Households net record £31 million from rooftop solar panels

Households in the UK received a record £31 million for energy produced by their rooftop solar panels, according to Ofgem. This payment was made from March 2023 to March 2024 through programs that pay households to sell unused solar energy back to the grid. This year’s earnings were significantly higher than last year’s £7.2 million. In total, households sent back 283.1 gigawatt hours (GWh) of electricity, up from 77.3 GWh the previous year.

This exported energy is enough to power over 88,000 typical homes for a full year. Ofgem noted that the growth in solar exports is linked to the increase in tariffs offered under the Smart Export Guarantee (SEG), a government-backed program. The number of SEG tariffs grew from 39 to 42, encouraging more households to participate.

As of March 2024, over 283,666 household installations were registered for SEG tariffs, showing a significant rise from the previous year. Ofgem’s director Neil Lawrence praised this growth, calling it an “exciting” step in developing a new energy market for small-scale solar power. The SEG’s aim is to promote fair pricing and innovation among energy suppliers to make solar exports even more attractive to households.