Montana-Dakota Utilities net metering in North Dakota
Western and central North Dakota, including Bismarck, Dickinson and Williston. Also serves Montana, South Dakota and Wyoming, under four different sets of state rules.
- Type
- Investor owned
- Accounts
- 80K
What they credit you
3.416 cents a kilowatt hour for what you export
Published termsThis utility buys exported energy at 3.416 cents a kilowatt hour under Occasional Power Purchase Rate 95, 4th Revised Sheet No. 44, effective 1 September 2026. It sells you power at about 11.85 cents, so a kilowatt hour you use yourself is worth roughly three times one you send back. The fixed monthly charge stays on the bill either way.
- Month to month
- Settlement is in dollars on the monthly bill rather than a bank of kilowatt hours carried forward.
Published terms · checked 2026-09-29 · source
Installers serving MDU customers
Pick one. Only the company you choose receives your details, and only that company calls you.
These are real companies operating in MDU territory, 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 MDU bill
An average North Dakota 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 reading falling from 41926 to 41639 kilowatt hours. A 1,029 kilowatt hour month against 1,316 kilowatt hours produced leaves 0 kilowatt hours billed and 287 banked for next month, so the energy charge falls from $145.29 to $0.00 at 14.12 cents per kilowatt hour.
North Dakota average household use, 1,029 kWh a month, at the current published residential price of 14.12¢ 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.
Battery backup is mandatory
in MDU territory.
MDU 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 MDU 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. North Dakota requires net metering only of its investor owned utilities and has among the lowest retail rates in the country, so both the credit and the bill it offsets are small. Size to daytime usage and check first which kind of utility you are on. MDU sets its own limits. Ask MDU 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 MDU 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
Size this to what the house actually uses during daylight rather than to the roof, because self consumption is worth three times what export is worth here. Note the contrast with the same company across the state line: MDU’s Montana customers get genuine one-for-one kilowatt hour netting under Rate 92, while its North Dakota customers get 3.416 cents in cash. Same utility, same meter, different state. Confirm the current figure in writing before you sign: this rate is reset by filing, Case No. PU-26-241 is the one in force today, and North Dakota's fixed monthly charges are among the highest in the country, so they dominate the arithmetic on a small system.
What MDU 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
- $15.24 a month as filed, about $19.22 with the interim increase
- How it is set
- Rate 10 prices the fixed charge by the day: "Basic Service Charge: $0.501 per day", which is $15.24 across an average month, and the tariff makes that charge the floor. A separate line then adds an "Interim Rate Increase: 26.118% of amount billed under Basic Service Charge, Energy Charge and Demand Charge", taking the real figure to about $19.22. That interim increase comes from an open rate case, so it is provisional — in North Dakota as in Montana, interim rates are refundable if the Commission ultimately sets lower permanent ones.
Residential Electric Service Rate 10, North Dakota Electric Rate Schedule, NDPSC Volume 5 · checked 2026-09-29 · source
Applying to MDU
What MDU itself requires, as distinct from what the state rule requires. Read from its own published guidelines on the date shown.
- Only the investor owned utilities have to offer it
- Net metering is available to customers of all investor owned utilities. At the municipal systems and the cooperatives it is optional, and the cooperatives cover much of the state.
- Most customers are on net billing, not one for one
- Excess energy is generally credited at a rate well below retail rather than netted against consumption at retail.
- Low retail rates make the arithmetic harder
- North Dakota has among the cheapest residential electricity in the country. The bill a system offsets is small before any credit rate is applied.
- Ask what kind of utility you are on first
- The answer to every other question depends on it. A cooperative here is not obliged to offer anything.
From MDU’s published guidelines · checked 2026-09-29 · source
MDU net metering questions
- Does MDU offer one for one net metering?
- No. This utility buys exported energy at 3.416 cents a kilowatt hour under Occasional Power Purchase Rate 95, 4th Revised Sheet No. 44, effective 1 September 2026. It sells you power at about 11.85 cents, so a kilowatt hour you use yourself is worth roughly three times one you send back. The fixed monthly charge stays on the bill either way.
- What does MDU pay for power sent back to the grid?
- 3.416 cents a kilowatt hour for what you export. Settlement is in dollars on the monthly bill rather than a bank of kilowatt hours carried forward.
- Do I need a battery with MDU?
- Yes, and we treat it as mandatory. Because MDU 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 MDU territory. This is our referral policy, not a legal or utility requirement.
- How do I find my MDU bill?
- Sign in at montana-dakota.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 MDU?
- Size this to what the house actually uses during daylight rather than to the roof, because self consumption is worth three times what export is worth here. Note the contrast with the same company across the state line: MDU’s Montana customers get genuine one-for-one kilowatt hour netting under Rate 92, while its North Dakota customers get 3.416 cents in cash. Same utility, same meter, different state. Confirm the current figure in writing before you sign: this rate is reset by filing, Case No. PU-26-241 is the one in force today, and North Dakota's fixed monthly charges are among the highest in the country, so they dominate the arithmetic on a small system.