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Net Metering Program
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Upper Peninsula Power Company net metering in Michigan

Much of the Upper Peninsula, including Marquette and Houghton. Small and remote, with the standard residential rate at about 25.7 cents a kilowatt hour in late 2026, which changes the arithmetic in solar’s favor.

Type
Investor owned
Accounts
52K

What they credit you

Retail in, about 11.5 cents out

Published terms

Under the Distributed Generation Rider, inflow is billed at the full rate of about 25.7 cents a kWh and outflow is credited at the power supply energy charges plus the power supply cost recovery factor, about 11.5 cents from May 2026. The two are counted separately rather than netted.

Month to month
Unused outflow credit carries forward to later bills and is refunded if you leave the program.

Published terms · checked 2026-10-01 · source

Installers serving UPPCO customers

Pick one. Only the company you choose receives your details, and only that company calls you.

Not sure which to choose?

These are real companies operating in UPPCO territory. Bold Energy is listed first because it is the company we introduce first. That order is our choice, not a score. The other companies are ordered by reviews, years trading and BBB grade. None of them pays us for placement. Pick the one you want and we will call you to arrange it.

Ordering combines three things we read from primary sources: Google review count and rating, years trading taken from the company’s Better Business Bureau profile rather than its own marketing, and its BBB letter grade. BBB accreditation is shown but never scored, because it is a paid membership rather than a mark of quality.

Check any contractor license yourself at the state register. Do that before you sign anything, with any company, including ours.

What this looks like on a UPPCO bill

An average Michigan household, against a system sized to cover its year. The energy charge is the part that goes to zero. The fixed monthly charge underneath it is the part that never does, and it is the number that decides whether a system pays for itself.

Meter readingkWh
Energy charge$142.08
$142.08
We have read this provider’s own tariff. What it still bills you at zero is set out below, with the sheet it came from. The energy line above uses the statewide average. See what they still bill
DirectionReading…

Meter reading falling from 41926 to 41754 kilowatt hours. A 618 kilowatt hour month against 790 kilowatt hours produced leaves 0 kilowatt hours billed and 172 banked for next month, so the energy charge falls from $142.08 to $0.00 at 22.99 cents per kilowatt hour.

Michigan average household use, 618 kWh a month, at the current published residential price of 22.99¢ per kWh. Your utility still bills a fixed monthly customer charge that no system offsets, so this is the energy part of the bill, which is the part that goes away.

UPPCO requirementRequired

Battery backup is mandatory
in UPPCO territory.

UPPCO does not credit the power you send back at the rate it charges you to take it.

That does not make solar a bad idea in UPPCO territory. It changes what you should build. When exports are worth a fraction of retail the credit stops being the return, and the job becomes using more of your own production inside the house, which usually means a larger array than a one for one utility would need.

Sizing is where that gets decided, so ask about it directly. Michigan bills what you consume at retail and credits what you export at a lower outflow rate, so the kilowatt hour your panels make and your house uses at the same moment is the one worth most. Sizing and load shifting matter more here than array size. UPPCO sets its own limits. Ask UPPCO what it allows before you accept that a bigger system is off the table.

A battery then does two separate jobs. It moves daytime production into the evening so you use it instead of selling it, and it keeps the house running when the grid goes down. That second job is not a bonus. Panels on their own shut off in an outage, by design, so a roof full of them powers nothing during a storm. That is the part we will not refer around.

So we treat it as a requirement, not an upgrade. We will not refer you for a panels-only system in UPPCO territory, and you should be skeptical of anyone who quotes you one without raising storage first.

Our referral policy, not a legal or utility requirement

What your installer should be telling you

Distribution, 13.567 cents of every kilowatt hour you buy, is never credited back, so solar is worth most here when you use it at the time it is generated.

What UPPCO bills you anyway

In a month when your production covers everything you use, the energy charge can reach zero. This does not. It is the floor under every bill, and it is the number that decides whether a system pays for itself.

