NJ Net Metering in 2026: PSE&G vs. JCP&L vs. Atlantic City Electric vs. Rockland Electric

NJ net metering rules are set statewide in 2026, yet PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, and Rockland Electric each print those rules on your bill using different words. All four bank your surplus kilowatt-hours month to month at full retail value, then settle whatever is left once a year at a wholesale rate far below retail. Drawing on PowerLutions' experience as a leading, award-winning New Jersey solar and battery installer, this guide translates utility terminology into the numbers homeowners actually see on their electric bills.

As of July 28, 2026: New Jersey net metering is governed statewide by the Board of Public Utilities net metering rules at N.J.A.C. 14:8-4.2 and 14:8-4.3, which define the annualized period, require monthly credit rollover, and require year-end compensation at the supplier's avoided cost of wholesale power. The bill labels and customer charges below come from each utility's own current tariff or rate schedule.

• Who qualifies: any residential customer of PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, or Rockland Electric can net meter a system sized no larger than the electricity supplied to them over a historical 12-month period they select, per the state net metering rules.
• Timing: your net metering year is an "annualized period" of 12 consecutive monthly billing periods, and each utility anchors it to when your net meter or net-metered account started, not to the calendar year.
• Monthly credits: surplus production becomes a kilowatt-hour credit that reduces your next bill at retail value in all four territories.
• Annual true-up: leftover kilowatt-hours are cashed out at the avoided cost of wholesale power rather than retail, which is exactly why an oversized array returns far less than homeowners expect.
• Fixed charges: every New Jersey solar customer pays a fixed monthly customer charge regardless of production, currently $4.27 at JCP&L, $6.00 at PSE&G and Rockland Electric, and $6.75 at Atlantic City Electric.

How Does Net Metering Work in New Jersey in 2026?

New Jersey net metering credits you one kilowatt-hour for every kilowatt-hour you export, banks the surplus month to month, and settles whatever is left once a year at a wholesale rate. That three-step mechanic is set by state rule, so it is identical in PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, and Rockland Electric territory. Only the vocabulary changes.

The state rules start by limiting how big your system can be. Under N.J.A.C. 14:8-4.3, eligible generating capacity cannot exceed the electricity supplied to you over a historical 12-month period that you select. In plain English, that is roughly 100 percent of your annual usage, measured against a baseline year you get to choose.

The second piece is the annualized period. N.J.A.C. 14:8-4.2 defines it as 12 consecutive monthly billing periods, and the customer selects when the first one begins. Every utility builds its true-up schedule on top of that definition, which is why your solar year almost never lines up with the calendar year.

The third piece is what happens to surplus. Within the annualized period, excess generation in one billing month reduces your bill in the next month, so the credit effectively holds retail value. At the end of the annualized period, the supplier compensates you for any remaining excess kilowatt-hours at its avoided cost of wholesale power. Those two sentences describe two very different values for the same kilowatt-hour, and the gap between them drives almost every net metering decision you will make.

What Do PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, and Rockland Electric Call Your Solar Export?

Each utility uses its own term for the same thing: PSE&G calls it "Total kWh Out," JCP&L calls it "KWH Out - Received," Atlantic City Electric calls it "excess generation," and Rockland Electric folds it into a "Net Meter Energy Credit." Learning your utility's vocabulary is the difference between reading your bill and guessing at it.

PSE&G: Cumulative Difference, Total kWh In, and Total kWh Out

PSE&G shows "Total kWh In" for what it delivered to you and "Total kWh Out" for what you exported, then reports a running "Cumulative Difference" that tracks your credit or debit balance since your last anniversary. The "Current billable kWh amount" is what you actually pay for that period. One credit is added to your bank for every excess kilowatt-hour, and banked credits from earlier months are applied to reduce later bills.

JCP&L: Delivered, Received, Deposits, and Withdrawals

JCP&L is the most explicit of the four. Its bill separates "KWH Used - Delivered" from "KWH Out - Received," then shows a "Current Month KWH Deposit" when you run a surplus and a "Current Month KWH Withdrawal for Credit" when you draw the bank down. Each received kilowatt-hour, including solar in Brick, offsets a delivered kilowatt-hour one for one, and monthly withdrawals are capped at that month's delivered kilowatt-hours, so the bank can zero out your energy charges but never push them negative. The monthly dollar result appears as a "Net Metering Credit," and the annual payout appears as a "Net Metering True-Up Credit."

Atlantic City Electric: Excess Generation and the Excess Generation Summary

Atlantic City Electric calls the program net energy metering, or NEM, and its tariff rider is formally titled Rider NEM. Overproduction is called "excess generation," and the bill carries a dedicated "Excess Generation Summary" block. Inside that block you will find "Credit kWh Balance from your last bill," "Current month usage KWH," "Current month excess generation KWH," "Total kWh balance," "Credit kWh Expired on Anniversary," and a closing "Credit kWh Balance." Note that Atlantic City Electric does not use the phrases "Net Excess Generation," "NEG," or "True-Up" in its customer-facing materials, even though those terms are common at other utilities and circulate widely on solar comparison sites.

