Nepra’s shift from net metering to net billing draws criticism over rooftop solar impact

The National Electric Power Regulatory Authority’s (Nepra) move to abolish the net metering system and replace it with a net billing framework under the Prosumer Regulations 2026 has sparked widespread criticism from politicians, former officials and energy experts, who argue it will disincentivise rooftop solar adoption and worsen power sector inefficiencies.

Political and expert reactions

Former Sindh governor and PML-N leader Mohammad Zubair wrote on X: “This government continues to prove it has no solutions to our economic challenges especially power sector,” and asked why citizens should “pay extra just because this government is inefficient, incompetent and has no imagination.”

PPP’s Senator Sherry Rehman said in a thread that the rules “will not only slow down the country’s energy transition and contradict Pakistan’s climate commitments, it will, quite literally, punish citizens for producing clean, affordable energy.” She added the change “rewards inefficiency, and props up an ageing distribution system that should have been privatised or given to the provinces long ago.”

Ammar Rashid, an activist and researcher, called the decision “disastrous,” saying it “explicitly aims to slow Pakistan’s consumer-led clean energy transition” and accused authorities of penalising solar users “to protect the interests of IPPs, extort more revenue, cover DISCO inefficiencies & delay reform of the grid.”

Power sector expert and former official Shahid Shafi Sial posted that the shift “addressed a long-standing anomaly” and described the change as “politically difficult,” while cautioning it “won’t fix the power sector” or resolve issues such as capacity payments.

PTI leader and former Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa finance minister Taimur Saleem Khan Jhagra said the government had used Nepra to front the decision and warned it could spur increased battery adoption and off-grid uptake.

Former finance minister Miftah Ismail underscored the stark pricing imbalance, noting that consumers will pay full retail rates while receiving far lower compensation for excess solar power, a dynamic he portrayed as advantageous to the state but unfair to citizens. Consumers would buy electricity at about Rs40 per unit while surplus would be bought back at about Rs11, with tax treatment widening the gap.

Former information minister and PTI leader Fawad Chaudhry also criticised the decision, framing it as part of what he described as a broader burden on domestic consumers. In a post on X, he alleged that electricity tariffs were being raised for households while solar net metering was being “practically abolished” to provide relief to industrialists. He further used the reference of “Ayub Khan’s 22 families” to argue that economic power had expanded to a much larger elite, naming the Zardari and Sharif families in this context.

Former finance minister and PTI leader Hammad Azhar also weighed in, criticising what he described as inconsistent and retroactive policymaking in the power sector. In a post on X, he said current decisions were effectively encouraging a shift towards battery-based off-grid solar solutions, warning that such measures risk making the national grid “irrelevant”. Azhar also pointed to last year’s sharp increase in fixed energy costs for industries, calling it a policy “blunder” that had already undermined confidence in the sector.

Under the new rules, utilities will purchase excess electricity from prosumers at the national average energy purchase price while selling electricity to consumers at the applicable consumer tariff, effectively ending one-for-one unit exchange under net metering, Nepra said. The buyback rate for surplus generation has been discussed at about Rs11 per unit, while consumers continue to pay grid tariffs that can exceed Rs40 per unit. The regulator has also reduced the standard contract term from seven years to five.

The regulations apply to solar, wind, and biogas systems and cap the maximum size of a distributed generation facility at 1 megawatt, with system capacity limited to the consumer’s sanctioned load. Nepra has introduced a technical restriction that bars new connections if generation on a transformer reaches 80% of its rated capacity, and facilities of 250kW and above must undergo a mandatory load-flow study, the report said. Existing prosumers will remain under their current agreements until expiry.

Financial and operational obligations also shift under the new framework: prosumers will bear interconnection costs, including meters and grid upgrades, Nepra said, and the regulator has introduced a non-refundable concurrence fee of Rs1,000 per kilowatt. Metering must support two-way measurement, either through a single bi-directional meter or dual meters. Nepra has retained powers to revise purchase rates during the life of agreements and to issue binding directions.