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What happens after you sign

Installed and switched on are different days. Here is the gap, and why it exists.

Written by Brian Tilford, NABCEP certified.

Start here: the two dates, and the gap between them

Contract to installed, then installed to switched on, drawn as one timeline — so you can see which weeks belong to your installer and which belong to your utility. The steps below name what happens in each of them.
Rather read it? What the video says, in words

The two dates that matter, drawn on one timeline: the day the array is finished and the day the utility allows it to run. Design and site survey, permits and the interconnection application, the install itself, then inspection and permission to operate — with the weeks that belong to the installer separated from the weeks that belong to the utility. A roof or a heat pump finishes at the install, because no utility approval stands between it and working.

Contract to power

Solar timeline from contract to producing powerInstallation happens 30 to 45 days after contract. The system then sits finished but switched off until the utility grants permission to operate, at day 60 to 90.ContractDay 0InstalledDay 30–45Making powerDay 60–90The wait almost nobody mentionsFinished, switched off, waiting on the utility.
The array is finished weeks before it is allowed to run. That gap belongs to your utility, not your installer — but you should hear about it before you sign, not in week six.

30–45

Days to installed

Solar. Design, permits, the crew.

60–90

Days to making power

Solar. Utility dependent.

2–7

Days for a roof or heat pump

No utility in the loop.

  1. Design and site survey

    Week 1

    Someone measures the roof, the service panel and the load. This is where a proposal drawn off a satellite photo meets reality.

  2. Permits and the utility application

    Weeks 2–5

    Your town issues the building and electrical permits; the interconnection application goes to the utility. Both queues are outside anyone's control.

  3. Installation

    A day or two

    The visible part, and the shortest. A roof or a heat pump on its own finishes here — there is no utility step.

  4. Inspection, then permission to operate

    Weeks 6–13

    The town inspects, then the utility grants permission to operate. Until that letter arrives the system stays switched off, however finished it looks.

Read next

How the money actually worksWho owns the system, what is inside the price, and where the dealer fee hides.Reading a proposal, line by lineHalf of a solar proposal is fact. The other half is assumption dressed as fact.What good design looks likeThe roof decides what is possible. A design that starts from a package is working backwards.
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