Solar Panel Cost in Syracuse, NY 2026: ~16.7-Year Payback
In Syracuse, NY, an 8 kW system at $2.76/W produces about 1,114 kWh per kW and pays back in roughly 16.7 years at 16.67¢/kWh with the federal credit at $0.
· Source: EIA Electric Power Monthly Table 5.6.A (July 2026 data) · next EIA update ~Oct 23
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- Syracuse production
- 1,114 kWh/kW/yr
- New York average
- 1,270 kWh/kW/yr
- Electricity rate
- 29.9¢/kWh
- 8 kW installed cost
- ~$22,080
- 2026 federal credit
- $0
- Payback (utility math)
- 16.7 years
Why this number
A kilowatt of panels in Syracuse produces about 1,114 kWh a year, the lowest of the 5 New York cities modeled here — behind New York City at 1,255, Albany at 1,178, Rochester at 1,137, Buffalo at 1,129. That is a payback of roughly 9.0 years against 8.0 years in New York City, with the same electricity rate, the same export rule and the same installed price. The difference is entirely the sky.
What sets Syracuse apart
Lake-effect cloud off Ontario makes Syracuse the weakest of New York’s major cities.
Your utility, officially
New York’s average residential rate is 29.9¢/kWh, but the bill in Syracuse comes from Niagara Mohawk Power Corp. at 16.67¢ — 44% below the state figure. These are the residential figures Syracuse’s utility reported to the U.S. Energy Information Administration on Form EIA-861 for 2024 — computed as revenue ÷ sales from the official file, not estimated:
| Utility | EIA ID | Residential avg price | Residential customers | Net-metering (residential, self-reported) |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Niagara Mohawk Power Corp. | 13573 | 16.67¢/kWh | 1,532,294 | 25414 customers / 199.328 MW |
How exports are treated matters as much as the headline price: Niagara Mohawk Power Corp. is modeled here under the state’s full-retail net metering rules, and that treatment is baked into every payback figure on this page.
Syracuse homes are billed by National Grid — legally Niagara Mohawk Power Corp., the name the utility still files under with the federal Energy Information Administration — and the 2024 EIA-861 numbers put its upstate residential average at 16.67¢/kWh across 1.53 million customers. Syracuse thus gets the strange end of a strange deal: the weakest solar production of any New York city we model, paired with electricity priced at less than half of what Con Edison charges 250 miles south. The state-average 29.5¢ used in the headline math on this page is a blend of those two worlds, and Syracuse sits firmly in the cheap one. Run the calculator above with 16.67 in the rate box and you will see what the sun and the tariff do to each other here; it is not flattering, and we would rather show you that than hide it.
Yet the utility’s own federal filing shows the market is not dead. Niagara Mohawk reported 199.33 MW of residential net-metered capacity across 25,414 homes in 2024 — systems averaging about 7.8 kW, a third larger than the 5.7 kW average on Con Edison’s cramped downstate roofs. Central New York houses have the roof area; what they lack is the sun and the rate pressure. The people installing here are, on the whole, installing bigger and expecting less per panel, which is the correct trade when the marginal panel costs the same everywhere but the payoff does not.
Because National Grid is investor-owned, the New York export rules on this page apply without asterisks: full-retail crediting under Phase One net metering, with VDER as the alternative track and an unconfirmed Customer Benefit Contribution charge that you should get quoted explicitly. The bill itself is delivery plus supply, and the supply portion floats monthly with the wholesale market unless an ESCO contract fixes it — which means your effective per-kWh value of solar drifts through the year even under full-retail crediting. Current rate schedules and the interconnection paperwork are on National Grid’s upstate site (nationalgridus.com ).
The honest Syracuse summary: this is the New York city where solar most needs the full-retail export rule to stay alive. If the state ever moves upstate customers to net billing, Syracuse’s math breaks first — before Rochester’s, before Buffalo’s, and long before the city that shares its utility rate but not its cloud deck, Albany.
Source: EIA Form EIA-861, 2024 final release , accessed 2026-09-02. Average price is total residential revenue divided by total residential sales for the year — your own rate depends on your tariff and usage tier.
