Arkansas pays about 12.6¢ per kilowatt-hour for residential electricity and receives about 4.9 kWh per square metre per day of sunlight — 44th and 14th respectively among the 50 states and DC tracked here. Those two numbers set the ceiling on what rooftop solar returns in Arkansas, and they point in opposite directions.
Where Arkansas sits against the rest of the country
Arkansas is 2.2¢/kWh below the median residential rate across this dataset (14.8¢/kWh) and 0.3 kWh/m²/day above the median insolation (4.6 kWh/m²/day). Under this site's standard assumptions, that combination puts Arkansas 40th of 51 for modeled payback speed, at 15.2 years against a dataset median of 13.5 years.
What actually drives payback in Arkansas
Arkansas is sunlight-led: 14th for insolation but only 44th for electricity price. Swap Arkansas's sunlight for the dataset median and payback moves to 16.0 years (0.8 years of swing). Swap its electricity rate instead and payback moves to 13.3 years (1.9 years of swing). The rate swap is the larger of the two, so what a kilowatt-hour costs is the input deciding the outcome in Arkansas.
State incentives on record
Recorded for Arkansas: Net metering preserved by Act 464 of 2019; no statewide tax credit; property tax exemption for residential solar.
No federal credit is applied above (Section 25D expired 31 December 2025), and export terms often matter more than the headline rate (net metering guide).
The modeled system, in numbers
At Arkansas's sunlight level a 7 kW array produces roughly 9,765 kWh a year, worth about $1,230 in first-year bill savings at 12.6¢/kWh against an assumed $22,400 installed cost. A ten-year payback at this sunlight level would require a residential rate of about 20.5¢/kWh, which is 7.9¢ above what Arkansas households pay today.
States with comparable economics
Arkansas's closest analogues by modeled payback are West Virginia (15.3 years), Wyoming (15.1 years), Utah (15.0 years). They arrive there from different rate and sunlight combinations, so their incentive rows are the useful comparison.
- West Virginia — modeled payback 15.3 years
- Wyoming — modeled payback 15.1 years
- Utah — modeled payback 15.0 years