Why New Jersey’s balcony solar bill is a huge deal for renters

By Ella Nilsen, CNN

(CNN) — The balcony solar revolution is coming to the United States, but not everyone has been able to benefit. The nearly 35% of Americans who rent could stand to gain the most from solar, but there is a potential barrier in the way: Their landlords.

This week, New Jersey became the tenth state to pass a bill allowing residents to purchase small plug-in solar installations, bypassing longstanding utility permitting laws. But the New Jersey bill went one step further, expanding plug-in solar access for renters by prohibiting landlords and homeowners’ associations from blocking them.

Following similar bills passed in Colorado and Virginia, it’s a move New Jersey lawmakers say will dramatically lower the barrier to entry for renters interested in solar who can’t afford or install expensive rooftop systems.

“At the end of the day, this is a bill for the consumer,” said New Jersey state Sen. John McKeon, a Democrat and the bill’s primary Senate sponsor. “When I count the votes, green is not red nor blue.”

It’s one step to tackle New Jersey’s energy affordability crisis. The Garden State saw a 17% jump in its electricity rates from 2024 to 2025, the biggest of any state (only beaten out by Washington, DC), according to a report from the US Senate Joint Economic Committee.

The bill will head next to Democratic Gov. Mikie Sherrill’s desk. A spokesperson for the governor did not comment on whether she’d sign it, but said Sherrill is examining the bill closely, and it is in line with her focus on lowering constituents’ electricity costs.

States are starting to codify a stealth backyard revolution that has been quietly growing in the US. Fed up with high electricity bills, consumers are starting to buy low-wattage solar systems they can plug into a regular outlet. Once connected, it feeds solar energy into a home to power appliances, rather than drawing that energy out of the home.

These panels, which can hang off outdoor balconies, aren’t big enough to power an entire home. But they can help shave money off monthly electricity bills, at a drastically lower up-front cost than a rooftop solar system, which can cost tens of thousands of dollars to install.

Balcony solar is a good option for renters who may move apartments, or first-time homebuyers who don’t want to invest thousands before moving again.

Most of balcony solar state laws adopted have broken down barriers that give electrical utilities the ability to reject balcony solar panels. But a few bills, including New Jersey, have added extra protections for renters that are “nation-leading,” said Hannah Birnbaum, co-founder and chief of advocacy at energy affordability nonprofit Permit Power.

“This is for people who live in apartments, who don’t own their roofs,” Birnbaum said.

An unlikely beginning

New Jersey’s balcony solar bill is not the first. That distinction goes to bright-red Utah, where a bill allowing permitting for balcony solar passed unanimously last year and was signed into law by Republican Gov. Spencer Cox.

Advocates say it’s a sign of bipartisan solar fervor sweeping the nation, driven by Americans’ collective frustration over rising energy bills. Around 30 other state legislatures are considering bills similar to Utah’s.

“What’s political about cheap? Nothing,” said Cora Stryker, co-founder of solar nonprofit Bright Saver, whose mission is to sell balcony solar panels for less than $300 — a fraction of the market price. “We think it’s the beginning of a tipping point for consumers everywhere.”

In Germany, balcony solar has proliferated. Renters there have installed over 1.2 million balcony systems, according to the country’s Federal Network Agency. But that may be an undercount, and the real number could be as high as 4 million, due to a proliferation of unregistered systems, according to a 2025 report from Solar Power Europe.

Germany’s plug-in solar revolution caught the attention of Ray Ward, a Republican state senator in Utah who has become the unexpected father of the plug-in solar movement in the US.

When he first read about people routinely buying plug-in solar panels in Germany, Ward wondered if similar solutions existed in the US.

“I was like, ‘That’s cool, can I buy one here?’” he said. “It took a long time to figure out why I couldn’t.”

The main reason was Utah law. Like that of many other states, the law forbade consumers from plugging any solar panel into the grid unless it has a blessing from their utility. Ward’s bill got around that type of permitting for very small solar panel systems that generated a max of 1.2 kilowatts and presented no liability to electrical utilities.

Ward, a staunch Republican, says plug-in solar is aligned with his values.

“To be able to take care of your own problems and to not have the government stop you from taking care of your own problems, that’s a libertarian principle, a Republican principle,” Ward said. “But I think everybody across the political spectrum resents it if they could take care of their own problem and the government stops them.”

At Bright Saver, Stryker estimates 70% of Americans can’t access solar energy through rooftop, community solar or other means.

Balcony solar “is a solution for that 70%, a huge chunk of whom are renters,” she said. The fact that New Jersey is the third state to give protections to renters who want to use it makes her optimistic other states will follow suit.

“We are incredibly optimistic this thing is going to move even faster than we anticipated,” Stryker added.

One hang-up has remained in the US, however. Plug-in solar panels are awaiting their product certification from private lab testing company UL Solutions, and that timeline remains uncertain. The individual components of a plug-in solar panel are UL certified, but the entire panel is not.

UL Solutions spokesperson Tyler Khan said the company is “actively testing” plug-in solar panels, adding “it’s clear that the market for safe, consumer‑friendly plug‑in solar systems is gaining momentum.”

Electrical utilities have raised safety concerns in several states. Utility representatives have said they’re worried about the potential for a plug-in solar panel to start electrical fires in a home or feed too much power back to the grid that could potentially injure linemen.

Realtor and landlord associations raised similar concerns during a June public hearing on the New Jersey bill, saying they wanted safety electrical standards attached, as well as guidelines around where panels were placed and how they were attached. Some also raised fears that smaller landlords could be held liable if something went wrong.

But in balcony-solar stronghold Germany, there have been no safety incidents, according to a research paper from the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory.

“I think this will change the way that people look at solar,” Ward, who has installed two small plug-in solar panels in his own home, said. “I hope it will be like in Germany; it’s not a political issue in Germany. People buy one because they saw the guy in the apartment down the hall had one. It’s not like where the government needs to go advertise it.”

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CNN’s Laura Paddison contributed to this report.