The Rules Say 10 Working Days. Cebu's Meter Still Waits on the Co-op.

Since April 1, 2026, a Cebu household with rooftop solar has a number to hold its electric cooperative to: 10 working days to process a complete net-metering application. The Department of Energy's Department Circular DC2026-01-00012 made that binding, cutting the old 20-working-day standard in half. The rule finally caught up with panels that got cheap years ago. The counter has to prove it can move that fast.

Net metering lets you generate what you use and sell the surplus back to the co-op, shrinking the bill. For years the wait for the one signature that let power flow back into the grid ran long, and slow interconnection was a documented drag on the program. That was the old normal. The circular is meant to end it.

The deadline is written. Compliance is the open question

Paper timelines and counter reality are two different documents. The circular also directs local government units to issue the required electrical permits and inspection certificates within three working days, which stacks a chain of hard deadlines from permit to interconnection. If a Cebu homeowner still waits months, the question is no longer what the rule says. It is whether the co-op and the LGU are following it.

The framework did not appear overnight. Net metering runs on the Renewable Energy Act of 2008, and the Energy Regulatory Commission tightened the program again with Resolution No. 15, Series of 2025, issued 27 August 2025. Those amended rules let households bank and roll over net-metering credits across billing periods, permit transfer of credits to a new property owner under conditions, and require distribution utilities to publish program information online. The direction of the rules is toward yes, faster.

What's still a proposal, not a guarantee

The sharper enforcement tool is not law yet. In its July 2026 reform package, the ERC proposed automatic, or deemed, approval where a distribution utility fails to install a bidirectional meter on time, alongside removal of the 1 MW distributed energy resources cap, legal validity for e-signatures, multi-site crediting, and priority dispatch for renewables in off-grid areas. That package is under consultation. Until it takes effect, a homeowner still leans on the 10-working-day clock, not on a deemed-approval fallback.

The ceiling moved for business rooftops

Part of the old bottleneck was scale. The April 2026 circular lifted the non-residential net-metering capacity cap from 100 kW to 1 MW, opening the program to the commercial and industrial rooftops the earlier limit locked out. Residential eligibility already ran under existing ERC rules.

The base is growing. At the time of the 2025 amended rules, DOE figures put the program at 17,175 users and about 157 MW of installed capacity. By June 30, 2026, ERC figures counted 23,684 net-metering prosumers with a combined 232 MW, plus 181 distributed energy resource participants accounting for another 226 MW. That is a lot of new pressure landing on co-op interconnection desks as cheaper panels pull more households in.

Cebu has every reason to say yes fast

Cebu leans heavily on power carried over submarine cables from neighboring islands, so the grid runs against a real transfer limit. Every rooftop that feeds back is power the province does not have to import over a constrained wire. With strong year-round sun, a Cebu roof pays itself off faster than in most of the country.

The reform work is largely done at the national level. What is left is enforcement at the window: 10 working days, three-day LGU permits, and a co-op that has to clear the queue. Until that discipline holds in practice, a paid-off array sits on a Cebu roof generating for the house while the meter below it keeps billing the full import rate.