Net Metering / NEM / Interconnection

Net metering (NEM) is the billing arrangement that credits a solar owner for electricity their system exports to the grid, and interconnection is the utility's formal approval to connect that system to the grid. They are distinct from the building/electrical permit a city issues for the install, but they describe the same physical solar project from the utility's side.

This distinction matters for solar data coverage. A city permit records that a solar system was approved to be built; a utility's NEM/interconnection dataset records that it was approved to connect. PermitStack ingests both kinds where they are public — for example California's statewide NEM interconnection data (~2.7M rows) and New York's NY-Sun program (~550K) feed our SOLAR category (5.9M records). They are normalized into the same schema as city building permits so you can query solar activity in one place. See solar permit data and solar permit.

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