Are Solar Panels Worth It in Arizona? The 2026 Answer

Key Takeaways

• Arizona is the inverse of New York: the nation's best sun with modest 15.23¢ rates and stingy exports — volume does what policy won't.
• The APS regime is net billing: self-consumption offsets full retail, exports earn 6.171¢/kWh (2026), locked ten years at interconnection.
• The 15¢-vs-6¢ spread makes Arizona a self-consumption state: aim production at the AC load, shift what shifts, and let batteries referee the rest.
• Verdict: yes for most roofs — powered by production physics, disciplined by export math.

The best fuel in America, priced modestly

Run any address through PVWatts and Arizona embarrasses the map: the desert Southwest's yields top the country, meaning fewer panels per kilowatt-hour than anywhere in this series. But the revenue side is ordinary — 15.23¢/kWh (May 2026), below the national average — so each of those abundant kilowatt-hours earns less than it would in the Northeast. Arizona solar is a volume business: the per-panel math at 5.5 peak sun hours simply outproduces the rate handicap for most households, before the export rules complicate the story.

Net billing, RCP, and the ten-year lock

Arizona retired classic net metering years ago. Under today's net billing: power you consume as it's made offsets the full retail rate, while exports earn an administratively set price — at APS, the Resource Comparison Proxy (RCP), 6.171¢/kWh for 2026 interconnections, with each customer locked to their interconnection-year rate for ten years. SRP and the co-ops run their own math (the SRP-vs-APS choice is its own homework where you have it).

Two strategic consequences. First, the lock rewards sooner: the RCP has ratcheted downward over the years, so this year's rate held for a decade beats next year's. Second, the 15¢-vs-6¢ spread puts Arizona in the same design family as California — milder spread, same conclusion: every kilowatt-hour self-consumed is worth ~2.5 exported ones.

Designing for the desert

Rates per EIA-derived data and APS filings, 2026; SRP territory runs different numbers.

The AC alignment deserves the emphasis: Arizona's load curve — cooling that runs hardest exactly when panels produce, then into the evening — is almost solar-shaped. Pre-cooling the house through the solar window, a west-tilted share of the array, and scheduled EV charging close most of the remaining gap without hardware; a battery closes the rest where the spread justifies it.

Verdict: yes for most Arizona roofs — the production volume is unmatched, and the RCP lock gives a decade of certainty few net-billing states offer. Just buy it as what it is: a self-consumption machine in the sunniest market in America, not a policy-subsidized one. The sun does the subsidizing here.