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Oklahoma · Oklahoma City
Oklahoma City solar: the rider decides the deal, so read it first
Written by the Solar Learning Lab research deskUpdated August 30, 202612 min read
This is our first Oklahoma city page, and OKC earns it with a tariff most out-of-state sales scripts get wrong. Since January 1, 2025, a homeowner who interconnects solar with OG&E takes service under the NEBO rider, the Net Energy Billing Option, approved by the Oklahoma Corporation Commission in Order No. 745601, Case PUD 2023-000087. NEBO does two things a buyer must price in before signing anything. It moves the household off the flat residential rate and onto the applicable standard time of use schedule. And it nets production against consumption at retail only up to what the home actually used that billing period, with any surplus bought at OG&E's avoided energy cost.
No annual banking. No state tax credit. What OKC does have is a genuinely strong sun resource, a cheap grid to measure against, and a permit desk with published rules. We walk all of it below, with the tariff sheets and statutes linked so you can check our reading against the record.
Price an OKC roof against NEBO, not a brochure
Start with a screening estimate, then make any bidder show their TOU assumptions in writing.
Open the OKC estimatorSigning NEBO changes your rate class, not just your meter
Here is the clause that matters most and gets mentioned least. Per the NEBO tariff sheets 70.10 to 70.13, a NEBO customer must take service under the applicable standard TOU rate schedule, excluding VPP, Flex, and RTP. That means the familiar R-1 numbers, a $13.00 monthly customer charge with energy at 8.00 cents per kWh June through October and 5.80 cents November through May, describe the rate you leave behind, not the one your solar economics run on. Any payback model built on R-1 pricing for a new OKC solar customer is modeling a tariff the customer cannot keep.
The rider also has housekeeping with teeth. The customer signs OG&E's Standard Electricity Purchase Agreement, the system must sit on the customer's premise and offset only that location's energy, usage cannot be aggregated across usage points, and OG&E retains the right to limit net energy installations on any distribution circuit or substation for operational concerns. The current rider took effect January 1, 2025 in all territory served, replacing versions from 2022, 2020, and 2017, so a proposal recycled from an older vintage of the program can be materially out of date.
Netting stops at your own consumption. Surplus earns avoided cost.
Oklahoma's framework lives in 17 O.S. Section 156 and OAC 165:40:9 under Corporation Commission rules. The mechanics: within a billing period, your production offsets your consumption at full retail value, but only up to the amount you consumed. Produce more than the house used that month and the excess is not banked as kWh for winter. It must be purchased at the utility's avoided energy cost, paid or credited the next billing cycle. Avoided cost is a wholesale-flavored number, a fraction of retail, which is why we will not describe Oklahoma as a full retail net metering state and you should be suspicious of anyone who does.
The practical design consequence is straightforward. In OKC, self-consumption is worth retail and exports are worth little, so a system aimed at roughly matching the home's own use beats a maxed-out roof. Load shifting helps too: running the big appliances while the array is producing keeps more kWh on the retail side of the ledger. That is tariff reading, not salesmanship, and it changes the right answer on system size.
The 125 percent ceiling turns oversizing into a tariff exit
NEBO eligibility caps nameplate at 300 kW, which no house will hit, and generating capacity at 125 percent of the customer's peak load, which a house absolutely can hit. The peak load figure is set initially from the 12 months before requesting NEBO service, per the rider. A system producing net excess energy above that 125 percent limit gets defaulted to the QF tariff for all billing services. In plain terms, oversizing for a future EV or shop addition is not a free option here. Build past the cap and you exit the program the economics were quoted under.
One caution on tariff names, because OG&E's own library can mislead a fast reader: the NET-1 and NET-2 documents in OG&E's tariff collection are Arkansas filings. The Oklahoma vehicle for an OKC roof is NEBO, full stop.
What Oklahoma does not offer, on the record
We checked the state's own paperwork rather than marketing pages, and the honest answer is bare. The 2025 Oklahoma Form 511-CR, which enumerates every claimable state income tax credit, contains no residential solar credit. The nearest line item, the zero-emission facilities credit, is for generators, not homeowners. On the federal side, the City of Oklahoma City's sustainability incentives page states plainly that the 2025 One Big Beautiful Bill Act accelerated the IRA sunset dates and that Section 25D residential solar, battery, and geothermal projects do not qualify in 2026.
We also could not confirm an Oklahoma property tax exemption or sales tax exemption for residential solar from a primary source, and third party marketing pages contradict each other on both, so we claim neither. The city's incentives page points OG&E customers to efficiency and weatherization programs and lists no OG&E solar rebate. Strip the incentives away and what remains is the real OKC pitch: bill offset against a rising-utility future, on a roof with a top-tier sun resource. That can still pencil. It just has to pencil honestly.
