Is plug-in solar legal in your state? The ten enacted laws, read from the statutes

The ten laws on one page

Only signed laws appear here. The start date is the one printed in the act or on the legislature's status page; where we could not read that page, the cell says the date was reported by news coverage. Caps are quoted in the units each statute uses, and those units are not identical, which is the subject of a later section.

Two cautions on reading it. First, a state missing from the table has no enacted law in the sources we checked. That is not a ban: it means no statute guarantees you the exemption, so the utility's ordinary interconnection rules and the electrical code decide, and the utility, not this page, is the place to ask. Second, "in force" describes the law, not the market. Maine, Maryland, Vermont, Colorado, Connecticut and Utah residents have a legal right to plug in a qualifying device today, but a device only qualifies if it carries the certification the statute names, and one trade guide reported that, as of late August 2026, no complete plug-in system on the market yet carried the certification, with the first UL 3700 certifications covering microinverters.

Standards and exported power: where the laws split

A second table sorts the same ten laws by the safety standard each one names and by what happens to power that flows back to the grid. Notice duties and tenant rules sit in the state-by-state notes below, where the section numbers are. A cell says "not addressed" when the act or section we read is silent, which is a statement about the text and not about practice.

Notice is where the laws diverge most. Maryland and Virginia make the owner notify the utility before installing, Maine does so within 30 days after installing for kits above 420 W, California and Colorado let the utility ask for a registration or the device's presence and size, and New Hampshire lets the utility set up a way to learn the wattage after installation. Utah, Vermont and Connecticut impose no notice at all. One feature does not vary: the device must not energize house wiring when the grid is down, the same rule that shuts off ordinary rooftop systems, covered in our guide to solar in a power outage.

Reading a cap: AC output, per meter, per dwelling, per address

The headline 1,200 watts hides two drafting choices that the tables cannot show. The tiers (Maine's 420 W line, the 391 W thresholds) are covered in the state notes.

The unit differs. California and New Hampshire cap AC output, Maine and Vermont cap combined inverter output or capacity, and Utah, Maryland and Connecticut say "maximum power output" without saying AC. None of the texts we read caps the panel's DC nameplate rating, so a kit sold as 1,600 W of panels behind a 1,200 W inverter is judged by the inverter number where the statute says AC. The rated output on the certification label is the figure to check, not the panel total on the box.

The denominator differs. Maryland and Connecticut allow one system or device per meter, Vermont allows several per meter if the sum fits within 1,200 W, California counts per dwelling, Virginia per customer or residential building unit, and Colorado per address, with one device per wall outlet. Two kits on two balconies are therefore legal in Vermont if the sum fits, not in Maryland or Connecticut, and a drafting question where the count is per address.

The statute text, state by state

The notes below keep to what the enacted words say, with the section named so you can find it, and leave out what the two tables above already show. Open the linked text and read the one section that governs you; the summaries are a map, not a substitute.

Utah: the first law, with the least detail

House Bill 340 of the 2025 General Session took effect on May 7, 2025, which makes Utah the earliest of the ten. It adds a definition of a "portable solar generation device" to the state's net metering chapter: a movable photovoltaic device designed to connect through a standard 120-volt outlet and intended primarily to offset part of the customer's consumption. A qualifying device is exempt from the interconnection requirements and agreement, must include a feature that prevents it from energizing the building's wiring during an outage, and the utility is "not liable for any damage or injury caused by a portable solar generation device." Utah says nothing about tenants, associations or notice.

Maine: two tiers and a licensed electrician

Public Law 2026, chapter 644, signed April 6, 2026, adds section 3475 to Title 35-A. It covers plug-in photovoltaic systems and also plug-in battery systems, defined as AC-coupled storage that connects through a standard outlet. An eligible system is listed or certified to UL 3700 or a comparable laboratory standard, or is configured under the National Electrical Code adopted by the state's Electricians' Examining Board.

The tiering is the distinctive part. Up to 420 W combined inverter output per service address needs no electrician and no notice. Above 420 W and up to 1,200 W requires a licensed electrician, a dedicated circuit with a single outlet, and a notification to the utility in the commission's form within 30 days. The inverter must shut off after 0.2 seconds if power is disrupted. A customer on a structure they do not own must not compromise it or violate building, fire or zoning codes, and must restore it on removal. The chapter has no emergency clause, so it took effect 90 days after the Legislature adjourned; one trade guide lists July 29, 2026.

