What Is the California Solar & Storage Association (CALSSA)?

An industry voice, not a regulator

CALSSA takes part in the regulatory process the way utilities, consumer advocates and environmental groups do. At the CPUC it is one of many parties that file proposals, briefs and comments. The CPUC's page on the net billing proceeding lists the California Solar & Storage Association among the parties that submitted proposals for a successor to net metering and presented them at the CPUC's March 23 and 24, 2021 workshop, alongside the three large utilities, the Public Advocates Office, and solar, environmental and consumer groups.

That matters for how you read anything with CALSSA's name on it. Its positions are an interested party's arguments, made on behalf of the businesses it represents. They can line up with a homeowner's interests, as when it argued for gentler export credit cuts, and they can conflict with them. The decisions themselves are made by the CPUC and CSLB.

What CALSSA proposed for NEM 3.0

CALSSA's March 2021 presentation to the CPUC, posted on the Commission's website, proposed keeping net metering compensation tied to retail rates and stepping it down gradually along what it called a capacity-based glide path, which it estimated at eight years. It proposed that low-income customers continue at NEM 2.0 rates, that there be no monthly fee on solar customers, and no change for commercial customers. The presentation argued that storage would follow solar, and that cutting solar deployment would not produce distributed storage later.

The CPUC went a different way on the main question. Decision 22-12-056, adopted December 15, 2022, based export credits on the Avoided Cost Calculator rather than retail rates. But it did adopt a temporary, stepped-down bonus on those credits, the ACC Plus adder, which the decision says follows the stepped-down approach recommended by SEIA/Vote Solar, CALSSA and the Sierra Club. The decision also notes that CALSSA and SEIA/Vote Solar opposed the Market Transition Credit concept but supported a stepped-down glide path.

The CPUC's press release on the decision says it includes no charges specific to solar customers. A fixed monthly charge on solar customers had appeared in the Commission's December 2021 proposed decision, which proposed a $8 per kilowatt Grid Participation Charge. That proposal was not adopted.

Where CALSSA stood on who may install batteries

The second fight is about licenses. In a February 23, 2022 letter to CSLB's registrar, CALSSA's executive director argued against tight limits on C-46 solar contractors installing batteries. The letter said solar contractors perform over 80 percent of battery installations and have worked safely under the C-46 classification for over 40 years, and it opposed a 20 kWh cap proposed by the electrical workers' union, suggesting instead that C-46 contractors be allowed to install systems up to 600 kWh.

CSLB's adopted rule landed in between. It adds battery energy storage systems to the C-10 electrical contractor's scope and lets a C-46 contractor install a battery only as incidental and supplemental to a solar installation, up to 80 kWh. The Office of Administrative Law approved it on June 5, 2024. CSLB says the rule's effective date is stayed by court order pending San Diego County Superior Court Case No. 27-2024-00029818-CU-TT-CTL.

For a homeowner, the takeaway is simple: ask any battery installer which license classification covers the battery work and check it on CSLB's site.

What CALSSA membership does and doesn't tell you

A company describing itself as a CALSSA member is telling you about its trade affiliations. It is not a license, a warranty, or a promise that the company follows any particular sales practice. None of the state's consumer protections for solar buyers run through the association.

Those protections run through state agencies. The CPUC's California Solar Consumer Protection Guide, which solar providers must have residential customers sign when they apply to interconnect in PG&E, SCE and SDG&E territory, tells you to check the contractor's license and any Home Improvement Salesperson registration on CSLB's website or at 800-321-CSLB (2752), and to report problems with a contractor to CSLB. Complaints about PACE financing go to the Department of Financial Protection and Innovation.

Why its positions still matter to you

Industry associations shape the options you are offered. The glide path CALSSA and others argued for is why a residential PG&E or SCE customer who applies to interconnect before the end of 2027 still gets a bonus on export credits for nine years, according to the CPUC. The licensing dispute decides whether the solar company that installs your panels can also install your battery, or whether an electrical contractor must.

When you read an industry statement about a pending CPUC decision, look for the decision number and read the Commission's own summary. The CPUC's net billing page lists the key decisions in order, from Decision 14-03-041, which set the 20-year transition period for existing net metering customers, to Decision 23-11-068, which plans an evaluation of the net billing tariff.