About Balcony Sun Lab
Balcony Sun Lab is an independent guide to plug-in solar: small solar kits, usually one to four panels and a microinverter, that you connect to your home through an ordinary wall outlet. In Germany more than 1.5 million of these "balcony power plants" are registered. In the US and the UK they only became legal in 2025 and 2026, and the rules are still changing month by month.
We started this site because the answers people need were scattered across bill texts, utility tariffs, retailer blogs and one-day news stories. Most of the pages that rank for these questions are written by companies that sell kits. We don't.
What we cover
- Laws: where plug-in solar is legal, the wattage caps, certification rules and paperwork in each US state, plus the UK rules that started on 27 August 2026.
- Savings: realistic numbers by state, including the cases where a kit is not worth it.
- Renters, condos and HOAs: what landlords and associations can and can't do.
- Kits, installation and safety: how to choose a certified kit and install it without creating a fire or shock risk.
Our principles
- Sources first. Every law page links to the bill, statute or regulator, and shows the date we last checked it.
- Dated updates. When a law changes we update the page and record the change in its update log.
- No paid rankings. Brands can't pay to appear or to be ranked higher. If we earn a commission from a link, we say so (see our affiliate disclosure).
- Honest about limits. We are not lawyers or electricians. Our guides are general information, and we tell you when to ask a professional.
Read more about how we research and calculate savings, or contact us if you spot an error or a law change we missed.
Who runs the site
Balcony Sun Lab is published by David Álvarez González, Valencia, Spain. Contact: hello@balconysunlab.com.