Rockland Electric: Total Usage kWh and Net Meter Energy Credit

Rockland Electric shows a single netted "Total Usage kWh" line, with surplus tracked as a "Net Meter Energy Credit" that appears every month. Rockland Electric serves far northern New Jersey, including parts of Bergen, Passaic, and Sussex counties, and it is an Orange & Rockland company under Con Edison, not a FirstEnergy company like JCP&L. That matters when you go looking for answers: the Orange & Rockland website serves both New York and New Jersey customers, and the two states have completely different net metering rules. Make sure you are reading the New Jersey section.

What Is the Difference Between Delivered and Received Electricity on a New Jersey Solar Bill?

Delivered electricity is what the utility sent to your home; received electricity is what your solar system sent back to the grid. A net meter measures both directions independently, which is why a solar bill shows two energy lines where a non-solar bill shows one.

The practical consequence catches most new solar owners off guard. Your monitoring app reports everything your panels produce. Your bill reports only what crossed the meter heading outward. Anything your home consumes the instant it is produced, the refrigerator, the heat pump, the well pump, the dryer running at noon, never reaches the meter at all.

That gap is a feature, not a billing error. Self-consumed solar avoids the full retail rate immediately, including delivery charges, with no banking, no anniversary, and no true-up. It is the highest-value kilowatt-hour your system will ever produce. Exported kilowatt-hours are the second-best outcome, and kilowatt-hours stranded in the bank at true-up are the third.

How Does Monthly Credit Banking Work Across New Jersey's Four Utilities?

In all four territories the bank is denominated in kilowatt-hours, not dollars: a surplus month deposits kilowatt-hours and a deficit month withdraws them. That single design detail explains why your bank does not lose value when rates rise. A kilowatt-hour banked in June is worth whatever the retail rate happens to be in January when you spend it.

The utilities differ in how visible they make the arithmetic. JCP&L spells out the deposit and the withdrawal as separate line items and caps the withdrawal at that month's delivered kilowatt-hours. Atlantic City Electric is similarly transparent, showing the opening balance, the month's usage, the month's excess generation, and the closing balance inside one Excess Generation Summary block. PSE&G reports a single running "Cumulative Difference" instead, which is more compact but harder to audit month to month. Rockland Electric shows the surplus as a running "Net Meter Energy Credit."

To read your credit bank correctly on any New Jersey bill, work through these five steps:

1. Find the two energy quantities for the month: what the utility delivered to you, and what it received from your system.
2. Find the banking line, whichever form your utility uses: a deposit and withdrawal pair, a cumulative difference, a credit kWh balance, or a net meter energy credit.
3. Confirm the billable kilowatt-hours equal delivered kilowatt-hours minus the credits actually applied that month.
4. Locate your anniversary or annualized period start date, since that is when the bank resets.
5. Compare your running bank against the months left before that reset. If the bank is growing faster than your remaining winter usage can absorb it, you are heading for a wholesale-rate cash-out.

Why Does Oversizing a Solar Array Cost New Jersey Homeowners Money in 2026?

Oversizing costs you because every kilowatt-hour you cannot burn off through the monthly bank is settled at the avoided cost of wholesale power, a fraction of the retail rate that same kilowatt-hour would have offset. The state rules are explicit about this: at the end of the annualized period, remaining excess is compensated at wholesale avoided cost, not retail.

There are two separate boundaries at work, and homeowners tend to notice only the first. The regulatory boundary caps eligible system capacity at your electricity use over a historical 12-month period you select. The economic boundary sits lower and is about shape rather than size: New Jersey solar overproduces in summer and underproduces in winter, so an array that matches your annual total on paper can still deposit far more into the bank in July than your December and January bills can withdraw.

Life changes make it worse. A system sized against a baseline year when three kids lived at home can be badly oversized two years later. Because the sizing baseline is a historical 12-month period, nothing recalculates automatically when your usage drops, and the surplus quietly starts arriving at the annual reset instead of offsetting retail kilowatt-hours. Atlantic City Electric customers can watch this happen in real time on the "Credit kWh Expired on Anniversary" line.

Do New Jersey Solar Customers Still Pay Fixed Charges in 2026?

Yes, and each utility's amount is set in its own tariff: $4.27 a month at JCP&L, $6.00 at PSE&G, $6.00 at Rockland Electric, and $6.75 at Atlantic City Electric. This is a fixed delivery-side charge you pay every month regardless of how much your system generates, and net metering credits do not touch it.

Those effective dates matter. Customer charges move with rate cases, and Rockland Electric's current figure took effect only this month. Treat the table above as accurate as of July 28, 2026 and confirm against a recent bill before you build it into a payback calculation.

The reason the charge survives net metering is structural. Net metering nets kilowatt-hours. The customer charge is not a kilowatt-hour charge; it pays for the connection itself, the meter, the line to your house, and the crews that restore it after a storm. A bank denominated in kilowatt-hours has nothing to apply against a flat monthly fee. Atlantic City Electric's tariff states the point plainly: in a month where you deliver more energy than you consume, you are billed the customer charge and any applicable demand charges, and nothing else.

How Does PSE&G's Time-of-Use Rate Change Solar Credits in New Jersey?

