SCE Solar Billing Plan: What Edison Pays for Your Solar Under NEM 3.0

SCE’s Solar Billing Plan is Southern California Edison’s version of NEM 3.0. If you applied to connect your system after NEM 2.0 closed in April 2023, you are on it. You buy grid power on the TOU-D-PRIME rate, and SCE credits your exports at hourly values, about 6 cents per kWh on a summer day and about 21 cents in the evening for newer customers, locked for nine years.

If you are not sure which plan your account is on, start with how NEM 2.0 and NEM 3.0 compare.

This guide covers what SCE pays for exported solar in each year and season, the bonus, what you pay for grid power, how to read the monthly bill and the annual settlement, and where a battery fits. Accounts still on the older tariff are covered in SCE NEM 2.0 and its 20-year legacy period.

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Is the Solar Billing Plan SCE’s NEM 3.0?

Yes. The CPUC says the utilities refer to its net billing tariff, the one people call NEM 3.0, as the Solar Billing Plan, and that it has applied to customers applying for interconnection since April 15, 2023. SCE’s FAQ says NEM 2.0 closed to new applicants that day and that later applications are processed under the Solar Billing Plan for Residential or for Business.

So the Solar Billing Plan is not a successor to NEM 3.0. It is NEM 3.0, and it succeeds NEM 2.0. Your bill and your Permission to Operate letter show which program the account is on.

How much SCE pays for your solar

Exports earn Energy Export Credits. SCE says they are priced from the CPUC’s Avoided Cost Calculator as approved on January 1 of the calculation year, with a delivery part and a generation part. Its export pricing files list a value for each of 24 hours, split by weekday versus weekend or holiday and by month. There is one price set for each start year, NBT23 through NBT26, fixed for nine years from the date you began using solar.

SCE also publishes averages by season and time of day, which are easier to read than the hourly files:

Per kWh exported, from SCE’s Solar Billing Plan page. Summer is June through September. SCE labels these averages; the hourly files hold the exact values.

Two things stand out. Daytime exports, when most panels produce the most, earn the least in every year. And the newer price sets pay more overnight and on winter evenings than the 2023 and 2024 sets, but less on summer evenings. SCE says a customer who moves into a house that already has solar gets the current year’s prices, and that those can change afterward. For how SCE’s values compare with PG&E’s and SDG&E’s, see NEM 3.0 export rates across California.

The export bonus and when it ends

SCE says eligible residential customers who enroll before 2028 receive an extra credit of about $0.04 per kWh, or about $0.09 for income-qualified customers. Those are the starting amounts the CPUC set in Decision 22-12-056: $0.040 and $0.093 for SCE. The decision cuts the bonus for new enrollees by 20 percent of that starting amount at the end of each calendar year until it reaches zero, and each customer keeps the amount they enrolled at for nine years. It is not available to customers who move over from NEM 1.0 or 2.0 at the end of their legacy period, or to someone who buys a home with an existing system.

What you pay for grid power on TOU-D-PRIME

SCE says Solar Billing Plan customers are on TOU-D-PRIME, a rate it also offers to households with an EV, a home battery or an electric heat pump. Prices are highest from 4 to 9 p.m. SCE’s rate page lists these bundled prices per kWh:

TOU-D-PRIME also carries a Base Services Charge of $0.79 per day, about $24 over a 30-day month, and has no baseline credit. Prices differ if a community choice aggregator supplies your generation. The rest of SCE’s residential plans are in SCE time-of-use rates for 2026.

Put the two tables side by side and the design is plain. A kWh exported on a summer afternoon earns about 6 cents; the same kWh bought back at 5 p.m. on a summer weekday costs 59 cents.

How to read an SCE bill with solar

Every month you pay SCE’s regular charges, including taxes, fees and the Base Services Charge, plus the grid power you used, priced by time of use. Your export credits are applied against eligible charges. SCE says the credits cannot cover set taxes and fees such as the Base Services Charge, so a solar home that exports more than it uses still gets a bill.

The annual settlement, or True-Up

Once a year SCE sends a settlement bill, which it also calls a True-Up bill, in the same month your system started service. If your system went live in March, the True-Up arrives each March. SCE calls that 12-month cycle the relevant period.

For the settlement, SCE compares the grid power you used, the energy you exported, and the credits you received. If you exported more than you used, some credits get taken back. SCE’s example: a home that used 900 kWh from the grid and sent 1,000 kWh back keeps credits for the 900 kWh, and the credits for the extra 100 kWh are adjusted. Because those credits were already used on monthly bills, the adjustment shows up as a balance on the settlement, labeled “EEC Adjustment.” SCE says the rule is there so solar is sized to a home’s needs.

The surplus itself is paid at Net Surplus Compensation, which SCE puts at about $0.02 per kWh. SCE treats it as a payment, issued as a check or rollover credit depending on your selection, and warns it may not cover the full credit adjustment. SCE’s FAQ says customers of a community choice aggregator or direct access provider are not eligible for Net Surplus Compensation from SCE. What else can make the settlement large is covered in reading an SCE annual settlement bill.

Batteries on SCE’s Solar Billing Plan

SCE’s own advice is to store solar instead of exporting it: because export credits are worth less than what you pay for grid power, it says, storing energy to use in expensive hours is worth more. Its FAQ says the Solar Billing Plan has no battery discharge requirement, so the battery can be set to cover your own evening use.

SCE also ties its battery incentive to this plan. For SGIP, SCE says new customers must be interconnected with Permission to Operate on the Solar Billing Plan before an incentive is paid, and must take an SGIP-approved rate such as TOU-D-PRIME. Where that program stands is on the SGIP battery rebate status page, and whether storage pays back is worked through in the NEM 3.0 battery payback guide.

If a community choice aggregator serves you

SCE’s FAQ says customers of a community choice aggregator or direct access provider can use the Solar Billing Plan if that provider agrees to support its provisions. SCE’s rate page sends CCA customers to their provider for generation costs, so ask the provider for its generation export pricing and its own surplus policy before you compare quotes.

What an SCE solar customer should check

1. Find the year you began using solar with SCE. It picks your export price set, NBT23 through NBT26.
2. Confirm the bill shows TOU-D-PRIME and the Solar Billing Plan.
3. Note your True-Up month, the month your system started service.
4. Compare your yearly exports with your yearly grid use. Exporting far more than you use leads to an EEC Adjustment.
5. If a CCA serves you, get its generation export pricing in writing.