Solar Valuation and the Modern Utility's Expansion into Distributed Generation

Residential solar's diffusion across the U.S. power grid is inspiring concern in the utility industry. Of particular debate have been net energy metering policies (NEM), which engender revenue losses and lead to cross-subsidization of solar customers by non-solar customers. An emerging alternative to NEM is the value of solar tariff (VOST), which is designed to pay residential solar generation based on a more nuanced benefit-cost analysis to determine the actual value of residential solar to utility operations.