Denver, Colo—If you’re a renter or condo owner, having solar panels might seem out of reach. But if you live in Virginia, Maine, Utah, and now Colorado—great news—you too can harness the sun.
On May 7, 2026, Colorado Governor Jared Polis signed HB26-1007 into law, which will allow residents to purchase “plug-in” solar panels that hang on a balcony or sit on a patio, easel-back style, anywhere they can catch some rays to generate power. Now, even the state’s apartment dwellers will be able to go solar and begin to lower their electricity bills.
The Colorado bill was inspired by a trip Representative Lesley Smith (D) of Boulder, Colorado, took to Germany last fall. “We were visiting my sister-in-law, and we were walking in her neighborhood, and I looked up at an apartment building, and I saw a balcony with a solar panel on it, and I said, oh my gosh, look at that.”
Within a day after returning home, Smith started hearing from constituents because Utah had passed a “balcony solar” bill the previous spring. She also got a call from her friend and former Speaker of the House, KC Becker, who is now the CEO for COSSA, the Colorado Solar and Storage Association, urging her to run a bill. And run, she did, introducing a bill in January 2026.
The “Plug-In Photovoltaic” or “PIPV” systems range in their power output, but 1920 watts was the limit set in the Colorado bill. A plug-in solar kit typically consists of one to four panels, each around three by five feet in size.
In most states, plug-in solar systems are illegal for safety reasons. Colorado’s law addresses those concerns with three basic rules, starting with the requirement that there can be only one system per address, and that residents can’t daisy chain several systems together. The next requirement is that the systems have to shut down during a power outage. Last, the products must be certified by Underwriters Laboratories, the organization that tests, certifies, and sets safety standards for products.
Having a UL-certified plug, together with allowing only systems that will shut off during an outage to protect lineman doing repairs, was how Xcel Energy, the largest utility in Colorado, was brought onboard. Similar bills are pending in over half of U.S. states—although legislation was deferred in a few according to the nonprofit Bright Saver, which tracks legislation on its website. Both Becker and Smith told H2O Radio that if bills stalled, it was because of utilities pushing back.
Plug and Play But with Some Delay
So, with plug-in solar legal in Colorado, can residents now go pick one up at a local home improvement store and plug it in? Not yet. After Utah passed its law in 2025, UL launched a testing and certification program for PIPV kits, based on its UL 3700 investigation, but manufacturers are just now in the process of submitting their products to get that recognizable UL seal of approval.
When customers do finally purchase a system, they will likely need to hire an electrician. That’s because for over 100 years, houses have been wired with outlets meant to pull power from the grid, but “now we're throwing a different curveball at that, saying we're going to bring in power from a different side,” says Joe Bablo, principal engineering manager for UL Solutions, one of three divisions of the organization. He and his team evaluated the potential hazards that plug-in solar systems pose by reversing the direction that power travels in house electric sockets.
Among those hazards are overloading wires in branch circuits, as well as “touch safety” concerns when a user pulls a plug from the wall. Bablo says requirements are built into the standards so that the plug’s blades, which could remain live long enough to injure a person if it were a normal receptacle, are safe.
The national electrical code requires all receptacles outdoors to have GFCI (Ground-Fault Circuit Interrupters) protection. (GFCI outlets are often in bathrooms to prevent electric shock near water.) Bablo explained that the GFCI socket will need to be bidirectional and people may have to upgrade their wiring to make that circuit safe.
As far as when the approved systems will be announced, Bablo is mum, “I can’t say who we're talking to or who we're working with.” But, he added, when they’re ready, they will have a UL certification database called ProductiQ on their website, where people can search for approved manufacturers. He said systems should be appearing within months.
The hope is that once UL-approved kits hit the market, more states will pass legislation to drive prices down and drive innovation, especially for systems that could connect to a battery and operate during an outage.
Meter Collars—More Savings for Customers Who Want to Go Solar
The Colorado legislation had two parts intended to make solar more affordable and accessible, including writing rules for HOAs and apartments prohibiting them from blocking plug-in solar systems. In addition to setting standards for plug-in solar, the law, which goes into effect on August 12, 2026, also addressed “meter collars.”
According to Becker of COSSA—which advocates for its members at the state capitol, the Public Utilities Commission, and in front of local governments and utilities—the meter collar is a device that helps integrate rooftop solar more seamlessly and much more cheaply.
Becker explains that a meter collar is installed between an electric meter socket and a utility billing meter to provide an immediate interconnection of customer-owned energy devices. Meter collars can cut the time and cost of solar installation by reducing the need for upgrades that a utility or local government might require, such as a new electrical panel. Having a meter collar eliminates the need for extra equipment and labor to install it, which will make rooftop solar cheaper, especially now that federal tax credits and incentives were eliminated by the Trump administration.
Giving Coloradans Choice
One notable carve out in the Colorado law is that very small systems under 391 watts can be plugged into a wall without needing an electrician or UL certification because the amount of power is so small it’s not significant enough to cause an issue. It also can’t probably do much more than power a laptop, but it can be an incremental way for people to lower their bills.
Smith says she’s doing everything she can to make it easier for people to harness the sun and produce clean energy for their homes or businesses. “You probably will get a payback much quicker than with…rooftop solar. It would probably be just a few years.”
It’s a payback that gives people a choice in the kind of energy they consume. And, Smith adds, they’re portable. If you move, you can take your system with you. 💧