Sri Lanka ends net metering for new rooftop solar and moves to Net Plus
Serguey Asael Shinder2 min readSri Lanka's Ministry of Energy has discontinued net metering for new grid-connected rooftop PV. Systems connected after 5 March 2026 operate under the Net Plus feed-in mechanism instead, and distribution licensees have been instructed to reject new net-metering connections and extensions of existing agreements. pv magazine reported the change on 22 September 2026.
New Net Plus agreements and extensions are limited to a maximum term of twelve years. Systems must carry smart meters allowing licensees to monitor generation and other system data remotely.
The tariffs, set by the Public Utilities Commission of Sri Lanka and effective from 25 August, are unchanged by this decision and are banded by size: LKR 23.11/kWh up to 10 kW, LKR 19.15/kWh above 10 kW and up to 40 kW, LKR 17.11/kWh above 40 kW and up to 250 kW, and LKR 15.81/kWh (about $0.05) above 250 kW. They are valid until 24 February 2027. Rooftop solar paired with storage draws a higher time-dependent rate: LKR 45.53/kWh in the prioritised feed-in period for the first fifteen years, and LKR 15.81/kWh at other times.
The context is growth. The Ceylon Electricity Board reported 1,935 MW of rooftop capacity across 108,979 connections at the end of 2025, up from 1,141 MW a year earlier, with generation reaching 1,674 GWh — a 93% year-on-year increase.
What it means
Net metering pays the retail rate by construction, which is affordable while rooftop is a rounding error and stops being so at the growth rates above. Moving to an administered feed-in tariff separates what a system is paid for exporting from what its owner pays for importing, and hands the regulator a dial it can actually turn.
The two details that will shape behaviour are not the headline rates. The twelve-year cap gives every new installation a defined horizon, which changes financing and resale rather than payback alone. And the storage differential — roughly triple the flat rate during the prioritised window — is an explicit instruction about when the system wants energy, not merely how much it wants. That is the lever an export tariff has and net metering does not.