Permits run through 420 W Main, and an electrician signs first
All solar permitting, review, and inspection in OKC belongs to the Development Services Development Center at 420 W Main St, with Plan Review at 405-297-2525 and the call center at 405-297-2948. Per the city's solar panel install checklist, a licensed electrical contractor is required to submit for the permit, filings go through the Citizens Access Portal at okc.gov/access or in person on the 1st floor, and everything uploads as PDF. Roof mount residential systems file as an Electrical - Residential Solar Install permit; ground mounts and commercial arrays file as building permits, per the solar permits page.
The checklist is specific about drawings: electrical plans stamped by an Oklahoma State licensed Electrical Engineer, manufacturer specs compliant with the adopted electrical code, plus a roof layout showing the array and access pathways along the perimeter, valleys, egress windows, and ridgeline. SolarAPP+ exists here but as a voluntary expedited lane for roof mount residential only, with certified documents still uploaded through the portal. On cost, we are deliberately silent: the city's fee change schedule lists photovoltaic installations under miscellaneous electrical fees, but the published document does not unambiguously tie a dollar figure to that line, so ask the Development Center for the current number rather than trusting a blog, including this one. The permit fees page is the place to start.
Title 17, Section 156 is the clause to watch going forward
The same statute that authorizes distributed generation billing in Oklahoma also draws a line worth knowing about. 17 O.S. Section 156 caps DG rates and surcharges at full cost recovery, bars non-solar customers from subsidizing solar customers in the same class, and expressly describes a higher fixed charge for DG customers as a legitimate way to avoid subsidization. No such OKC-specific fixed charge is in front of you today. But the statutory door is open, and a 25 year purchase decision should account for the possibility. When you stress test a quote, ask what the payback looks like if the fixed charge on solar accounts rises. An installer who has thought about that question is the one you want on your roof.
3,089 hours of sunshine, and one violent season
The resource is the best argument OKC has. The city records about 3,089.4 mean annual sunshine hours, sunny roughly 69 percent of the time, ranging from 60 percent of possible sun in December to 80 percent in July, per climate records. Our downtown PVGIS run models 1583.4 kWh per year per installed kW, peaking in July at 151.1 kWh per kW and bottoming in December at 100.5. Note how flat the curve is: even February models 114.9. That evenness suits NEBO, since monthly self-consumption, not an annual bank, is what earns retail value here.
July models 151.1 kWh per kW, right when OKC cooling load peaks. High summer self-consumption is exactly what the NEBO structure rewards.
PVGIS v5.2 model run by Solar Learning Lab on August 30, 2026, NSRDB radiation database. Fixed south facing mount, 30 degree tilt, 14 percent losses, downtown Oklahoma City coordinates. Your roof will differ. Tool documentation at PVGIS. The other half of the weather story is severe. The National Weather Service Norman office counts 194 tornado listings for the immediate OKC area since 1890, with May the peak month and about two thirds of strikes falling April through June. That does not argue against solar. It argues for impact rated modules, attachment hardware selected with wind in mind, and a call to your insurer before installation, not after.
What OG&E power costs, benchmarked against the model
OG&E is the investor owned utility for OKC, serving 778,307 residential customers across a 30,000 square mile territory at the end of 2025, per the OGE Energy 10-K. Cheap power is the headwind: the 2024 EIA residential average for OG&E's Oklahoma jurisdiction was 11.78 cents per kWh, per EIA Table 6. Every avoided kWh is worth less here than in most states we cover, which makes honest sizing and the TOU details matter more, not less.
| Energy source | Type | Average price | What that means |
|---|---|---|---|
| OG&E Oklahoma | 2024 residential average | 11.78¢ per kWh | EIA Table 6, 2024 Utility Bundled Retail Sales, Residential. |
| OG&E R-1 standard rate | Energy charge, June through October | 8.00¢ per kWh plus fuel adjustments | Customer charge $13.00 monthly. NEBO customers move to the applicable standard TOU schedule instead. |
| OG&E R-1 standard rate | Energy charge, November through May | 5.80¢ per kWh plus fuel adjustments | Effective January 1, 2025 in all territory served. |
| Oklahoma City rooftop | PVGIS modeled output | 1583.4 kWh per kW annually | Fixed south facing model at 30 degree tilt. Individual roofs differ. |
Rate details from the OCC tariff filing and EIA Table 6. Seasonal fuel cost adjustments apply on top of R-1 energy charges.
Crews quoting OKC roofs
The screening question for this market writes itself: which TOU schedule will my account take under NEBO, and what does my payback look like on it? A bidder who answers with R-1 arithmetic has not read the rider. A bidder who walks you through the TOU move, the 125 percent cap, and avoided-cost exports has done OKC homework.