PSE&G's voluntary time-of-use rate splits your net metering credits into separate banks by time period, so midday solar exports do not automatically offset expensive on-peak usage. PSE&G's residential time-of-use rate, RS-TOU 3P, took effect June 1, 2026, with an on-peak window of 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. on weekdays. This wrinkle is PSE&G-specific and does not apply to JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, or Rockland Electric customers.

PSE&G describes each time-of-use period as having its own energy credit bank, and states that the banks cannot be combined. Rooftop solar in New Jersey does most of its work between mid-morning and mid-afternoon, which sits outside the 4 p.m. to 9 p.m. on-peak window. Exported kilowatt-hours therefore accumulate in the mid-peak and off-peak banks while the on-peak bank, the one attached to the most expensive hours, stays close to empty.

This description comes from PSE&G's customer-facing materials rather than verified tariff text, so confirm the bank structure with PSE&G directly before switching rates. If you are weighing time-of-use with an existing solar array, that phone call is worth more than any rate calculator.

• PSE&G Time-of-Use Rates Are Live: Can a Home Battery Lower Your Electric Bill?
• Is a Free Home Battery Worth It When Backup Power Is Not Guaranteed?
• Solar and Battery Equipment in 2026: Domestic Content, FEOC, and Who Actually Gets the Tax Credit
• Can I Add a Tesla Powerwall to My Existing Solar Panels in New Jersey?
• What Makes a Good Commercial Solar Installer? A Practical Guide for NJ Businesses in 2026

Frequently Asked Questions About Net Metering in New Jersey

What happens to my banked solar credits if I switch to a third-party electricity supplier?

The settlement moves to the supplier. JCP&L's published billing materials state that when a customer buys supply from a third-party supplier, that supplier, not JCP&L, pays out the true-up credit and resets the bank. Atlantic City Electric's tariff handles it the same way, settling the annual reconciliation through the supplier rather than as a direct cash-out, though the annualized-period timing rule does not change. Before you sign a supplier contract as a solar customer, ask in writing how that supplier handles annual net metering settlement, because a low advertised supply rate is worth very little if it comes with a worse true-up.

What is an annualized period in New Jersey net metering?

An annualized period is 12 consecutive monthly billing periods, defined that way in the state net metering rules, and it is the window in which your kilowatt-hour bank fills and empties. Rockland Electric and Atlantic City Electric both use that exact phrase. PSE&G calls its version a contract year and settles it at the Anniversary True-Up. JCP&L ties it to the anniversary of the account becoming net metered. Different names, same 12-month clock.

Which New Jersey utility pays the most for surplus solar at the end of the year?

None of them pays retail, and no utility is reliably better than the others. All four settle leftover kilowatt-hours against PJM wholesale locational marginal pricing, which floats constantly and is recalculated every annualized period, so nobody can quote you a dependable cents-per-kilowatt-hour figure in advance. You also cannot choose your electric distribution utility in New Jersey, since it is determined by your address. The only lever that actually raises the value of surplus is consuming more of it yourself through load shifting or storage.

Why do the four New Jersey utilities describe net metering credits so differently?

Because the state sets the mechanism while each utility writes its own tariff language and bill format. The net metering rules require monthly rollover and an annual avoided-cost settlement from all four companies, but nothing requires them to use the same words. That is why "Cumulative Difference" at PSE&G, "Net Metering Credit" at JCP&L, "excess generation" at Atlantic City Electric, and "Net Meter Energy Credit" at Rockland Electric all describe the same underlying mechanic.

Does a bigger solar array always mean a bigger net metering credit in New Jersey?

No. Past roughly your annual usage, additional production stops offsetting retail kilowatt-hours and starts landing in the annual settlement at the avoided cost of wholesale power. State rules also cap eligible capacity at the electricity supplied to you over a historical 12-month period you select, so a substantially oversized array is both worth less per kilowatt-hour and potentially outside the net metering sizing rule.

Is there a statewide limit on how many New Jersey homes can net meter?

There is a statutory trigger, but it is discretionary rather than an automatic shutoff. N.J.S.A. 48:3-87 provides that the Board may authorize suppliers to stop offering net metering to customers who are not already net metered once statewide net-metered capacity equals 5.8 percent of total annual kilowatt-hours sold in the state. The Board is not required to act at that point. Be aware that a lower figure circulates widely on solar comparison sites; the statute itself says 5.8 percent.

Size Your New Jersey Solar System Around Your Bill, Not Around Your Roof

The four utilities use four vocabularies for one set of state rules, and the rules reward the same behavior everywhere: build to your actual annual usage, consume as much of your own production as you can, and pick your anniversary date on purpose. The homeowners who lose money on net metering are almost never the ones who built too small.

If you want your array sized against your real 12-month usage rather than your available roof area, PowerLutions designs residential solar and battery systems across PSE&G, JCP&L, Atlantic City Electric, and Rockland Electric territory, and we will walk through your current bill line by line before recommending a system size.

Call 732-987-3939 or email info@powerlutions.com with a recent electric bill, and we will show you exactly where your credits are going and what a correctly sized system would do to that number.