Problems

Hail and storm damage to solar: the insurance claim

Two things decide what you are paid, and neither of them is a fact about your panels.

Updated September 2026 · Data as of Laboratory papers and a state regulator’s guidance read on 3 September 2026

Written by HyreSolar Research team Research and analysis

Audited by HyreSolar Research team Data audit and fact check

$0 is what an ACV policy pays on a 20-year-old roof Regulator’s own worked example

22 J cracked glass on a glass-glass module edge hit Against 41 J for glass-backsheet

0 articles on solar at the main consumer insurance bodies Verified absence

The short answer

What decides a hail claim on a solar roof is the ordinary roof-claim machinery: whether your roof is insured at replacement cost or at actual cash value, and whether wind and hail carry a separate deductible. A state insurance regulator publishes a worked example that makes the first point unmissable. On a $10,000 roof replacement with a $4,000 deductible, a replacement-cost policy pays $6,000. An actual cash value policy pays $4,500 on a five-year-old roof, $3,000 on a ten-year-old roof, and $0 on a twenty-year-old roof. Meanwhile the hardware side is less informative than it looks: laboratory work notes that hail test standards "only produce a pass or fail result based on visible damage" and bin modules across a wide range of ice-ball sizes, "which causes most modules to be categorized at the same resiliency level". A hail rating is therefore weak evidence about which module survives your storm.

What the hail rating on a module actually tells you

Modules are hail tested, and the result is commonly presented as a differentiator. The laboratories doing the testing are candid that it is a weaker signal than that.

The method is a pneumatic cannon firing cast ice balls at a mounted module, with pressure calculated to reach terminal velocity for the ball diameter and the actual muzzle velocity measured. Impact energy is computed from mass and velocity. That is a reasonable physical test.

The limitation is in what the standards do with the result. From a Sandia paper, verbatim: "existing test protocols typically only produce a pass or fail result based on visible damage (i.e., glass cracking) and therefore do not account for susceptibility to cell cracking. Furthermore, these standards bin modules by survival of ice ball diameter classes from 25 to 85 mm, which causes most modules to be categorized at the same resiliency level even when nuances in survivability may exist."

Two problems in one paragraph. Cell cracking is invisible and does not fail a test that looks for broken glass, yet it is real damage that reduces output. And the bins are wide enough that most modules land in the same one, so a rating rarely separates products.

There is a further mismatch between the test and the weather. Indoor testing fires one ball at a time, so the module returns to mechanical equilibrium before the next strike. Real hail does not wait. Researchers note that outdoors a module "can get struck multiple times before return to mechanical equilibrium", and a project exists specifically to test whether near-simultaneous strikes cause more damage than sequential ones. That question is open.

What we are not quoting

You will find pages citing a specific ice-ball diameter and impact velocity as "the standard". We are not repeating those, because the standard itself is paywalled and we could not read it.

What we can attribute, because it appears in publicly funded laboratory papers describing their own rigs, is the 25 to 85 millimetre class range, the terminal-velocity rule, and the pass-or-fail-on-visible-damage limitation. That is enough to understand what a rating means without inventing precision we do not have.

What actually breaks, and at what energy

Where the standards are blunt, the laboratory measurements are specific, and they contain a result worth knowing before you choose a module.

Testing full-size commercial modules on standard racking, with damage assessed by electroluminescence imaging after each impact, researchers found that impacts below about 20 joules, equivalent to roughly 45 millimetre ice balls, "resulted in no appreciable decrease in EL output or glass cracking for any of the conditions tested".

Above that, construction matters more than most buyers realise. Glass-glass modules cracked first, with glass cracking at only 22 joules on an edge impact. Glass-backsheet modules were substantially tougher: no appreciable cell cracking until 37 joules, no glass cracking until 41 joules, and for interior impacts "no glass cracking and an EL area decrease of only 1 to 2% at impact energies up to 79 joules".

The reason is thickness, and it is counterintuitive. The glass-backsheet module had 3.2 millimetre tempered front glass; the glass-glass module had 2 millimetre heat-strengthened glass front and back. Total glass on the glass-glass module was thicker at 4 millimetres, but as the researchers put it, "the added rear glass did not provide relevant protection from front side impacts".

And on both types the edges are the weak point, showing cell and glass cracking at lower energies than central impacts. Modules were also shot repeatedly until glass broke: glass-backsheet averaged twelve impacts, glass-glass just under ten.

One finding matters for anyone inspecting after a storm: "remote cell cracking was a significant source of damage observable in EL images, expanding the scope of potential harm beyond the immediate impact site". Damage is not confined to where the stone landed.