The charge
$15.00 a month, $16.50 with the low-income fund surcharge
How it is set
Residential Service A-1 sets a Service Charge of $15.00 a month ($0.4932 a day) for year-round service, or $30.00 for seasonal, effective 1 January 2025 (Case U-21555), and its minimum charge is “The service charge included in the rate.” The Low-Income Energy Assistance Fund surcharge adds a fixed $1.50 a month per residential site from September 2026, so a month of zero use costs $16.50. Energy is 13.567 cents a kilowatt hour for distribution plus the 0.64 cent energy waste reduction surcharge, and 9.19 cents for power supply (8.567 non-capacity and 0.623 capacity) plus the power supply cost recovery factor, 2.342 cents from May to December 2026: about 25.7 cents in all. Under the Distributed Generation Rider, everything you draw (inflow) is billed at that full rate, and everything you export (outflow) is credited at the power supply charges and the recovery factor only, about 11.5 cents from May 2026, because distribution is not credited. Unused credit carries forward and is refunded if you leave the program. Systems are limited to 110% of the previous 12 months’ use, and the application fee is $50.

Upper Peninsula Power Company, MPSC Vol. No. 8 - Electric: Residential Service A-1, 11th Rev. Sheet No. D-4.00, effective 1 January 2025 (Case U-21555), and 3rd Rev. Sheet No. D-5.00; LIEAF, 8th Rev. Sheet No. D-78.00, effective 1 September 2026; Energy Waste Reduction, 22nd Rev. Sheet No. D-73.00, effective 1 October 2025; PSCR, 230th Revised Sheet No. D-2.00 (2026 plan, Case U-21883); Distributed Generation Rider, Sheet Nos. D-72.80 to D-72.85 · checked 2026-10-01 · source

Applying to UPPCO

What UPPCO itself requires, as distinct from what the state rule requires. Read from its own published guidelines on the date shown.

Inflow and outflow are counted separately, and that is deliberate
A smart meter sums power flowing to the grid and from the grid. Consumption is billed at the retail rate; exports are credited at the utility’s outflow rate, which is lower. The two are not netted against each other.
Self consumption never touches either total
Energy your panels produce and your house uses in the same moment does not flow either way, so it is worth the full retail rate. Under an inflow-outflow arrangement that is the most valuable kilowatt hour you can make.
Net metering itself ended under PA 342 of 2016
Existing net metering customers were grandfathered for ten years. New applicants enrol in the distributed generation program instead.
The cap has moved, upward
The program was capped at 1% of each utility’s peak load. Public Act 235 of 2023 raised the aggregate distributed generation cap to 10% of average in-state peak load, and Consumers agreed to double its own from 1% to 2%.
Ask for the outflow rate as a number
The whole economics of a Michigan system sits in the gap between the retail rate you pay and the outflow rate you are paid. A quote that does not state the outflow rate is not a quote you can check.

From UPPCO’s published guidelines · checked 2026-09-05 · source

UPPCO net metering questions

Does UPPCO offer one for one net metering?
No. Under the Distributed Generation Rider, inflow is billed at the full rate of about 25.7 cents a kWh and outflow is credited at the power supply energy charges plus the power supply cost recovery factor, about 11.5 cents from May 2026. The two are counted separately rather than netted.
What does UPPCO pay for power sent back to the grid?
Retail in, about 11.5 cents out. Unused outflow credit carries forward to later bills and is refunded if you leave the program.
Do I need a battery with UPPCO?
Yes, and we treat it as mandatory. Because UPPCO does not credit exports one for one, the return has to come from using your own production rather than selling it, which after dark means storage and usually a larger array than a one for one utility would need. The other half is backup: panels alone shut off in an outage, so a battery is what keeps the house running in a storm. We do not refer panels-only systems in UPPCO territory. This is our referral policy, not a legal or utility requirement.
How do I find my UPPCO bill?
Sign in at uppco.com. Open My Account, then Billing. Open the latest bill and save the PDF. Or screenshot the summary page. If you cannot get to it, a rough guess at your average monthly amount is enough to start.
What is the catch with UPPCO?
Distribution, 13.567 cents of every kilowatt hour you buy, is never credited back, so solar is worth most here when you use it at the time it is generated.