Author Topic: Thoughts . solar panel power, a split tariff meter and putting things on . (Read 5803 times)

cloddopper · « **on:** February 23, 2015, 05:02:12 pm »

My next disability vehicle that allows transport of my wheel chair , electric buggy etc and is something that I can actually drive is one of these new fangled hybrid electric vehicles with a 2 litre engine and fully automatic gearbox ..... a Mitsubishi Outlander 2.0 ltr PHEV

Government test figures give 147 MPG , though of course we will have to pay for the electricity to charge the batteries )( yes that's 147 MPG ).

I realise that it will not always need a full charge everyday that would take 8 hrs @ 3.24 Kw hr, though it appear that I have to have it plugged in when it is at home even if the batteries are fully charged.
I take all the above on board & can easily understand it .

Now I introduce the fact that we have solar panels .
We have solar panels able to kick out 4Kw hr max on a real good day , winter and this time of the year the generation is a lot less. Ca 120 kw hr per quarter against nearly 320 KW last summer .

I've been told that the supply companies have a night rate tariff similar to the old economy seven idea & I'll have to have a new meter if i go that route .

Current cost is about 12. 4 p a KW for all consumption through the boards meter and every thing that is consumed before the meter that has been generated by the panels is free plus we get a premium of 14.7 p for half of the Kw shown on the panels generation meter as that amount is classed as being exported into the grid by us.

Now the problem... it's about the most cost effective set up for us.

I'm trying to get my head round as to whether it will be cheaper to pay for the split tariff , hook to the panel output for charging in summer when it is belting put power in the day but still have the latest high efficiency dishwasher, washing machine & separate condensing dryer set on their time clocks .

or

Do I put them on the low night rate along with the PHEV but bring them into play during the day one at a time during high solar generation ?

or

Some other sequence ?

Your thoughts would be much appreciated

Greenerlife · « **Reply #1 on:** February 23, 2015, 08:17:36 pm »

Hi,

Moving to Economy 7 would reduce your night rate for each unit and that maybe when you want to plug your hybrid in. However, your day rate will also go up (versus a non-Economy 7 contract).

The only way to establish a 'best' package will be to estimate your overall cost under an Economy 7 regime and compare it to single rate use profile.

If you're out of the house during the day, have few appliances on all the time (including fridge, freezer, computers, entertainment systems and heating etc.) then Economy 7 is most likely to be better value.

If your home is occupied during the day and/or you can program appliances to work during that time and your car will be on charge during the day, the single rate deal will probably be best. Bearing in mind most of your daytime use will be in low daylight periods when your panels are not working to the optimum.

If you have a full household with plenty of laundry, you could install solar thermal as well, set your washing machines to run at midday, run on hot and cold then get the best of all worlds.

With no gas (so no central heating) we've just installed air to air source heating in place of old storage heaters and switched away from Economy 7 despite having an EV and solar PV. We do have multiple freezers etc. her's hoping we made the right choice but, changing the meter only costs £50...

cloddopper · « **Reply #2 on:** February 23, 2015, 08:53:12 pm »

Thanks GL
The washing machine , dryer, dishwasher can all be setup on their integrated time clocks , I can slip the big chest freezer on to a time clock as well .

I'm still not sure if the new split rate meters will see me having to sneak out in the middle of the night to plug the PHEV into the " 2 POD POINT" or if I'll have to resort to the 13 amp plug in charger that comes with the vehicle 7 put it on a time clock to take in the lower rate of supply .

One thought I've just had is:- Perhaps insert a 16 amp sealed time clock between the meter and the 16 amp trip switch for the POD POINT .... IF that is allowed under the government scheme terms .

Greenerlife · « **Reply #3 on:** February 23, 2015, 09:27:09 pm »

Ask the POD installer to connect the charger to the Economy 7 panel?

He'll probably refuse unless you pay for the point yourself since, a free POD requires you agree to data transfer to the government which will require a continuous feed to the charger to power the O2 GPRS sender. An in-line timer will cause the same problem.

cloddopper · « **Reply #4 on:** February 23, 2015, 10:01:50 pm »

Thanks GL, I'd forgotten about the continuous O2 contact requirement for the pod , that alone could be amusing where we live .
It looks like I may end up putting the mobile charger that comes with the car in a water proof box adjacent to our 13 amp water proof protected outside socket and running that off a time clock then.

cloddopper · « **Reply #5 on:** February 23, 2015, 11:39:24 pm »

Whoopeeeeee!

