How does it tie into the power grid, is that at the meter? Do I need any work done inside the house?
I have a gas furnace and water heater, so solar for my electricity might be getting plausible…
My system ties in via the circuit breaker panel through a (IIRC) 60 amp, 240 volt breaker. It’s probably not practical to do it at the meter panel because it would require a separate circuit breaker panel. The only work inside the house is the wire from the outside solar cutoff (an NEC requirement, I believe) to the breaker panel. Our inverters are installed on an outside wall. Since your circuit breaker panel is generally on the inside of the wall where your meter is mounted, the inside work is usually pretty limited. If you have an outdoor circuit breaker panel, there probably won’t be any inside work.
My breaker panel is in my bedroom, on the opposite side from where the meter is. 
If his meter is running backwards, ISTM that he’s getting credit for power being put back on the grid (Net metering - Wikipedia).
It may be quite another thing if they won’t buy back excess power, though. It also says later in the article that there are still four states with no net metering rules.
How it hooks up:
My PV array has micro inverters so the DC from the panels is converted to 220 AC and fed down to my panel as follows:
PV array 220 AC ==> Solar Generation Meter ==> PANEL ==> NET METER to UTIL
There is some control equipment between the 220AC feed and the Meter to talk to the Micro inverters.
If you have “string inverter” or “inverters”, DC comes down from the panels to inverter, then hooks up to Solar Generation Meter then to Panel then out to Utility thru “net meter”.
With either set up the utility grid is your battery. At night, electricity flows from utility grid to your house. During day, if you are making more than you use, electricity flow back to the grid and meter runs “backward”. If cloud passes over, flow reverses and grid makes up shortfall.
The PV system does not help in blackout, as you have no battery bank to smooth out power flow. The amount of batteries required is cost/space prohibitive.
Economics:
My utility gives me credit for surplus generation at full rate, not just the generation rate, so I can build up a surplus of KWH to draw on later.
If I make 100% of my usage, I have no electric bill at all.
If I over generate I cannot cash in, but I can transfer the surplus on a KWH basis to another bill from the same utility.
The big factor in the payback period is the Solar Credits (“SRECS”). The price of these (per MW generated) varies in MA between $220 and $530. My payback assumes $280 per MW generated, but the State could change its policies and the bottom could drop out of the SREC market. I just got in under the wire to get 10 years of SREC’s guaranteed. If you install now in MA, you get only 8 years guaranteed, although state might extend program to get you (newer install) two additional years.
My impression is that the Solar PV installation/marketing companies move from state to state based on the subsidies. Oregon/New Jersey then things peter out in NJ, so the come up the coast to MA where governor is big time solar/clean energy supporter, and legislature passes solar credit legislation. Since the real cost of the subsidy passes to the rate payers, the legislature can be solar friendly without being accused of creating or raising a “tax”.