Rooftop Solar Power in Puerto Rico Reaches 10% as Grid Reliability Continues to Decline
The Institute for Energy Economics and Financial Analysis (IEEFA) has reported that more than 10% of electricity consumption in Puerto Rico comes from rooftop solar power, which demonstrates a continued increase of distributed solar as an alternative to the increasingly unreliable centralized grid.
According to data filed by private grid operator, LUMA Energy, approximately 1.2 GW of residential and commercial rooftop solar had been installed under Puerto Rico’s net metering regulations as of June 2025.
IEEFA estimates that the rooftop systems will produce more than 1.8 GWh of electricity annually. As per LUMA’s estimate of FY 2025 sales and data on net metering exports to the grid, IEEFA predicts that the commercial and residential rooftop installations account for about 10.3% of Puerto Rico’s total electricity consumption. The statistics do not capture off-grid systems, meaning that the actual amount of electricity provided by solar on the island is even higher.
Over 2024, residential and commercial solar systems have been added to the grid at a rate of almost 3,200 per month. LUMA projects installations to continue growing at a similar rate, reaching almost 2 GW of installed capacity by mid-2028.
The day-to-day unreliability of the grid and the threat of another catastrophic power outage during Hurricane Maria in 2017 is a driving factor in these installations. The reliability of the grid got worst in recent years, with metrics for the frequency and duration of transmission and distribution system outages deteriorating from 2023 to 2025.
Approximately 83% of residential and commercial rooftop solar systems have battery storage to continue to operate during blackouts. These distributed batteries also provide support to the grid.
LUMA has created a program paying participating customers with battery storage for LUMA to be able to centrally dispatch some of the energy stored in their batteries. During July 2025, LUMA approached these resources to dispatch an average of about 40 MW of power during peak times.
The rooftop systems contributed to reduced load shedding (blackouts) during peak hours when there was no centralized generation capacity on the system to meet total demand.
The number of residential installations are at 163,000, or about 12% of Puerto Rico’s total residential customers. The Puerto Rican government is doubling down on centralized generation rather than embracing the transition towards a decentralized grid.
The government’s announcement of an RFP for 3 GW of large-scale power generation favoring natural gas will help protect Puerto Ricans with centralized infrastructure and price-volatile fossil fuel imports.
