensive hassle for people in the US. But small, simple, plug-in solar panels for use on balconies are soon to become available for millions of Americans, with advocates hoping the technology will quickly go mainstream.
Earlier this year, Utah became the first state in the country to pass legislation allowing people to purchase and install small, portable solar panels that plug into a standard wall socket.
When attached outside to the balcony or patio of a dwelling, such panels can provide enough power for residents to run free of charge, home appliances such as fridges, dishwashers, washing machines and wi-fi without spending money on electricity from the grid.
Balcony solar panels are now widespread in countries such as Germany – where more than 1m homes have them – but have until now been stymied in the US by state regulations. This is set to change, with lawmakers in New York and Pennsylvania filing bills to join Utah in adopting permission for the panels, with Vermont, Maryland and New Hampshire set to follow suit soon.
Read more: https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/nov/30/balcony-solar-power-states-laws
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progree
(12,621 posts)HOAs have more power over their members than Hitler or Trump ever dreamed of having.
FredGarvin
(737 posts)progree
(12,621 posts)yardwork
(68,689 posts)HOS covenants overrule local and state ordinances. An HOA can legitimately make a lot of things illegal in their communities. Most people don't know how much power they have.
The speed bump is usually enforcement. They have to take people to court and a lot of HOAs try to avoid that. However, if they do it and you lose they can put a lien on your house and levy outrageous fines.
Before buying a home in an HOA obtain and read all the bylaws and covenants because if you can't live with their rules you may end up miserable.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)Unless I am incorrect on this, if you plug your inverter into a wall socket, that energizes the line. The problem is that if the power goes out at the location, and if the inverted is plugged into the wall socket, the power line is energized from the panel and could potentially harm/kill a lineman working on the problem.
It follows that the other countries have taken this into consideration. I wonder how they protect a lineman who is working on a power outage.
Anybody know the answer?
FredGarvin
(737 posts)Or be sued to oblivion.
Very dangerous for linemen.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)So it appears that you concur with the concern of energizing a line during a power outage.
I wonder how the other countries do it?
Also, 1KW is not a lot of wattage. My fridge uses 1kw per day. But it could power lights and a washer 1 maybe 2 times.
And, since there is no batter storage, it would only work during sunny days.
mdbl
(7,929 posts)as far as plugging it into a power outlet, I would think you would have to keep it away from the same system that is using the power company as a source. What type of current is being generated by solar? AC or DC? I have no experience with it.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)That implies that an inverter is required to convert DC to AC. You cannot connect DC to an AC outlet.
And what happens if 100 of these 1kw solar power setups are connected and the power goes out? And a lineman is working on the outage - 100kw is a death sentence.
I still am learning about all this. I have a solar generator with 4kw battery storage. In California, there are strict laws about solar because they can kill people.
I do wonder if the electric companies bribe enough politicians to mask the real potential of solar. Of course Republicans and nuke people would never do anything to help solar energy.
groundloop
(13,516 posts)A kilowatt is a unit of power, a kilowatt-hour is a unit of energy. If an appliance uses 1 kilowatt (120 Volts at 8.3 Amps) for 1 hour it has consumed 1 kilowatt-hour of energy.
A modern, efficient refrigerator might use between 1 and 2 kilowatt-hours of energy per day, implying that it draws an average of between 0.042 and 0.084 kilowatt-hours each hour, which means that it's drawing an average of between 42 and 84 watts which at 120 Volts is only 0.35 to 0.7 Amps..... (not very much).
AND, from what I've read about these units they come with a small inverter which has a built in transfer switch function..... it will only supply power while it detects voltage on the outlet it's plugged in to. The user doesn't need to do anything to disconnect it if the grid goes down.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)Thanks for pointing out my typos and laziness.
My fridge takes precisely 1.03 kwh per day (I have a kill-o-watt meter). It doesn't run all day but in a 24-hour period it uses 1.03 kwh/day. Isn't it interesting that the fridge runs 1.03kwn/day no matter what? Sort of means my fridge just runs perodically without any concern for coldness loss...
And groundloop, thanks for:
AND, from what I've read about these units they come with a small inverter which has a built in transfer switch function..... it will only supply power while it detects voltage on the outlet it's plugged in to. The user doesn't need to do anything to disconnect it if the grid goes down."
