Granada Hills, CA · January 2025 – September 2026 · LADWP / LADBS

The solar was held by a job somebody else never finished.

Two interconnection requests, filed on the same morning and stopped the same morning, for a reason that had nothing to do with either array.

An interconnection request does not stand on its own. It sits on top of a service, and if anything about that service is unfinished in the city's record the utility will not proceed — even when the unfinished work has nothing to do with solar and was done by somebody else years earlier. Here new meter panels had gone in under a separate work request eighteen months before, and the building department had never released them. Both solar requests went on hold until it did.

At a glance

Applications

Two, one per metered dwelling

Recorded by the utility

1.99 kW on each

Filed

29 June 2026

On hold

The same day

Reason

Meter panels never released by the building department

Panels installed

5 January 2025 — a separate work request

Building department release

11 September 2026

Utility / AHJ

LADWP / LADBS

The story

Two interconnection requests went in on the same morning, one for each metered dwelling on the parcel. Both were stopped the same day. Neither array was the problem, and neither had been looked at.

The reason, in the utility's own words, was the metering. The addresses had asked for a meter panel upgrade to take the new dwellings. New panels had been installed under a separate work request on the fifth of January 2025. Those panels had never been released or inspected by the building department, and until they were, no solar request at either address would move.

Eighteen months. That is the number to sit with, because of how ordinary it is. A meter panel that has been installed and energized looks finished from every angle that matters day to day. Power flows. The building is occupied. Nobody has any reason to check. The permit behind it stays open in a system that only two kinds of people ever read: an inspector, and whoever files the next thing at that address.

This is what makes a solar application quietly useful even when it is being obstructed. Filing one is often the first time in years that somebody reads the entire service record for an address. Every open electrical permit, every unreleased upgrade, every work request that was installed and never signed off comes back up. It functions as an audit that nobody asked for, and the findings land on whoever is standing there.

The utility named the remedy in the same message: the meter panel installation had to be inspected and released by the building department before anything at either address would move. So that is what we went and got done.

Worth separating clearly, because people conflate the two: a hold on the interconnection does not stop the installation. It stops permission to operate. So both systems went on in the middle of July — five modules and five microinverters each, into the sub panel inside each unit — and then sat finished, waiting on a signature about a panel installed the year before last.

The building department's release on the service came through on the eleventh of September.

The lesson is one question, asked before anything is filed: is every electrical permit at this address closed? Not every solar permit — every electrical permit. A service upgrade from two years ago, a panel swap nobody remembers, a meter panel that was energized and forgotten. Any of them can stop a solar request cold, and none of them will announce themselves until the moment they do.

The release came through in September, permission to operate followed on both meters and the two dwellings have been running since. Cali Energy filed both Granada Hills requests and chased the eighteen-month-old permit that was holding them. The build itself is on three meters on one building.

How it ran

Eighteen months between the panels going in and anybody noticing they had never been signed off.

What we did

• Filed a separate interconnection request for each metered dwelling.
• Traced the hold back to a meter panel work request from the previous year.
• Chased the inspections on work that was neither our permit nor our installation.
• Installed both systems while the interconnection was held, so nothing waited twice.
• Carried both applications through to the building department's release on the service.

System specifications

Is your project like this one?

• Your solar application has been put on hold and the reason is not about your solar.
• There is a service upgrade or panel swap in your address's history that you did not commission.
• You bought a property with recent electrical work and no paperwork to show for it.
• You are being told to chase an inspection on work that was finished years ago.
• You want to know what an interconnection request actually checks.

Cali Energy in Granada Hills

Frequently asked questions

Why would a utility put a solar request on hold over old work?

Because the request sits on top of the service, and the utility acts on the building department's record of that service. An electrical permit that was never signed off leaves the service unfinished on paper, whatever it looks like on the wall. Until the release arrives, the solar request waits.

Can work be installed while the interconnection is on hold?

Yes. The hold applies to the utility's side — the meter and permission to operate. The array can be installed and inspected on its own permit in the meantime, which is what happened here, so that only one thing was waiting at the end rather than two.

Why does an old open permit have to be closed before solar can proceed?

Because the utility checks the whole electrical record at an address, not only the solar part of it. A meter panel that was installed and energized but never inspected leaves its permit open, and an open permit on the service is enough to hold every later request behind it. Closing it means booking the inspection and getting the release issued, which is what we did here.

How do I find out whether an address has open permits?

The building department's records are public and searchable by address, and it is worth looking before you file anything rather than after. An open permit from years ago is easy to miss and cheap to close; finding it while a finished array waits on the roof is neither.

What does Cali Energy check before filing a Granada Hills interconnection request?

Whether every electrical permit at the address is closed — not only the solar ones. An unreleased service upgrade or a meter panel that was energized and never signed off will hold a solar request indefinitely, and nothing announces it until the hold appears. On this Granada Hills building a panel installed eighteen months earlier did exactly that, and clearing it was most of the work.

What this would look like on your roof

Related

• How an old electrical permit can block solar PTO Explainer · Los Angeles · LADWP and LADBS Solar
• One building, three services Granada Hills, CA · 1.99 kW each · SB9 unit and ADU, two applications Solar
• The inspection passed. The paperwork did not Granada Hills, CA · 7.47 kW · 76 days Solar
• The meter was in. The utility's record said it was not North Hollywood, CA · 13.3 kW · forty-two days from meter to permission Solar

This timeline reflects this property and this permitting path. Updated September 2026.