It has about 750 customers in its net metering program, which allows the customer to install and use solar generators on their property for their own use while remaining attached to the Appalachian Power grid, and most are residential solar installations.

All APCo customers pay a monthly service charge which is less than $9.

That covers meter reading, billing and account servicing.Others who get some of their power from solar power also receive the monthly service fee and might also receive a stand-by charge if they use over 10 kilowatts of the generation capabilities. Those charges range from about $5 to $75.

Those using solar aren’t completely going “off the grid,” Shepelwich said. They are still connected to the utility, which has to have a plan for those customers if their system goes down or power goes out.

“Six hours a day [solar] may be generating power for them; the rest comes from us. We still have to have the infrastructure available, power system, transformers and people available to fix all of that stuff,” he said. “That’s still part of the formula. We’re providing that service. It has to be covered in some way.”

He said APCo is in a middle ground of moving toward a new world of distributed generation.