That would indeed work and protect linemen.
Do you have a link for that? I would definitely like to read it.
DBoon
(24,566 posts)and this is exactly what is used.
Balcony power would be no different
hunter
(40,259 posts)They cut the connection if the power goes out or when something looks wrong with the power supply in terms of voltage, frequency, or waveform.
That can actually be a problem if there are a significant number of these on line. If they all cut out at once this destabilizes the electric grid and causes outages. This has actually happened with larger scale solar and wind projects. The grid starts to get wobbly, solar or wind projects disconnect simultaneously, and the entire grid crashes.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)is a myth. The Electricity Royalists will do and say anything to protect their cash cow...
Solar and wind issues do not impact the grid. Engineers would never allow that to happen...
hunter
(40,259 posts)Keeping an electric grid stable is a balancing act made more difficult when everyone is doing their own thing. That's just the physics of these complex systems. Even in the past, when grids were powered exclusively by huge power plants there would be system wide blackouts. Intermittent and varying inputs of solar and wind power do not improve the stability of any electric grid.
But nobody wants to face the larger horror. A world economy powered entirely by "renewable" energy cannot support 8 billion plus human beings.
It's easier to pretend renewable energy will somehow, miraculously, save the world.
If you don't like your electric company you can go out right now and turn off your main breaker. Or even easier, stop paying the bill. If you have a smart meter they'll disconnect you remotely. ( I remember back in the twentieth century when my wife and I were poor, that they'd actually have to send someone out to turn off your electricity, which would usually buy you a few more days.)
Or maybe I'm missing your sarcasm? There are engineers who build bridges that fall down, airplanes that crash, cars that catch on fire...
Anyways, I bet you'd like this guy:
https://solar.lowtechmagazine.com/about/
I like him too. If the site is not available, that's because it runs on solar power and the batteries are empty, waiting for the sun to shine again.
My internet runs on solar too, but only when the sun is shining. I hate batteries.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)I live in California and according to your profile so do you. Near where I live, the major reason for power failures is PG&E's failure to protect the power lines. Profit first for them, power outages and forest fires are the result. This has zero to do with solar and wind power.
My personal take on solar and wind is that the more we install the less dependent on fossil fuels we become, making out entire planet cleaner. It will save our planet (well, once we get rid of republicans for good). This will take time because the electric moguls want their profit and the hell with the planet.
And it is interesting that your Internet runs on solar and you hate batteries, yet you are able to post at night? Something does not compute.
I have a solar generator (4kwh capacity battery) powered by solar panels. We get power outages here (see above) so having a charged up solar generator will power the fridge for 3 days (as an example).
My plan is to use the generator to power specific needs - like my router and Mac to start off with, then the TV and streaming device. Then I want to power the fridge with the generator - 1kwh per day. My average kwh usage is about 14-20kwh per day.
hunter
(40,259 posts)The big box stores have solar on their rooftops. The schools have parking lot solar, so does the hospital and a neighborhood supermarket. Our neighborhood probably exports power when the sun is shining brightly.
At night everyone who doesn't have batteries, including myself, relies on natural gas power plants to keep the lights on.
You can watch the system in operation here:
https://www.caiso.com/todays-outlook/supply
or, if you like the comparative global perspective, here:
https://app.electricitymaps.com/map/zone/US-CAL-CISO/live/fifteen_minutes
Here in California 39% of our electricity comes from renewables (including big hydro), 10% from nuclear, and the rest is fossil fuels, mostly natural gas.
California also has some of the most expensive electricity in the developed world, which tends to be the case in all places with aggressive renewable energy programs. Sunlight may be free, but capturing that power, storing it, and converting it to AC current is expensive. The limitations of these solar power systems are the same at any scale.
Solar and wind power are incapable of displacing fossil fuels entirely, which is something we need to do. The only energy resource capable of displacing fossil fuels entirely, capable of supporting all eight billion of us, is nuclear power.
I'm a bit blasé about power failures so long as the water keeps running. I can live without washing machines, dryers, televisions, dishwashers and refrigerators. When I was a kid this wasn't unusual, the longest stretch was for about eight months when we lived in Europe, and whenever we were visiting my great grandmother or camping for the summer.