Why invisible damage matters

The distinction between cracked cells and cracked glass is not academic, and the researchers explain why each is bad differently.

Cracked cells "can result in electrically disconnected segments, potential induced degradation, recombination centers, and hotspots". That is lost output and a possible thermal issue, from damage you cannot see.

Cracked glass "compromises the module's protection against moisture ingress and mechanical stability", and the researchers judge that it "arguably poses a more substantial threat, as multi-busbar designs can mitigate the impact of cracked cells".

The practical consequence for a claim is that a visual inspection is not a damage assessment. An adjuster looking for broken glass will miss cell cracking entirely, and cell cracking is what the test standards were criticised for ignoring. If your production has fallen after a storm and nothing looks broken, that is a coherent story rather than a contradiction.

The researchers also note the direction of travel: "the trend toward thinner glass, thinner cells, and larger modules could exacerbate future hail-related issues".

The insurance question, where the money actually is

Now the half that decides what you are paid, and it has almost nothing to do with solar.

The first thing to establish is whether your roof is insured at replacement cost or at actual cash value. Replacement cost pays what it costs to replace. Actual cash value pays that minus depreciation for the roof's age. A state insurance regulator publishes a worked example that makes the difference concrete, and it is stark.

On a $200,000 home with a $4,000 deductible and a $10,000 roof replacement: a replacement-cost policy pays $6,000. An actual cash value policy pays $4,500 on a five-year-old roof, $3,000 on a ten-year-old roof, and $0 on a twenty-year-old roof.

Read the last figure again. Not a reduced payment. Nothing, because the depreciated value has fallen below the deductible.

The second thing is the deductible itself. The same regulator tells consumers directly to "ask your agent if the deductible for wind and hail damage is different than the deductible for other types of damages". Wind and hail frequently carry their own deductible, sometimes calculated as a percentage of the dwelling value rather than as a flat sum, which on a large claim is a very different number.

And in some places the peril may not be covered at all. The same regulator warns that in certain coastal areas a home policy "might not cover wind and hail damage", pointing to a residual market mechanism instead.

Finally, an ageing roof can change your position without you doing anything. Insurers may move a policy to actual cash value as a roof ages, and a roof in poor condition may receive limited or no coverage.

The same claim, four different outcomes

Policy type	Roof age	What it pays
Replacement cost policy	Any age	$6,000
Actual cash value policy	Roof 5 years old	$4,500
Actual cash value policy	Roof 10 years old	$3,000
Actual cash value policy	Roof 20 years old	$0

Texas Department of Insurance worked example: a $200,000 home, a $4,000 deductible and a $10,000 roof replacement. Read 3 September 2026.

This is one state regulator’s illustration and the numbers are its own. What generalises is the mechanism: actual cash value depreciates with roof age, and past a certain point the depreciated value falls below the deductible and the claim pays nothing at all.

Nobody publishes consumer guidance on solar and insurance

We went looking for authoritative consumer guidance on how homeowner's insurance treats rooftop solar. We found an absence, and it is worth reporting as a finding rather than papering over.

The main consumer insurance information body publishes no article on solar panels or rooftop photovoltaics at all. We verified this by reading its own sitemap: 127 top-level URLs, with no solar or renewable energy entry.

The national association of state insurance regulators does not address rooftop solar on its consumer homeowners page either. That page defines other-structures coverage generically, naming "a detached garage, work shed, or fencing". Solar is not mentioned.

And the state regulator whose roof guidance we do quote never mentions solar on either of its roof pages. No classification of solar, no treatment of leased systems, no instruction to notify an insurer after installation.

So three questions we would like to answer for you are genuinely unanswered by any authoritative source we could reach: whether rooftop solar sits under dwelling coverage or other structures, whether leased and PPA systems are treated differently, and whether you are expected to notify your insurer after installing. We are not going to guess at any of them. Your own policy and your own agent are the only reliable source, which is an unsatisfying answer and an honest one.