I decided to Google " Can I put my PHEV charger on economy seven electricity ? "
I got all sorts of guff to read then I found these little gems under FAQ's terms & conditions for a free pod point .

So :-

3) You need to keep the unit plugged in on standby, so that the government can know where the units are. You need to have a decent mobile phone signal from the site as this is how the unit communicates its location. The only data collected is a postcode location of the unit and charging hours, no personal information about you, the homeowner.

How do electric car owners use POD Point Home units?

Most people drive under 10,000 miles a year, at this mileage electric car owners need to fully charge their cars two or three times a week using a Home unit.

In practice, most people connect their electric car to their POD Point Home as soon as they get home, and use the timing feature to ensure that their car is charged using off-peak electricity .

That kind of indicates that the meters are different to the old economy seven's that I knew as a kid , it seems that it is a single meter for the whole property that switches to the cheaper rate no matter what is connected & switched on in the property , it's looking good

Greenerlife · « **Reply #6 on:** February 24, 2015, 11:59:32 am »

Yep - completely forgot about the timer! I usually just top up my car every time I get home, but you can use the app to set charging time. Good news!

cloddopper · « **Reply #7 on:** February 24, 2015, 04:02:13 pm »

That app ....

Do I have to get a new fangled mobile phone ( current one runs on coal & takes two people to carry it) or can this app be computerized and then wifi sent to our pod from our modem ?.

Would the same apply when we go out & about & need to top up the charge etc.

We know very little about the charging as yet .

Greenerlife · « **Reply #8 on:** February 24, 2015, 06:36:33 pm »

I use my app on a computer (but it is an iPad - don't know about PC - expect it will work on both). More and more points for charging being set up - Sainsburys is great because it's free whilst you shop. Actually most of them are free at the moment because they can't get their arses into gear about what do to with them. My car is not a hybrid though, it is 100% EV so I have to cover all the EV bases I can

cloddopper · « **Reply #9 on:** February 24, 2015, 11:23:35 pm »

Thanks , we have iPads, iPods and a Mac Book Pro as well as our PC's .. looks like another visit to the dealers is the order for tomorrow .

cloddopper · « **Reply #10 on:** February 25, 2015, 12:54:07 pm »

Whaaaagh !
I found out this morning that as I didn't spend an extra six or so grand that my version of the Outlander does not have the luxury of being able to be charged up using an app to set the integral charging clock .

Though there may be other ways of skinning the cat in the offing for off peak use .. more of that when I find out more

regen · « **Reply #11 on:** February 26, 2015, 08:04:28 am »

Assuming daily full charge then the cost pa on day rate would be about £1416 and on night rate about £756 so stick it on charge for the full 8 hours every night.

However your day rate will go up by say 2p and as you have solar PV your usage should not be more than say 2500 units pa on day rate worth an extra £ 50 . So the total cost using night rate would be £806.

Using the surplus PV is a possibility and i put all the excess via an immersun into the thermal store. This amounts to around 2000 units pa out of 3600 units generated.

A full charge every day would use 3.24x8x365=9460 kwh pa so the maximum the pv could supply would be 20%. assuming similar usage pattern.

Via the immersun the max daily input from a 4kw pv is 18kwh in my case (20% lees than that required for a full charge.

Unless the charger can be arranged to only take the excess then my gut feeling is that you are better off charging on night rate and utilising the spare pv capacity within the house.

Unfortunately the two main variables- when and how much charge is required and when and how much the sun shines are almost impossible to reconcile.

Good luck

Regen

cloddopper · « **Reply #12 on:** February 26, 2015, 10:38:42 am »

Thanks for your thoughts & figures I came to a similar conclusion . We can bin the idea of Immersuns as we don't have hot water storage tanks nor the space to put one.

We got an email this morning setting out the initial low tariff rates .. It's looking very good as we think that well over 60% ( break point is around 40% ) of our power consumption can be time clocked into the low tariff period .