At my worst, as a young adult, I was either homeless, couch surfing, or living in the garden shed of a Vietnam war vet. That's probably the smallest environmental footprint I've ever had.
If I was living alone I probably wouldn't have a refrigerator but I'm married and my wife wouldn't put up with that. Nevertheless, if the power was out long enough that we had to compost all the food in our refrigerator it wouldn't be a huge economic hit. My wife is a vegetarian and I'm mostly vegetarian so there's rarely any meat in there, let alone expensive meat.
Nobody likes doing business with PG&E but that's a different matter. Things went very wrong when they decided they owed more to their shareholders and upper management than they did their customers.
Old Crank
(6,510 posts)Automatically cut off to the apartment to stop that risk.
Many units are also being sold with batteries so you won't lose power in that occasion and won't send excess into the grid for free.
What will happen in the US, I have no clue.
FredGarvin
(737 posts)But a solar panel array from a balcony ain't gonna power a washing machine yo.
A fair portion of a rooftop would be required to do that. On a sunny day.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)My space heater uses 1.3 kw per hour - notorious gobbler of watts. So a clothes washer could easily be ran 3 times and still under 1kwh.
Just fyi…
littlemissmartypants
(31,001 posts)All the panels when they become obsolete junk? Art? Or just create more toxic dumps? How many can be recycled?
IDK...
Obviously, I have questions.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)Panels can last a decade or more. Recycling must be an option to everything we build...
littlemissmartypants
(31,001 posts)I probably need to update my knowledge on the subject. ❤️
Old Crank
(6,510 posts)
SWBTATTReg
(25,910 posts)and saves tons of money having to connect to the local power grid or coop.
hunter
(40,259 posts)And even then they won't keep you supplied with electricity throughout the year, especially during cloudy stretches in the winter. You'll need a fossil fueled backup generator too.
It's a lot less trouble to have someone else generate your electricity. Everything on the other side of your electric meter is not your problem. With an off-grid solar/battery/generator system everything that goes wrong is your problem.
hunter
(40,259 posts)I don't push power back into the electric grid because my smart meter would detect that and the electric company would not be amused.
There are a few things in our home and garden that run continuously, these being my computer servers, some small outdoor fountains, and a small fish pond pump. If I keep my solar power production less than those are drawing so I don't export any power.
I can also reconfigure the system into an off-grid power supply with batteries. That might be useful if the power goes out for a long time in some sort of natural disaster.
People talk about charging their cell phones with these small systems but I don't have a lot of confidence that cell phone service here will keep going if the power is out for a day or more. But it would be nice to have a few reading lights.
Grins
(9,167 posts)How did Germany do it? With 1-million homes using it, how did they make it safe?
(And the Germans test the crap out of everything.)
Old Crank
(6,510 posts)Units are limited to the amount of power that they can push into your house. There are amperage limits to your normal house wiring. That has been tested. They are thinking that they might increase the average allowed after further testing.
The units will not push power into the house if the power goes out. So if your house lises power the solar won't help. You might be able to circumvent with an extension cord to some lights etc.
These are sold as plug and play units and can be added to. You do have to have solid installation of the panels. More people are going with battery backup so thay can augment their electric in the evenings when they can use it.
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)What is the typical or required power output (wattage) of the solar panels? This obviously determines what you can power in the home.
Old Crank
(6,510 posts)Depending on system size. Most balcony units are around 400w at the small end and rated up to 1,000 watts at the high end. But you can only put 800w into you home through the plug. In Germany your 500w panel might give you a bit more than 400w, depending on a whole host of variables. 800 would run all the lights in my apartment and a couple of exhaust fans, 2 bathrooms, kitchen. No necessarily all at once. With Led lights I think my total watts for lights is under 200.
Here is more information from a manufacturer. We can get a setup from IKEA. It is my understanding that apartment owners can no longer stop you from adding on a system. Next year I think we will be checking with our home owners group since we have a south facing balcony.
https://www.ankersolix.com/eu/blogs/balcony-power-plant-with-storage/balcony-power-plant-requirements
SnoopDog
(2,695 posts)And thanks for your reply!