New York is not one solar market
Across the 5 New York cities with their own modeled figures, production spans 13% — Syracuse at 1,114 kWh per kW to New York City at 1,255. Every column except production is identical down this table: same 29.9¢/kWh retail rate, same export regime, same $2.76/W installed cost. The payback differences are caused by weather and nothing else.
| Location | kWh per kW per year | 8 kW output | Annual value | Payback |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| New York City | 1,255 | 9,036 kWh | $2,702 | 8.0 yrs |
| Albany | 1,178 | 8,482 kWh | $2,536 | 8.5 yrs |
| Rochester | 1,137 | 8,186 kWh | $2,448 | 8.8 yrs |
| Buffalo | 1,129 | 8,129 kWh | $2,431 | 8.9 yrs |
| Syracuse (this page) | 1,114 | 8,021 kWh | $2,398 | 9.0 yrs |
| New York state average | 1,270 | 9,144 kWh | $2,734 | 7.9 yrs |
Against the state figure, Syracuse runs 12% below New York’s 1,270 kWh per kW — a payback 8.8 years longer than the statewide 7.9-year estimate on the same hardware at the same price.
An 8 kW system in Syracuse, priced out
| Metric | Estimate for Syracuse | New York statewide |
|---|---|---|
| Production, unshaded 20° south | 1,114 kWh per kW/yr | 1,270 kWh per kW/yr |
| 8 kW output after a 10% roof derate | ~8,021 kWh/yr | ~9,144 kWh/yr |
| Average residential rate | 29.9¢/kWh (EIA) | 29.9¢/kWh |
| Installed cost, 8 kW | ~$22,080 at $2.76/watt | ~$22,080 |
| 2026 federal credit | $0 | $0 |
| Export rule | Full-retail net metering | Full-retail net metering |
| Export credit modeled | retail (29.9¢/kWh) | retail (29.9¢/kWh) |
| Annual value of that output | ~$2,398 | ~$2,734 |
| Rough payback (your utility) | 16.7 years | 7.9 years (state-average model) |
| 25-year net position | $48,863 | — |
Only the first two rows differ. Everything financial — rate, tariff, price per watt — is inherited from New York without change, which is the point: a city page that quietly used a different electricity rate from its state page would be guessing, not measuring.
Doing nothing is not free either. Twenty-five years of the electricity an 8 kW Syracuse array would produce, with rates rising at 2.5% a year, comes to roughly $81,910.
If an EV charges at the Syracuse house, the EV + TOU + whole-home calculator prices that charging against this same solar output.
Run it with your own bill
Shared methodology · identical on every city page
- Production figures are unshaded, south-facing, 20° PVGIS values. A real roof — its own pitch, orientation, a tree or a chimney — typically produces 10–25% less; every payback here already carries a 10% real-roof derate.
- Paybacks include $150/yr of running costs and one $2,000 inverter replacement in year 14, which is why they run longer than paybacks quoted elsewhere.
- State export rules cover investor-owned, state-regulated utilities. Municipal utilities and rural electric cooperatives are exempt in most states and set their own terms.
- Installed cost is the state-level EnergySage market figure, not a city quote; a swing of 50¢/W moves payback by roughly a year and a half either way. Get three quotes before trusting any payback — including ours.
Syracuse against the rest of New York
Same rate, same export rule, same installed price per watt — only the sunshine changes:
| City | kWh per kW | Payback |
|---|---|---|
| New York City | 1,255 | 8.0 years |
| Albany | 1,178 | 8.5 years |
| Rochester | 1,137 | 8.8 years |
| Buffalo | 1,129 | 8.9 years |
| Syracuse | 1,114 | 9.0 years |
A 13% production span across one state is the reason a single statewide number is only ever a starting point.
What New York pays Syracuse for exported power
New York credits exported power at the retail rate under Phase One net metering + VDER Value Stack , so a kilowatt-hour a Syracuse array sends to the grid is worth the same as one you buy. That is the best case for solar economics and it is why the payback above is what it is.
It is also the assumption most likely to change. Twenty-two states have already moved to net billing. If New York did the same on typical terms, this system would take about 16.1 years instead of 16.7 — 0.6 years’ difference from a policy change, with no change to the hardware and none to Syracuse’s weather.
Customer Benefit Contribution values were not confirmed.
