Do Solar Panels Work in a Power Outage?

Every grid-tied inverter sold in the United States has to include anti-islanding protection, spelled out in the safety standards UL 1741 and IEEE 1547. The idea is simple: if the utility power is out, your solar must not keep pushing electricity onto the neighborhood lines. Otherwise it could create a live “island” of power on wires that a lineworker believes are dead — a serious electrocution hazard. Current standards call for a grid-tied inverter to stop energizing within the short time set by the applicable interconnection standard (UL 1741 / IEEE 1547) once it detects the grid is gone.

So the shutdown is not your system failing — it is your system doing exactly what code requires. The catch is that a plain grid-tied inverter has only one operating mode: follow the grid. Take the grid away and it has nothing to synchronize to, so it powers down completely, and your panels sit idle no matter how bright the day.

This is one of the most common questions we hear after a blackout, and the answer is almost always the same: the system was designed to lower your bill, not to back up your home. Those are two different jobs. A solar-only system offsets the energy you buy from the utility over the year, but it leans on the grid to function. When the grid disappears, the solar goes quiet with it.

If your panels normally produce fine on sunny days but you are getting nothing at all — and the utility is not reporting an outage — that is a different problem worth checking. See solar not producing? a California troubleshooting guide before assuming it is the grid.

Outages here are not only storms and equipment faults. During high wildfire risk — hot, dry, windy weather — the investor-owned utilities can call a Public Safety Power Shutoff (PSPS), deliberately cutting power to reduce the chance that their lines spark a fire. Much of greater Los Angeles and the foothill communities are served by SCE, where these shutoffs are most common; the city of Los Angeles proper is served by municipal LADWP. Per the CPUC, most PSPS events are restored within about 24–48 hours after the weather clears and lines are inspected — but a large or repeated wind event can keep power off for several days.

That is the scenario where solar owners are most disappointed to learn their panels shut off with everything else. If riding out multi-day shutoffs is your goal, the planning details — battery sizing, which loads to back up, and how solar recharges the battery — are covered in solar + battery for outages and PSPS in California.

If your solar is already in, you usually do not have to start over — you add storage plus a backup gateway. Two decisions shape the cost:

Which loads do you want to keep on? A whole-home backup carries the entire panel; a critical-loads (partial) backup covers a chosen subset — fridge, some lights, Wi-Fi, a medical device, maybe well or HVAC. Critical-loads is typically cheaper and easier to size. We compare the two in whole-home vs critical-loads backup.

Is a battery worth it for you? Under NEM 3.0 the case for storage is often about self-consumption and resilience together, not backup alone. We walk through that decision in do I need a battery under NEM 3.0? California’s SGIP rebate can offset part of a battery — check the live program status before counting on it.

This page answers the specific question — does solar work in an outage, and why or why not. If you already know the answer is “only with a battery” and want the next step: read solar + battery for outages & PSPS for backup planning, do I need a battery under NEM 3.0? for the buy/skip decision, and whole-home vs critical-loads backup for how much of your home to protect.