SAN FRANCISCO--(BUSINESS WIRE)-- Pacific Gas and Electric Company (PG&E) today announced that it has connected 200,000 solar customers, accounting for one in every four rooftop solar households in America. PG&E is among the fastest in the nation at connecting solar customers to the grid with an average of a five day turnaround. That’s better than the industry average of four weeks.

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Year to date, PG&E has already connected over 70,000 solar customers to the electric grid, a rapid increase compared to 45,000 solar customers interconnected in all of 2014. Faster interconnections due to technical and process improvements helped the utility get more customers online with solar than ever before.

“We connected our first solar customer to the grid in 1993, and since then we’ve been the nation’s leader in bringing solar to our customers’ homes. We hear from customers that they want choice and control when it comes to energy management. For any customer who wants to take advantage of sunny days to generate power, we’re ready to connect them safely and quickly,” said PG&E Senior Vice President and Chief Customer Officer Laurie Giammona.

PG&E continues to work with industry partners to further shorten and improve the time it takes to connect new solar customers to the grid. In September, PG&E announced its participation in the Northern and Central California SunShot Alliance, sponsored by the U.S. Department of Energy. With its alliance partners SolarCity, Qado Energy, Accela and the City of Livermore, PG&E plans to construct and interconnect rooftop solar systems in one day or less, an unprecedented goal given the industry’s current average of 30 days.

Also today, PG&E celebrated the top 10 cities with the highest number of solar customers interconnected to the electric grid – including Bakersfield, Fresno, San Francisco and San Jose – accounting for over 30 percent of PG&E’s solar customers.

PG&E offers online resources and tips for customers as they consider solar for their home at www.pge.com/solar, including:

• Ensuring energy efficiency at home before going solar,
• Estimating costs of installing solar and potential bill savings with PG&E’s solar calculator,
• Finding a contractor,
• Receiving bids from at least three solar vendors, and
• Exploring different financing options.

For an in-depth look at how PG&E has improved the interconnection process, read the National Renewable Energy Laboratory report “Decreasing Soft Costs for Solar Photovoltaics by Improving the Interconnection Process: A Case Study of Pacific Gas and Electric.”

Visit CleanEnergyCA to learn more about how Californians are leading the way by investing in clean energy.

About PG&E

Pacific Gas and Electric Company, a subsidiary of PG&E Corporation (NYSE:PCG), is one of the largest combined natural gas and electric utilities in the United States. Based in San Francisco, with more than 20,000 employees, the company delivers some of the nation’s cleanest energy to nearly 16 million people in Northern and Central California. For more information, visit www.pge.com/ and www.pge.com/en/about/newsroom/index.page.

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Source: Pacific Gas and Electric Company