Rebates and incentives, Virginia
A mandatory property tax exemption, full retail net metering that survived a 2026 fight to cut it, and a growing SREC market. No state credit, no statewide rebate. See your numbers.
How it works
Step 1
Nearly all residential systems fall under this threshold, but if you're near it, confirm with your installer. Use the property tax exemption savings calculator to see what it's worth to you.
Step 2
Use the SREC value estimator to see what your annual production could be worth at current prices, and confirm registration if you're a cash buyer.
Step 3
The April 2026 SCC ruling preserved 1:1 retail net metering for Dominion customers. New customers pay a small monthly admin fee, but the core value proposition is intact, so proceed with confidence on this front.
Reading Virginia Code Section 58.1-3661 directly resolves a point of real confusion across guides. Subsection A, as amended by SB 686 effective January 1, 2023, declares any solar facility with a nameplate capacity of 25 kilowatts or less to be wholly exempt from state and local taxation, a threshold that covers virtually every residential rooftop system. This is a mandatory statewide rule, not something your city or county votes on. Some guides describe an 80%, 70%, then 60% declining exemption schedule instead, which actually comes from a separate statute, Section 58.1-2606.1, governing solar photovoltaic projects up to 5 megawatts, a scale well beyond residential. Other guides describe a locality-by-locality opt-in system, which reflects the older Subsection B framework that predates the 2023 change and still applies to certain other equipment types and to systems above the 25 kW residential threshold. For a typical home installation in 2026, the operative rule is the full, mandatory exemption under Subsection A.
Dominion Energy petitioned Virginia's State Corporation Commission to cut net metering compensation for new customers by nearly half, alongside proposals to claim ownership of customers' renewable energy certificates and add new application fees. After a lengthy process including more than 1,300 public comments and over 50 people testifying at the hearing, the SCC issued its final ruling on April 30, 2026, rejecting the core of Dominion's proposal. The 1:1 full retail credit and the 12-month netting period, both central to what makes Virginia solar economically attractive, were preserved. New customers connecting under the resulting NEM 2.0 tariff pay a modest monthly administrative fee, and the rate applied to genuine excess remaining after the 12-month netting period was adjusted slightly, but the fundamental value proposition for a typical homeowner is essentially unchanged from before the case began. If you were holding off on solar because of this uncertainty, that uncertainty has now been resolved in solar owners' favor.
Several sources describe Virginia as exempting solar equipment from state sales tax, which would apply automatically at the point of sale if accurate for your purchase, though the exact statutory basis is described inconsistently enough across sources that confirming this with your installer's itemized quote is worthwhile. Separately, Virginia's Clean Economy Act created a renewable portfolio standard that drives demand for solar renewable energy credits, with 2026 pricing commonly cited in the roughly $22 to $30 per MWh range, translating to annual income somewhere between about $585 and $910 for a typical residential system, a figure that moves with market conditions but represents real, ongoing income beyond your bill savings. Your installer typically handles SREC registration as part of the installation process, but confirm this happened if you paid cash, since an unregistered system earns nothing from this market. Run your own numbers with the SREC value estimator. The DSIRE database of state incentives lists the incentives that apply in your state, with links to each program's rules.
Virginia does not offer a state income tax credit for residential solar, and there is no statewide cash rebate program, a gap that several sources describe candidly as making Virginia's incentive stack solid but not spectacular compared to states like Massachusetts or Illinois. What Virginia does have, the mandatory property tax exemption, preserved full retail net metering, and a real SREC market, forms a genuinely workable foundation, particularly now that the net metering fight has resolved favorably. Compare the overall package against a neighboring state with the Maryland incentive estimator or the North Carolina incentive estimator.
With your rebate total in hand, the combined loan and rebate timing tool shows the monthly payment on the amount you still need to borrow.
Questions
For a typical residential system, it's automatic and mandatory statewide. Virginia Code Section 58.1-3661(A), as amended by SB 686 effective January 1, 2023, declares any solar facility with a nameplate capacity of 25 kilowatts or less to be wholly exempt from state and local taxation, which covers essentially every residential installation. Some older guides describe an 80%, 70%, then 60% declining exemption schedule or a locality-by-locality opt-in system, which reflects either a separate statute covering larger solar projects up to 5 megawatts, or the older local-option framework that applied before the 2023 change. For residential systems 25 kW or smaller, the current rule is a full, mandatory exemption, not a local vote.
No. Dominion petitioned Virginia's State Corporation Commission to cut net metering compensation for new customers, in some reporting by nearly half. The SCC issued its final ruling on April 30, 2026, rejecting the core of Dominion's proposal. The 1:1 full retail credit and the 12-month netting period were preserved. New customers connecting under the resulting tariff pay a small monthly administrative fee, and any true excess remaining at the end of the 12-month period is compensated at a specific rate rather than the retail rate, but the fundamental value of net metering for a typical homeowner is essentially unchanged from before the case.
No to both. Virginia does not offer a state income tax credit for residential solar, and there is no statewide cash rebate program. What Virginia offers instead is a combination of the mandatory property tax exemption, a sales tax exemption on solar equipment, full retail net metering, and an active SREC market, which together form the core of the state's incentive picture in the absence of a federal residential credit for most 2026 purchases.
A modest but real amount, and the market has been described as growing. Virginia's Clean Economy Act established a renewable portfolio standard that creates demand for solar renewable energy credits, with reported per-MWh prices in the roughly $22 to $30 range as of 2026, translating to commonly cited annual income somewhere between about $585 and $910 for a typical residential system, though this figure moves with market conditions. Your installer often handles registration as part of the installation process, but confirm this was done if you're a cash buyer, since an unregistered system can't sell credits.