Maryland: notify first, pay for any locking switch

House Bill 1532, the Utility RELIEF Act, was approved on May 12, 2026 as Chapter 353, adding section 7-321 of the Public Utilities Article. Our reading of the effective-date clauses is July 1, 2026 for the section that adds 7-321, consistent with a trade guide's table.

Maryland is unusual in how it treats the utility. The company may not require approval or a fee, but the customer must notify it before installation and give it "a certification of the safety features and maximum generating capacity," and if the system needs an automatic locking disconnect switch the customer pays for it. A person may install not more than one system per electric meter, for residential use only, and the system cannot generate renewable energy credits.

Vermont: the most detailed on tenants and deeds

Act 149, signed June 16, 2026 and effective July 1, 2026, adds 30 V.S.A. section 256. A device must connect by cord to a receptacle, be installed and operated under IEEE 1547-2018 and successors, work only on systems using smart meters, and be secured "temporarily but securely" to the ground or a structure.

The act then does what most states skip. A tenant must give the landlord at least 10 days' notice; the landlord has 10 days to answer with reasonable restrictions, which can include requiring a licensed electrician at the tenant's cost; silence lets the tenant proceed; and a tenant may not do electrical work without the landlord's permission. Zoning bylaws may not regulate the devices, and deed restrictions cannot prohibit one, including on patio railings in condominiums. The utility may still recover costs of service overloading, and a net metering customer cannot also install a plug-in device.

Colorado: the highest cap and the association rules

HB26-1007, signed May 7, 2026 and listed by the General Assembly as Chapter 127 effective August 12, 2026, creates section 40-2-140. A "portable-scale solar generation device" is a single photovoltaic system per address designed or commissioned to supply no more than 1,920 W to the grid. A customer may not connect more than one to a single wall outlet, and providers may ask the customer to indicate the device's presence and size in kilowatts but may not require approval, fees or extra equipment.

From January 1, 2027, a person may not unreasonably prohibit installation, covenants that do so are void, a device counts as an energy efficiency measure under the common interest community statute, and an owner in such a community can be required to secure it and to indemnify the association. From the same date a device above 391 W that is not labeled and listed by a nationally recognized laboratory cannot be sold, leased or rented in the state.

Connecticut: the consumer warning and the UL 1741 hook

Public Act 26-127, signed May 27, 2026 as House Bill 5340, makes section 9 effective October 1, 2026. Its device must be non-permanent, connect through a 120-volt outlet behind the customer's meter, and meet the State Building Code, the National Electrical Code with IEEE 1547, and UL 1741. It must also carry a consumer warning that generation exceeding on-site consumption "will result in such excess generation being charged to the customer as usage" unless the customer's meter allows net metering.

The act expressly keeps the building code, fire codes and local ordinances in force, and section 10 asks the building and fire code authorities to consider provisions for safe installation in their next code amendments.

Virginia: a notification form with a 15-day clock

Virginia's two bills, H.B. 395 and the identical S.B. 250, became chapters 998 and 1052 of the 2026 Acts. Section 56-596.8 of the Code applies from January 1, 2027 and counts 1,200 W per customer, or per residential building unit in multifamily housing.

The customer must notify the provider using a State Corporation Commission form before installing. The provider has 15 days to review it for accuracy and completeness; if it does not respond, the customer is deemed to have met the requirement. A locking disconnect may be installed at premises with more than one device or if the circuit requires it. The section does not apply to rental units under ratio utility billing. A companion section, 55.1-1212.1, bars landlords who own more than four units from prohibiting a tenant's exterior installation while allowing reasonable size, place and manner restrictions, and requires seven days' notice with documentation.

New Hampshire: signed, read second-hand, with a late-notice channel

Senate Bill 540 was approved on July 2, 2026 as Chapter 262. The General Court's own bill-status and text pages would not return the bill to our fetches, so the text we read is a mirror of the chaptered version marked final, cross-checked against a New Hampshire Bulletin report of the signing; treat this row as one notch less certain than the others and confirm it at gc.nh.gov.

