If you’re thinking about adding solar panels to your home or business to reduce energy use, save money and improve the environment, you’re not alone.

We’re here to help.

More than 4,500 distributed energy resources, such as solar panels, have been added to our electrical system in 2023, a 224-percent increase over what was added during the same period in 2022. Most residential customers, through our online automated interconnection process, can get approval to interconnect solar panels or other distributed energy resources to the grid in fewer than 24 hours.

Our checklist for distributed energy resources takes the guesswork out of interconnecting to the grid. Check out the key steps to take during each phase – application, design, scheduling and construction – of your project.

Innovation for a cleaner energy future

We’re committed to supporting a clean energy future while providing reliable and affordable power for all of our customers. We’ve implemented smart delivery platforms that balance two-way flows of power to better manage the addition of solar panels and other distributed energy resources (DER). This technology allows for monitoring and active management of every interconnected DER. We can detect voltage or power quality issues affecting customers and correct them remotely.

It’s similar to our innovative smart grid system, which allows us to monitor and make system adjustments remotely, and has improved reliability, notably by helping us avoid more than 1.4 million power outages.

Since 2021, we’ve evaluated hundreds of types of inverters on the market to help ensure that they can all be used seamlessly without adversely affecting the grid. An inverter is an essential part of solar energy system equipment that converts the direct current (DC) electricity generated by solar panels to alternating current (AC) electricity that is used on the electric grid.

Customers and installers now have many approved inverter options for their solar installations.

We’re also making use of a new device that we have designed in house to help manage the power quality of distributed energy resources.

“We’ve set ourselves up well for a time when all of our customers will be using solar power and are building the foundation for the grid of the future now,” said Bashar Jarrah, manager of operations engineering and DER management.

“We took on an innovative pilot project knowing how important distributed energy resources were to our customers and the grid and we’re well positioned to deliver for our customers in the future. We are a true learning organization.”

We’re proudly supporting Pennsylvania’s vision of renewable energy growth to address climate and sustainability objectives, while continuing to provide safe and reliable service to our customers.