LCEC Puts Solar Customers on a Different Rate Schedule
Interconnecting with LCEC moves your account onto its Net Metering Rider — a separate schedule with different energy and demand charges. Here's what the filed tariff says.
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Short answer: LCEC doesn't simply net your solar against your current rate. Its filed 2026 tariff puts net-metered accounts on a separate Net Metering Rider with its own customer charge, energy charge, and demand charge. For a commercial demand account the rider bills $77.81 customer charge, $20.20 per kW of demand, and 4.34¢ per kWh — against the standard GSD schedule's $40.00, $11.00 per kW, and 7.60¢. Before you sign anything, ask your installer to price the proposal on the rider, not on your current bill.
What the tariff says
LCEC's Regulatory Rates and Tariffs document for 2026 contains a Net Metering Rider beginning at Sheet 11.000. It applies to customers with a renewable generation system who have executed a standard interconnection agreement. It's not an add-on to your existing schedule. It's a schedule.
Here is the commercial demand comparison, straight from the filed sheets, before the Power Cost Adjustment and taxes.
- Standard General Service–Demand (Sheet 10.000): $40.00 customer charge, $11.00 per kW of billing demand, 7.60¢ per kWh
- Net Metering Rider, GSD (Sheet 11.200): $77.81 customer charge, $20.20 per kW of billing demand ($8.55 distribution plus $11.65 purchased power), 4.34¢ per kWh
The residential rider works the same way. The standard schedule is a rising three-tier block at 11.29¢, 12.06¢, and 12.82¢ with a $20.00 customer charge. The rider is a flat 8.21¢ on all kilowatt-hours with a $22.22 customer charge.
Why this changes the arithmetic
A solar proposal values every kilowatt-hour your array produces at some rate. If that rate came from dividing your bill by your usage, it includes fixed charges and demand charges that solar doesn't touch, and it's drawn from a schedule you won't be on after the system energizes.
On the commercial rider, a generated kilowatt-hour displaces the rider's 4.34¢ energy charge plus the Power Cost Adjustment. Not 7.60¢. Not a blended figure in the low teens. A proposal built on the wrong rate overstates savings by a multiple, not a few percent.
And the demand charge moves the other way. Going from $11.00 to $20.20 per kW is an increase of $9.20 per kW per month on the same account. On a 200 kW demand that's roughly $1,840 a month working against the energy savings.
The ratchet makes it stickier
The tariff sets billing demand as the maximum fifteen-minute integrated demand in the billing period, but never less than 20 kW, the contract demand if applicable, or 70% of the maximum measured demand in the preceding eleven months.
That means one peak in August prices the next eleven bills. Solar can't reliably prevent a fifteen-minute peak, because a cloud at the wrong moment undoes it. Storage can, because it's dispatchable. If demand is a meaningful share of your bill, the honest conversation is about batteries and load management before it's about more panels.
What we can and can't tell you yet
The comparison above is read directly from the filed tariff, and we'll show you the sheets. What we won't do is hand you a savings number derived from it until LCEC confirms a billing mechanic we can't resolve from the document alone: whether the rider's unbundled demand components on the residential and general service schedules are applied to net or delivered kilowatt-hours.
Read literally, the rider would be cheaper than the standard residential schedule at 1,000 kWh even with no solar at all, which is almost certainly not the intent. So we've flagged it, we ask LCEC on every project, and we'd rather say 'we're verifying that' than publish a number we can't stand behind.
What to ask before you sign
- Price this proposal on LCEC's Net Metering Rider and show me the line item you used
- What is my billing demand today, and what will it be billed at after interconnection?
- What happens to my bill in a month when the array underproduces?
- Have you read the LCEC tariff, or are you using a Florida average rate?
That last question sorts the field quickly. An installer who works in LCEC territory regularly will know exactly what you're talking about. One who doesn't hasn't modeled your project — they've modeled a generic one.
None of this means don't do it
Plenty of LCEC commercial projects still make sense. The point is that the rider changes which projects make sense and by how much, and that a proposal ignoring it is describing a different building than yours. Get the rate right and the decision gets easy in either direction.
Questions worth asking
- What rate per kWh did you use, and which LCEC tariff sheet is it from?
- What is my demand charge before and after interconnection?
- Does my billing demand have a ratchet, and what is my current floor?
- What is the current Power Cost Adjustment, and is it in your model?
• When this might not make sense
We'd rather lose a sale than put you in the wrong solution. Reasons we might tell you to wait or pass:
- —Your installer can't or won't price the proposal on the rider
- —Demand charges are the bulk of your bill and there's no storage in the design
- —The array is sized above your annual consumption — Florida surplus cashes out at avoided cost
Sources
- LCEC Regulatory Rates and Tariffs 2026 — Sheets 8.000, 10.000, 11.000–11.300 — LCEC (2026)Primary
- LCEC Rates (2026 residential schedule and Power Cost Adjustment) — LCEC (2026)Primary
- LCEC Net Metering program — LCEC (2026)Primary
- Fla. Admin. Code R. 25-6.065 — Interconnection and Metering of Customer-Owned Renewable Generation — Florida Administrative CodePrimary
Get a second opinion priced on the right tariff
Send us the proposal and a recent bill. We'll tell you what changes when the rider is applied — including when the answer is that it still works.