As mirrored, the law amends RSA 362-A. A plug-in solar generation system has a maximum inverter output of 1,200 W AC, connects through a receptacle or other non-permanent wiring, must be certified by a nationally recognized laboratory to nationally recognized safety standards, and is limited to one system per metered customer. Utilities may not require approval, a fee beyond charges incurred through use, extra controls, or an interconnection review or agreement. RSA 362-A:10 II does give the utility a role after the fact: it "may develop a method for the customer to inform [it] of the wattage of the system ... subsequent to installation." That is permissive wording about the utility's method, and we found no customer duty to use it in the text we read.

Two cautions on the mirror text. The insurance point is a duty on the Department of Energy's consumer web page, which is to say that connecting unlisted systems improperly may affect homeowners or renters coverage; it is not a warning the statute puts on owners. And the building-code section depends on a future national standard under the act's later section, so it does not change anything yet. The remainder of the act takes effect January 1, 2027.

California: a sunset on the exemption

Senate Bill 868 was approved and filed on September 30, 2026 as Chapter 985, adding Chapter 13 to the Public Utilities Code. Qualifying devices are exempt from all interconnection requirements, and utilities cannot demand approval, a fee on the device or the electricity it feeds into the building, or added equipment. A utility may require a simple online registration of the address, make, model and size, without approval.

Then the catch: the exemption section "shall remain in effect only until January 1, 2030, and as of that date is repealed," and from that date a receptacle-connected photovoltaic device that lacks the code compliance, certification and isolation features cannot be sold in the state. The act does not print an operative date; California's general rule that non-urgency statutes take effect on the following January 1 gives January 1, 2027, which matches news reports.

New Jersey: the governor's release, not the statute

The Garden State Balcony Solar Act, S2368/A4836, was signed on September 1, 2026. The legislature's website did not respond to our requests, so for New Jersey we rely on the governor's signing release, which describes the law as exempting qualifying plug-in solar devices of up to 1,200 watts from utility interconnection and metering requirements, including certain fees, approvals and equipment mandates, preventing landlords, homeowner associations and similar entities from broadly prohibiting the devices, and barring municipalities from prohibiting them or requiring permits for them.

The release does not give an effective date. Trade coverage reports March 1, 2027 (pv magazine, September 2, 2026). The same coverage describes a 400 W exemption, but the pieces disagree on what it covers. pv magazine USA, July 1, 2026 describes it as an exemption from the UL 3700 requirement, while a Solar.com article describes it as an exemption from code rules that would force wiring or panel changes. We could not reach the bill text, so treat the 400 W tier as unconfirmed. Solar.com's separate state guide also lists a 14-day written notice from renters who pay their own electric bill; we did not read that in any primary text and the table does not rely on it. Check the act at njleg.gov before relying on any of this.

Bills that have passed but are not law

New York is the clearest case. The Solar Up Now NY Act, S8512C, passed the Senate 62 to 0 on April 21, 2026, and the Senate's page showed the Assembly companion A9111 substituted for it on May 28, 2026, but no delivery to the governor and no signature as of our check. As drafted, it would cap a device at 1,200 W of continuous AC inverter nameplate output, require a complete plug-in system listed or certified by an accredited laboratory, exempt it from interconnection and net metering with exports uncompensated, require notice to the utility within 30 days through an online form, and take effect on the 90th day after it becomes law. Until it is signed, none of that is a right. One consumer site reported Massachusetts as sitting in conference committee; we did not read that bill and do not list it. Bills move: governors veto, sunsets get added in late amendments as in California, and effective dates slide, which is why the table is dated.

UL 3700, UL 1741 and the National Electrical Code in the statutes

Three safety references recur, and they are not interchangeable. UL 3700 is the one written for these products. UL describes it as "the Outline of Investigation for Interactive Plug-In Photovoltaic Equipment and Systems," defining "construction, performance and labeling criteria tailored to plug-in solar systems," and announced a testing and certification program based on it on January 8, 2026. An older UL explainer page still says the standard is "under development." An outline of investigation is a UL certification document, not an act of a legislature or a code adopted by one.

In the texts we could read, only Maine and Vermont name UL 3700; New Jersey does so per trade reports. Most of the others ask for certification by a nationally recognized laboratory without naming a standard, and Connecticut alone hooks to UL 1741, the standard for inverters and interconnection equipment, with IEEE 1547.