What to do, before and after a storm

1
Find out now whether your roof is on replacement cost or actual cash value
It is on your policy declarations and it is the single largest determinant of what a hail claim pays. If it is actual cash value and your roof is old, you may be carrying a risk you did not know you had.
2
Ask whether wind and hail carry a separate deductible
A state regulator tells consumers to ask this directly. Percentage-based wind and hail deductibles behave very differently from flat ones on a large claim.
3
Tell your insurer you have installed solar, and get the answer in writing
No regulator we could find requires this, and no regulator we could find says it is unnecessary either. Given that nobody publishes guidance on how solar is classified, an answer specific to your policy is worth having before you need it rather than after.
4
Photograph the array while it is undamaged
A dated set of clear photographs of an intact system, plus your production history, is the baseline that makes a later claim provable. It costs one afternoon and there is no substitute for it afterwards.
5
After a storm, check production before checking appearance
Cell cracking is invisible and is precisely what the test standards were criticised for ignoring. A drop in output with nothing visibly broken is a coherent damage pattern, not a contradiction.
6
Ask for electroluminescence imaging if output fell and nothing looks broken
That is the method the laboratory work uses to find damage a visual inspection misses. Whether it is available and who pays depends on your situation, but it is the right thing to ask for.
7
Do not let anyone repair before it is documented
The same rule as any other warranty or claim situation. Once the condition is altered, the evidence for what happened is gone.

Method and limitations

What was read

Sandia National Laboratories papers on hail impact testing of photovoltaic modules, for the description of the test method, the standards' stated limitation, the measured damage thresholds by module construction, the edge-versus-interior finding, the remote cell cracking observation and the impacts-to-failure counts. A related workshop poster for the statement that hail is the leading cause of photovoltaic insurance claims and for the indoor-versus-outdoor impact mismatch.

A state insurance regulator's consumer guidance for the replacement cost versus actual cash value worked example, the separate wind and hail deductible warning, the coastal coverage point and the ageing-roof treatment.

What we could not read, and what follows

The hail test standard itself is paywalled and was not obtained. We therefore publish no clause number, no nominal ball diameter and no nominal velocity. What we do publish about the standard comes from publicly funded laboratory papers describing their own compliant rigs.

The claim that hail is the leading cause of photovoltaic insurance claims is a statement by researchers on a poster that cites no underlying claims dataset. We report it as their statement rather than as an established figure.

Three things no source could answer

Whether rooftop solar falls under dwelling coverage or other structures. Whether leased and power purchase agreement systems are treated differently by insurers. And whether any regulator expects a homeowner to notify their insurer after installing.

All three are unverified and we assert nothing about them. The absence of authoritative consumer guidance on this subject is itself the most useful thing we found, because it tells you that the answer lives in your policy rather than in anything you can look up.

Not insurance advice

Coverage varies by insurer, by policy and by state, and nothing on this page tells you what yours does. We have deliberately never written that anything "is covered". Your declarations page and your agent are the authority, and the questions above are the ones worth putting to them.

Questions

Does homeowner’s insurance cover solar panels?

We are not going to tell you it does, because coverage varies by insurer, policy and state, and no authoritative consumer source we could reach addresses how rooftop solar is classified. What we can tell you is what determines the outcome of a roof claim generally: whether the roof is insured at replacement cost or actual cash value, and whether wind and hail carry a separate deductible.

What is the difference between replacement cost and actual cash value?

Replacement cost pays what it costs to replace. Actual cash value pays that minus depreciation for age. A state regulator’s worked example on a $10,000 roof with a $4,000 deductible shows replacement cost paying $6,000, while actual cash value pays $4,500 at five years, $3,000 at ten years and nothing at all at twenty, because the depreciated value has fallen below the deductible.

Are solar panels hail resistant?

They are hail tested, and the rating tells you less than it appears to. Laboratory researchers note that test protocols typically produce only a pass or fail on visible damage and do not account for cell cracking, and that the size bins are wide enough that most modules end up categorised at the same resiliency level. So a hail rating rarely distinguishes one module from another.

Which module construction survives hail better?

In the testing we read, glass-backsheet modules were substantially tougher than glass-glass. Glass cracking appeared at 22 joules on a glass-glass edge impact against 41 joules for glass-backsheet, and the reason given was front glass thickness: 3.2 millimetre tempered against 2 millimetre heat-strengthened, with the added rear glass providing no relevant protection from front-side impacts.

My panels look fine but production dropped after a storm. Is that possible?

Yes, and it is exactly the failure mode the laboratory work identifies. Cell cracking is invisible and is what the researchers criticise the standards for ignoring, and they found remote cell cracking extending beyond the immediate impact site. A drop in output with nothing visibly broken is a coherent damage pattern rather than a contradiction.

Should I tell my insurer I installed solar?

No regulator we could find requires it, and none says it is unnecessary either, which is itself informative. Given that no authoritative source publishes how solar is classified for coverage, getting an answer specific to your policy in writing is worth doing before you need it.

Does a hail claim on the roof cover the panels too?

That depends on your policy and we cannot tell you. What we can say is that the roof-claim machinery, which is well documented, will govern the roof portion, and that whether solar is treated as part of the dwelling or as another structure is a question no authoritative consumer source we reached answers.