Sources and method
- Production: modeled with PVGIS v5.2 PVcalc (European Commission JRC) using the PVGIS-NSRDB radiation database — the same NREL satellite dataset PVWatts draws on for the Americas. Assumptions: 4 kWp, standard c-Si, 14% system loss, roof mounting, 20-degree tilt, due south, horizon shading on. The 1,114 kWh per kW figure for Syracuse is a modeled location point, not an interpolation from the New York average. PVGIS is free to use with JRC attribution requested; the underlying NSRDB is public domain (NREL/DOE).
- Real-roof derate: a separate 10% deduction for azimuth, pitch and shading, applied in the shared model rather than folded into the production data — so you can adjust it if your roof is genuinely unobstructed.
- Electricity rate: U.S. Energy Information Administration, average price by state . This is New York’s residential average; EIA does not publish a Syracuse figure, so the state rate is used and labeled as such.
- Export rules: Phase One net metering + VDER Value Stack , from our New York state page and the shared export-rules dataset behind it.
- State average rate: EIA Table 5.6.A, July 2026 data (released Sep 2026), used for every state-average comparison on this page.
- Payback model: shared with the solar savings calculator and the state pages — 2.5%/yr utility inflation, 0.5%/yr degradation, $150/yr running costs, one $2,000 inverter replacement in year 14, federal credit $0. The rest of the toolset — battery, sizing, financing — is under all calculators .
- Incentives: DSIRE . City and utility programs change more often than state ones — check yours directly.
Electricity rate, export regime, production figure and installed cost on this page were last verified on 30 August 2026. Export credits reset on annual tariff cycles and incentive budgets run out mid-year, so treat every figure as a snapshot at that date and confirm current terms before acting. Nothing here is tax or financial advice.
Frequently asked questions
How much do solar panels cost in Syracuse in 2026?
About $22,080 for a typical 8 kW system at $2.76 per watt, before any incentive. With the federal credit at $0 in 2026 that is close to your net cost. Note that the price per watt is a New York market average — there is no reliable city-level cost data, so treat it as a starting point and get three quotes.
What is the solar payback in Syracuse?
Roughly 16.7 years on this model, using Syracuse’s own production figure of 1,114 kWh per kW and its own utility tariff (16.67¢/kWh) with each utility’s real export treatment. That includes $150 a year of running costs and one inverter replacement, which many published paybacks leave out.
Is Syracuse better or worse for solar than the rest of New York?
Against the state figure, Syracuse runs 12% below New York’s 1,270 kWh per kW — a payback 8.8 years longer than the statewide 7.9-year estimate on the same hardware at the same price.
Is solar worth it in Syracuse in 2026?
At 29.9¢/kWh and 1,114 kWh per kW, an 8 kW system in Syracuse pays back in about 9.0 years on this model. Treat that as a starting point for reading real quotes rather than as a quote: your roof’s orientation, its shading and the price you are actually offered will move it more than your city does.
How we calculated this
Year-1 saving = production (kW × the city’s modeled kWh per kW) × the blended kWh value (retail rate for self-use, the state export rule for exports). Payback = net cost ÷ year-1 saving, with the federal credit at $0 for 2026 purchases and cost per watt from the state’s installed-price band. Production is modeled from PVGIS/NSRDB irradiance for the city.Sources: U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA) electricity rates · DSIRE incentive records · public IRS/OBBBA guidance. Figures are modeled estimates, not quotes or tax advice. See our methodology.
Compare with the rest of New York
- Solar panel cost in New York — The statewide picture: New York’s rate, incentives, export rules and the 1,270 kWh per kW average this page corrects.
- Solar panel cost in New York City — 1,255 kWh per kW and a 8.0-year payback — better than Syracuse on identical hardware.
- Solar panel cost in Albany — 1,178 kWh per kW and a 8.5-year payback — better than Syracuse on identical hardware.
- Solar panel cost in Rochester — 1,137 kWh per kW and a 8.8-year payback — better than Syracuse on identical hardware.
- Solar panel cost in Buffalo — 1,129 kWh per kW and a 8.9-year payback — better than Syracuse on identical hardware.
- Solar panel cost in Seattle — 1,086 kWh per kW in Washington — the closest production match to Syracuse in our data.
- Solar panel cost in Portland — 1,083 kWh per kW in Oregon — the closest production match to Syracuse in our data.
- All city solar figures — The 66 US cities with their own modeled production data, and the spreads between them.