Ratings snapshot: Google Maps, August 2026, via the DataForSEO SERP feed. Zero companies paid us and none are endorsed by us.
Anova Home
Oklahoma City, OK
4.0(130 Google reviews)
think solar OKC
Oklahoma City, OK
5.0(115 Google reviews)
Ratings and review counts are Google Maps ratings for Oklahoma City local results, retrieved August 17, 2026 via the DataForSEO SERP API. We list the highest rated established companies we found. No company paid to appear here, and appearing here is not an endorsement. Check current reviews and licensing before you sign anything.
Model the bill offset, then adjust for the tariff
The calculator below runs on the 11.78 cent EIA average and our downtown production model. It treats every kWh as equally valuable, which NEBO does not, so treat the output as a ceiling for a heavily exporting design and a fair screen for a self-consumption design.
Slider top is our downtown Oklahoma City PVGIS run at 1,583.4 kWh per kW. Slider bottom trims 15 percent for shade and orientation. OKC gets sunshine about 69 percent of the time, so the resource is real even when the tariff is stingy.
Cash quotes in Oklahoma City cluster near $2.62 per watt, against a $3.50 national 2024 median (LBNL). Use your quote.
Assumptions you can change
Use the rate on your actual lease or PPA quote. There is no published statewide average we trust enough to hardcode.
Cash purchase
$22,270 after state credit
- Year 1 benefit
- $132/mo
- Payback
- 13 years
- 20 year net position
- $16,205
A cash purchase in OKC stands on bill offset alone. There is no Oklahoma solar income tax credit on the 2025 Form 511-CR, and the NEBO rider pays avoided cost, not retail, on monthly surplus.
Solar loan
$292/mo 15 yr payment
- Year 1 net
- -$160/mo
- Upfront
- $0
- 20 year net position
- -$14,058
Loan pricing here uses the Oklahoma cost inputs plus the standard loan-over-cash spread. No OG&E financing product is modeled.
Lease / PPA
$0 down you buy the power
- Year 1 net
- -$137/mo
- Upfront
- $0
- 20 year net position
- -$36,145
The 25D homeowner credit ended December 31, 2025. Any third party ownership pitch in OKC should be judged on its rate, its escalator, and how the contract handles NEBO's TOU requirement.
Estimates, not quotes. Inputs use the OG&E Oklahoma 2024 residential average from EIA, our downtown OKC PVGIS run, and Oklahoma cost benchmarks. The tool values every kWh at the average rate, which NEBO's TOU pricing and avoided-cost exports will not match. We are a solar installer and we also partner with other solar companies. See our disclosures.
We are a solar installer and we also partner with other solar companies.
Oklahoma City questions, answered from the record
Does Oklahoma City have full retail net metering?
Do I keep the flat R-1 rate after going solar?
How big can my system be?
Is there an Oklahoma state solar tax credit?
Can I still claim the federal homeowner credit in 2026?
Who pulls the solar permit in OKC?
The record stack
Every claim above traces to these documents, reviewed August 30, 2026. Items we could not confirm from a primary source, including the exact PV permit fee and any state property or sales tax treatment, are labeled as unconfirmed rather than guessed.
- https://www.okc.gov/departments/development-services/development-center/solar-permits
- https://www.okc.gov/Infrastructure-Development/Development-Planning/Development-Center/About-Us
- https://www.okc.gov/Infrastructure-Development/Development-Planning/Housing-Neighborhood-Programs/Sustainability/Solar
- https://www.okc.gov/Infrastructure-Development/Development-Planning/Housing-Neighborhood-Programs/Sustainability/Incentives-Tax-Credits
- https://www.okc.gov/files/assets/city/v/2/development-services/documents/application-checklists/solar-panel-install.pdf
- https://www.okc.gov/Services/Permits/Building-Trade-Permits/Permit-Fees
- https://oklahoma.gov/occ/divisions/public-utility/energy/electric-utility/netmetering.html
- https://public.occ.ok.gov/WebLink/DocView.aspx?id=11250833&dbid=0&repo=OCC
- https://law.justia.com/codes/oklahoma/title-17/section-17-156/
- https://materials.proxyvote.com/Approved/670837/20260316/FO10K_628778/INDEX.HTML?page=12
- https://www.eia.gov/electricity/sales_revenue_price/xls/table_6.xlsx
- https://oklahoma.gov/content/dam/ok/en/tax/documents/forms/tax-credits/511-CR.pdf
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Climate_of_Oklahoma_City
- https://www.weather.gov/oun/tornadodata-okc
- https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Oklahoma_City
Get an OKC estimate built on the rider, not around it
Bring a recent OG&E bill. Peak load history and monthly usage shape the right system size under NEBO more than roof square footage does.
What does your monthly electric bill look like?
Oklahoma City average is $167 per month (EIA, 2024).