How do I prove damage after a storm?

Have a baseline first: dated photographs of an intact array and your production history. Afterwards, check production before appearance, document everything before anyone repairs anything, and if output has fallen with nothing visibly broken, ask about electroluminescence imaging, which is the method the laboratory work uses to find damage a visual inspection misses.

Written and audited by

HyreSolar Research

Primary-source research, data analysis and fact checking

We are a research desk, not a sales floor. We read the statute, the tariff, the code section, the federal filing or the manufacturer data sheet ourselves, and we publish the figure with the document it came from and the date we retrieved it. Where a number cannot be traced to a primary source, we publish the shorter page and say what we could not verify. That rule has cost us whole sections, and it is the reason the rest can be trusted.

160: primary sources read and cited
220: figures with a retrieval date
115: federal and state government sources
66: researched pages published

How this desk works

Primary sources only. Statutes from the legislature’s own publishing system, federal data from the agency that collects it, code text from the adopted edition, manufacturer claims from the data sheet. We do not cite an article that cites a source; we go and read the source.
Every figure carries its provenance. A named document and the date we retrieved it, so you can check it and so you know how old it is. Retrieval dates are not decoration: an EIA rate from May is a different fact from an EIA rate from August.
We publish what we could not verify. Every research page carries a section naming the things we tried to establish and could not, and why. A paywalled standard, a state website that refused the request, a manufacturer that publishes no figure at all.
We separate measurement from modelling from our own reasoning, and label which is which on the page. A laboratory measurement, an assumption inside a modelling tool and our own inference are three different kinds of claim and they are never presented as one.
We do not sell solar, and we take no payment for placement, ranking or a favourable mention. Nobody buys a position on this site.

Data as of Laboratory papers and a state regulator’s guidance read on 3 September 2026. Authorship on this site is organisational: the analysis belongs to the desk rather than to a named individual, and we do not publish credentials we do not hold. Our editorial policy sets out how we source, date and correct what we publish.

Sources & retrieval dates

Hartley, Shimizu and Braid, Measurement of Photovoltaic Module Deformation Dynamics During Hail Impact Using Digital Image Correlation (SAND-2024-09110J) — Sandia National Laboratories. Source for the description of the pneumatic cannon test method and terminal-velocity rule, and for the standards’ stated limitation that test protocols typically produce only a pass or fail result based on visible damage, do not account for susceptibility to cell cracking, and bin modules across ice ball diameter classes from 25 to 85 mm in a way that causes most modules to be categorized at the same resiliency level. Retrieved 3 September 2026.
Laboratory Hail Damage of Photovoltaic Modules: Electroluminescence and High-speed Digital Image Correlation (SAND2024-07477C) — Sandia National Laboratories, June 2024. Source for the measured damage thresholds on full-size commercial modules: no appreciable damage below about 20 joules, glass cracking at 22 joules on glass-glass edge impacts, no cell cracking until 37 joules and no glass cracking until 41 joules on glass-backsheet, interior impacts to 79 joules producing only a 1 to 2% electroluminescence area decrease, the front glass thickness explanation, the edge weakness on both constructions, the remote cell cracking finding, the impacts-to-failure counts, the explanation of why cracked cells and cracked glass matter differently, and the observation that thinner glass, thinner cells and larger modules could exacerbate future hail issues. Retrieved 3 September 2026.
Jordan, Newkirk, Springer and Hartley, Multiple Hail Impact Testing (NLR/PO-5K00-98978) — 2025 PV Reliability Workshop poster. Source for the researchers’ statement that extreme weather events such as hailstorms are the leading cause of photovoltaic insurance claims, reported here as their statement because the poster cites no underlying claims dataset, and for the indoor versus outdoor impact mismatch where a module outdoors can be struck multiple times before returning to mechanical equilibrium. Retrieved 3 September 2026.
Texas Department of Insurance, consumer guidance on home policies and roofs — Source for the worked example comparing replacement cost and actual cash value on a $200,000 home with a $4,000 deductible and a $10,000 roof replacement, including the outcomes at five, ten and twenty years of roof age; for the instruction to ask whether the wind and hail deductible differs from other perils; for the warning that some coastal home policies might not cover wind and hail damage; and for the observation that insurers may move an ageing roof to actual cash value or limit coverage on a roof in poor condition. Cited also for the verified absence of any mention of solar on either roof page. Retrieved 3 September 2026.

Storm damage, and not sure what your policy does?

Send us the declarations page and the production history. We will tell you what determines the roof portion of the claim and what to ask your insurer about the array.

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