The National Electrical Code is the reference the laws lean on for installation. UL's own safety discussion explains the pressure on it: plug-in units "backfeed power into existing branch circuits via standard receptacles" and can push combined current past conductor ratings without tripping the breaker. That is the risk behind Colorado's one-device-per-outlet rule and Maine's dedicated-circuit rule.

What a legal kit can earn: a break-even price table with every input printed

Legal does not mean worth buying, and the cap is the main reason. The arithmetic is simple enough to do before reading a product page. A kit rated at 800 W DC, in a place that yields 1,200 kWh per kW of panel a year, makes 800 W x 1.2 = 960 kWh a year. Both inputs are planning examples, not measurements of any roof; a roof-specific run in NREL's PVWatts replaces the 1,200 figure, and the kit's nameplate replaces the 800.

The second input is how much of that energy the household uses at the moment it is made. Under laws that pay nothing for exports (Vermont says so outright, Connecticut warns it can be billed as usage, Maine bars net energy billing), only consumed energy has value. A refrigerator, router and standby loads often absorb a small plug-in device's whole output on a weekday, which is why a 100 percent share is a best case and a 70 percent share is shown beside it. The third input is the electricity price, which belongs to your utility; EnergyBS covers how rate plans work in its time-of-use rate strategy guide, and we use three round example rates instead of a state average.

The table converts those inputs into the most a kit can cost and still repay itself in ten years of undiscounted savings, ignoring degradation and any federal credit, which does not apply because the residential credit under section 25D is not available for property placed in service after December 31, 2025, according to the IRS page reviewed July 4, 2026.

Read across the rows and the statute drops out of the answer, which is why the plug-in solar hub treats cost and legality as separate questions; the rate and the usage share carry it. At $0.25 per kWh and full use, a kit priced under $2,400 clears the ten-year line, which is $3.00 per watt DC. For a rooftop comparison, the method in our credit-free worth-it guide applies the same break-even idea to a full system. The U.S. Department of Energy's Q1 2025 residential benchmark of $2.95 per watt DC (modeled market price for an 8 kW system, 2024 dollars, checked October 30, 2026) is a comparison line for a roof-mounted system with installation, not a plug-in kit price, so it marks where a kit stops being cheap relative to a full system, not what a kit costs. At $0.15 and 70 percent use, only a kit under about $1.26 per watt gets there. Our payback method page shows how the same arithmetic extends to degradation and price changes, and the net metering explainer shows why a state that pays for exports changes the answer for a rooftop system but, in the plug-in laws read above, mostly does not for these kits.

What a law does not settle: landlords, associations, insurers and local rules

Every one of these acts answers one question: may the utility make me go through its process for a small device? Three other questions decide whether a balcony kit goes up, and each is better closed in writing before you spend money. A fourth, the local building department, can add a permit or a railing-mount rule that a state act does not mention, so ask it a direct question and write down the name and date of the answer.

Landlords come first. Vermont and Virginia write tenant rules into the statute and the governor's release says New Jersey does; their details are in the state notes above. In Maine the act speaks only to the person installing on a structure they do not own. In Utah, Maryland, Connecticut, Colorado (for tenants), New Hampshire and California, the lease and the landlord's consent govern. For a plug-in device the practical document is a signed email or lease addendum naming the location, the size and who pays for removal. Our guide to solar ownership structures is about rooftop contracts, not renters' kits, so it will not answer this.

Associations are second. Colorado's covenant rules start January 1, 2027 and Vermont voids deed restrictions; elsewhere the question lives in your governing documents. Virginia's section on plug-in devices does not reach homeowner or condominium associations in the text we read, and an access statute for rooftop systems may or may not cover a balcony; the general question is worked through in our HOA solar rules guide. Ask the board whether a plug-in device on a balcony counts as an exterior alteration under your declaration.

Insurers are third, and the least settled. The only insurance language in the texts we read is the New Hampshire point above, a duty on a state web page rather than a rule for insurers. No act we read requires insurers to cover the device, restricts them from asking about it, or says how a loss would be treated. That silence is a reason to ask your insurer in writing, and to keep the certification label and receipt.