How solar permits work in Michigan: the license, the city permit and the utility application

Three approvals, and who gives each

A rooftop system in Michigan goes through three steps that don’t stand in for each other. The first is a license. Michigan’s licensing law defines electrical wiring to include generating equipment, so ask the company for its electrical contractor license number before anything else. The second is the permit: the MPSC’s consumer tips say city or county rules may require a permit and an inspection. The third is your electric utility’s approval of the interconnection, which has its own forms, fees and clock, covered in utility interconnection timelines.

The license and the permit meet on one form. LARA’s electrical permit application, form BCC-339, has a section for the electrical contractor that asks for the contractor’s “STATE OF MICHIGAN LICENSE NUMBER” and its expiry. The permit is pulled under the contractor’s license, not yours. Once you have the number, how to check a Michigan electrical contractor license shows where to look it up.

What the state form says, and where it applies

LARA’s own permit form doesn’t require plans when the service is 400 A or less and the building is 3,500 sq ft or less. It also carries the state’s fee schedule. The application fee is $75 and non-refundable. For a solar photovoltaic system whose total inverter generating capacity is less than 5,000 kW, the row reads $2 for each panel, and the next row, for capacity of no less than 5,000 kW, reads $1. The form’s columns are laid out ambiguously, so take those two panel figures as the state’s schedule and never as what a city charges.

That schedule is for places where LARA is the enforcing agency. The cities below print their own electrical permit applications and fee rows, which is why your city’s sheet is the one to read. If a quote carries a permit line, ask which office’s schedule it came from.

What cities charge for the electrical permit

Michigan has no statewide flat solar permit fee. Each city prints its own row in its own unit (per visit, per kW, per panel or per module), and these are what the city charges for the electrical permit, not installer prices.

• Detroit’s electrical permit application dated January 2024 and the Buildings, Safety Engineering and Environmental Department (BSEED) fee schedule list $165 per visit for a system with no utility grid connection and $278 per inverter connection per visit for one with a connection.
• Grand Rapids lists $42 for the first 10 kW and $4 for each additional kW, under “Alternative Power” in its fiscal 2027 schedule.
• Wyoming’s schedule, effective 2026, prints the same shape: $40 for the system and first 10 kW, then $4 for each additional kW.
• Royal Oak’s schedule effective July 1, 2025 lists $20 per kW.
• Taylor’s 2025 to 2026 schedule lists $19 for each solar panel, residential or commercial, and a $50 application fee that isn’t refunded.
• Kalamazoo’s 2026 application lists an $83 application fee and $7 per PV module for units up to 20 kW, $11 for 21 to 50 kW.
• East Lansing lists $12 per solar panel module on the electrical side. Its building side lists a $60 application fee and $140 for systems under 10 kW.
• Livonia’s electrical application lists $8 for each solar panel, per the city’s form, and the same line says the job needs plan review and a building permit.
• Westland’s application prints $10 and $15 per panel for its two inverter-capacity bands, per the city’s own form, which differs from the state’s $2 and $1.
• Ann Arbor’s checklist and fee sheet, both from 2020, show no charge for expedited residential solar apart from a $35 inspection where one applies.

Many cities want a building permit too. Kalamazoo, East Lansing and Livonia say so on their forms or checklists, and Ann Arbor adds one for non-expedited residential jobs. The amounts above are the electrical permit only.

Lansing’s building pages don’t show a solar fee, so the Building Safety Office (517-483-4355, per the city’s listing) is where to ask for the electrical permit amount.

Codes the inspector measures against

Michigan’s electrical code is the 2023 National Electrical Code, second printing, effective March 12, 2024. LARA’s Code Books page adds a note: residential requirements are contained in the Michigan Residential Code.

For houses, the 2015 Michigan Residential Code is current as of LARA’s notice. A July 7, 2025 Court of Claims order temporarily bars LARA from implementing the rules that would adopt the 2021 code. While that order stands, LARA says the 2015 versions remain valid and in effect.

Michigan’s rule R 408.30521a adds a rooftop PV section to that code. PV panel systems mounted on or above the roof covering must comply with the code, Section R324 and NFPA 70. The same rule says the roof must support the loads, and that the system is installed per the manufacturer’s instructions, with roof penetrations flashed and sealed.

R324 covers roof access. As one city’s checklist reproduces the residential code, pathways are at least 3 ft wide from eave to ridge, panels sit at least 18 in. from a hip or valley when there are panels on both sides, and panels stay at least 3 ft below the ridge, with roofs at 2:12 or flatter exempt. That’s a city document, not LARA’s text. Midland’s PV checklists ask for the same three items: three-foot access paths, 18-inch valley clearance and 3 ft below the ridge.

Doing the work yourself

An owner-occupied single-family homeowner is exempt from the electrical license under MCL 339.5737(3)(g) for installing, altering or repairing electrical equipment in the home and its outbuildings. The exemption covers the license and nothing else, so the city permit, the inspection and the utility interconnection still apply.

Detroit adds a local layer. LARA says that if you live in the City of Detroit, the city issues its own licenses and registrations, so ask BSEED before you assume a state license alone is enough there.

Large projects are a separate case. LARA’s utility exemption under MCL 339.5737(3)(d) applies only to work integral to a utility’s system, independent of other structures, installed by trained personnel and accessible only to authorized personnel. It isn’t a residential rooftop exemption.

Ann Arbor and SolarAPP+

NREL announced on November 30, 2022 that Ann Arbor was one of 12 communities selected to compete in Step 2 of the SolarAPP+ Prize by adopting SolarAPP+. Ann Arbor’s 2020 checklist, separately, prints a turnaround of 3 to 5 business days for expedited residential solar and 5 to 10 business days for other jobs.

What to ask before you sign

Put four questions to the company and keep the answers in writing, since the permit office may ask for the same details.

1. Which license number will appear on the electrical permit?
2. Who pulls the permit, who pays its fee, and is that fee in the contract price?
3. Does your city also require a building permit, and who files it?
4. Who files the utility application, and when does it go in relative to the permit?

On the utility side, DTE’s Level 1 and Level 2 application is $50, and so is Consumers Energy’s distributed generation application review. DTE says that within 10 business days of a complete application and fee it tells you whether the file is conforming, incomplete or non-conforming. For your own address, the city building office holds the electrical permit fee for solar, so that’s the number to get before you sign.