The solar tax credit ended. Here's what North Carolina's permits did next.

The 2025 federal budget law, Public Law 119-21, ended the main tax credits that helped homeowners pay for clean energy. The 30 percent federal solar tax credit, which also covered home batteries, ended for systems installed after December 31, 2025. The credit for heat pumps and other efficiency upgrades ended for equipment put in service after that date too. The credit for a home EV charger followed on June 30, 2026. Nine months into 2026, North Carolina's building permits show what happened when the money went away. The answer is different for each piece of equipment.

Quick answers

Which credits ended, and when

These are the dates in the IRS's fact sheet on the law (FS-2025-05). For solar and batteries, the date that matters is when installation is finished, not when the homeowner pays. A system paid for in 2025 but completed in January 2026 got no credit.

• Residential clean energy credit (Section 25D): rooftop solar, home batteries, geothermal. 30 percent of the cost, with no cap. No credit for expenditures made after December 31, 2025, and an expenditure counts as made when installation is completed.
• Energy efficient home improvement credit (Section 25C): heat pumps, heat pump water heaters, insulation, windows and doors. Up to $2,000 a year for heat pumps. No credit for property placed in service after December 31, 2025.
• New and used clean vehicle credits (Sections 30D and 25E): up to $7,500 on an electric vehicle. No credit for vehicles acquired after September 30, 2025.
• Alternative fuel refueling property credit (Section 30C): home and business EV chargers. No credit for property placed in service after June 30, 2026.

Solar: a rush to the deadline, then a drop

Through the first eight months of 2025, about 109 permits a month were filed for new rooftop solar systems in the eight permit offices in this count. Installers then had a deadline: a system had to be finished by December 31 for its owner to get the credit. Permits jumped to 163 in September and 158 in October, the two busiest months in the records, then fell to 72 in November and 46 in December. January 2026 had 38, the fewest of any month since these records begin in January 2024.

The market has settled lower since. From February to September 2026 the same offices averaged about 73 new solar permits a month, a third below the pace before the deadline. Over January to September, new solar permits fell 40 percent from 1,034 to 618, while permits of every kind in the same offices rose 7 percent. The drop wasn't even. Onslow County lost four-fifths of its solar permits, from 160 to 30, and Morrisville nearly all of its own. Wake County and Alamance County held up best.

Fewer companies are doing the work, too. 94 businesses were named on new solar permits in these offices from January to September 2025. In the same months of 2026 there were 54, and 63 of the 2025 names haven't appeared on a new solar permit at all this year. Some will have moved into other work or other counties rather than closed, but the field is much smaller than it was a year ago.

Batteries: the part of solar that held up

The systems still being installed are different. In 2024, 20 percent of new solar permits included a battery. In the first eight months of 2025 it was 28 percent. In 2026 it's 47 percent: nearly half of new rooftop systems now go in with storage, such as a Tesla Powerwall, Enphase or Franklin battery. Without the credit, a system that only offsets the power bill is a harder sale, and storage adds a reason to buy that has nothing to do with the tax code: backup power when the grid goes down.

A second, smaller market has appeared: batteries added to solar systems that are already on the roof. These permits were rare, 12 in all of 2024 and 19 in 2025. From February to July 2026 there were 92, with a peak of 36 in April. About half came from a single installer, so it's one company's campaign as much as a trend, but it shows where installers are looking: the thousands of homes that went solar in earlier years and have no storage.

Solar panel removal for roof replacement keeps climbing

Roofers should notice a third number. Permits to take solar panels off a roof and put them back after roof work rose from 43 in 2024 to 74 in 2025, and there have been 94 in the first nine months of 2026. As older systems age alongside the roofs under them, more reroofs come with a solar crew attached.

The heat pump tax credit ended too. Heat pumps didn't notice.

Heat pumps lost their federal credit on the same day as solar, up to $2,000 a year, and the permits show no sign of it. In the six offices whose mechanical permits describe the equipment, heat pump permits rose 18 percent from January to September, from 2,775 in 2025 to 3,281 in 2026. Permits overall in those offices rose 8 percent, and furnace permits 6 percent. Heat pumps now outnumber furnaces by about five to three.

The reason is in the descriptions. About three in four 2026 heat pump permits are replacements: a change-out, often noted as "like for like". In most of North Carolina the heat pump already is the standard system. When one fails in July or January, it's replaced whether or not there's a credit, and $2,000 off was rarely what decided it. Solar is a purchase a homeowner chooses to make. A heat pump is usually a repair they have to make.

EV chargers followed the cars, not the EV charger tax credit

EV charger permits in the same six offices tell a two-part story. The credit for buying an electric car ended September 30, 2025, and buyers rushed to beat it. Charger permits peaked that month at 105. They then fell by half, to 53 in February 2026, which fits fewer new EVs coming home needing one. By spring they had recovered, and when the charger credit itself ended on June 30, 2026, nothing happened: July to September 2026 had 332 charger permits, 17 percent more than the same months of 2025. September's 121 was the most in any month. Over January to September, charger permits rose 11 percent.

For an electrician, an EV charger is a 40- to 60-amp circuit in a garage. The permits suggest demand follows the number of electric cars on the road, not the credit for the charger.

What it means for your business

• Solar installers: the market is smaller, and so is the competition: about four in ten companies have stopped pulling permits. Storage is now in half of the jobs that remain, and homes with solar but no battery are a list you can build from past permits.
• Roofers: solar removal and reinstall permits are up more than twofold since 2024. A reroof on a house with panels needs a solar contractor in the schedule. Knowing which roofs have panels before you bid saves a surprise.
• HVAC contractors: the end of the credit didn't slow heat pump replacements. Most of the demand is failure-driven change-outs, so it follows the weather and the age of the systems in a neighborhood, not tax policy.
• Electricians: EV charger circuits are growing again and hit a monthly high in September 2026. Battery installs on existing solar are new electrical work too.
• Homeowners: the federal credits are gone for systems installed now, but the work hasn't stopped. A permit record shows who installed systems near you and how recently they were active, which matters when fewer companies are in the business.

Every permit counted here is in TarSignal's Permit Search. Search the work description for "solar", "battery", "heat pump" or "EV charger" to see each job, its address, its value and the contractor, in any office we cover.

How these numbers were counted

• Permits are counted by the date they were filed with the office (or issued, where an office records no filing date), from January 2024 to September 30, 2026. Only offices whose records describe the work and whose permit counts stayed steady over the whole period are included. The solar figures use eight offices: Durham City-County, Wake County, Brunswick County, City of Greensboro, Onslow County, Gaston County, Alamance County and the Town of Morrisville. Heat pump, furnace and EV charger figures use six: Wake County, Greensboro, Gaston, Onslow, Brunswick and Alamance, the offices whose trade permits describe the equipment. Mecklenburg, Raleigh, Cary, Wilmington and others are left out because the records we hold for them grew during the period, which would make a trend look like a jump.
• Equipment is identified from each permit's work description. Solar means a description mentioning solar, photovoltaic or PV. Permits to remove and reinstall panels and batteries added to "existing" solar are counted separately, and withdrawn permits are left out. Batteries include battery, Powerwall and energy storage. EV chargers include descriptions of an EV or electric vehicle charger and EVSE. A permit that installs equipment without naming it isn't counted, so these are counts of described work, best read as trends.
• Company counts use the business named on each permit, with spellings of the same name merged. Permits that name no contractor aren't counted as a company.
• Credit dates and rules are from the IRS fact sheet on Public Law 119-21 (FS-2025-05, August 2025).