Cheaper night time tariff

[LHRFlightman]

This from Shell Energy. Who uses 42% of their energy at night?!

These cheaper tariffs seem a con to me. Yes, obviously you'll save money in charging the car, but surely the day to day cost of energy that you need to live during the far outweighs those savings. Especially as they jack up the day rate. In my case by 10p a kWh.

"Thank you for your email.
We currently offer a variable Economy 7 which might be beneficial for the EV owners (it is best if you use 42% of your electricity at night on this tariff).

The name of the tariff is: Energy Price Guarantee Direct Debit v2 (Two Rate, Economy 7)

Electricity
Unit rate Day: 43.013p per kWh
Night: 21.426p per kWh

Standing charge 44.50p per day"

[Mikehig]

Shell are considering whether to leave the business:
https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/shell-cons...
You might want to start looking at other suppliers, just in case.

[blueacid]

LHRFlightman said:

This from Shell Energy. Who uses 42% of their energy at night?!

These cheaper tariffs seem a con to me. Yes, obviously you'll save money in charging the car, but surely the day to day cost of energy that you need to live during the far outweighs those savings. Especially as they jack up the day rate. In my case by 10p a kWh.

"Thank you for your email.
We currently offer a variable Economy 7 which might be beneficial for the EV owners (it is best if you use 42% of your electricity at night on this tariff).

The name of the tariff is: Energy Price Guarantee Direct Debit v2 (Two Rate, Economy 7)

Electricity
Unit rate Day: 43.013p per kWh
Night: 21.426p per kWh

Standing charge 44.50p per day"

Well, that's it - for each given tariff there'll be a break-even point in terms of the percentage of electricity you use in the cheap night rate, versus the more expensive day-rate.
Some folks have long commutes, so are charging their cars through the entire cheap rate, plus can use the timer to schedule things like (say) hot water heating, washing machine, dishwasher, oven self-clean... all the big heavy thirsty items where you might not care when they happen, just that they happen in the first place. It might be that once those are done, the energy cost of some LED lights, a laptop, and the odd cuppa when working from home isn't that much.

Equally, you might only have a 5 mile commute, and the odd long run, and be unwilling to run any of the abovementioned items when you're sleeping. In that case, yeah, you'd be better on a tariff offering cheaper power in the waking hours.

However, the right answer is going to be specific to each household; it's good that these tariffs are available - but they're not the automatic best choice for anyone just because they possess an EV.

My dad just ran the numbers; break-even for the night tariff he's on is close to the 30% mark; however their nighttime usage proportion is 59%. A clear saving, despite the more expensive daytime power.

[Aunty Pasty]

Traditionally, homes with Economy 7 set up have some sort of heating system that runs at night, usually hot water tank via an immersion heater or storage heaters. So the usage of electric heating is offset by saving on gas costs. Economy 7 just for Ev charging will only make sense if you tend to do lots of EV milage.

[somouk]

I've done a spreadsheet to work it all out and I will save about £500 a year swapping to the Bulb EV tariff compared to their normal one i'm on at the moment.

That's factoring in about 13000 miles of electric charging and not swapping any other high load usage like washer/dryer to out of hours. Anything under about 7000 miles charging and it starts to become not worth swapping.

[dmsims]

It's all about averages:

[NugentS]

LHRFlightman said:

This from Shell Energy. Who uses 42% of their energy at night?!

These cheaper tariffs seem a con to me. Yes, obviously you'll save money in charging the car, but surely the day to day cost of energy that you need to live during the far outweighs those savings. Especially as they jack up the day rate. In my case by 10p a kWh.

"Thank you for your email.
We currently offer a variable Economy 7 which might be beneficial for the EV owners (it is best if you use 42% of your electricity at night on this tariff).

The name of the tariff is: Energy Price Guarantee Direct Debit v2 (Two Rate, Economy 7)

Electricity
Unit rate Day: 43.013p per kWh
Night: 21.426p per kWh

Standing charge 44.50p per day"

I do
I use 95%+ of my electrickery during the cheap night rate

[Maracus]

LHRFlightman said:

Who uses 42% of their energy at night?!

We normally use 60-65% of our energy at night.

[Downward]

I’ll charge the car 12.30am or 4.30am and also run the tumble drier and dishwasher.

I worked out around 1/3rd of electric used in the day was in this off peak period.

[Dave Hedgehog]

Downward said:

I’ll charge the car 12.30am or 4.30am and also run the tumble drier and dishwasher.

I worked out around 1/3rd of electric used in the day was in this off peak period.

same

set our immersion heater to only come on then as well, gives us about 60% usage overnight

[MrTrilby]

LHRFlightman said:

This from Shell Energy. Who uses 42% of their energy at night?!

We are currently averaging 44% of electricity used at night off-peak. And that’s down a little on normal because it’s cold and we have some electric underfloor heating currently being used during peak rates.

Off-peak consumption for us is primarily in order of consumption: hot water, dishwasher, washing machine.

[TheDeuce]

I use about 60% of my energy to power the EV, all at night during off peak.

I doubt many EV drivers do so few miles they wouldn't use at least ~40%. There will be exceptions of course but generally a typical mileage EV driver will need to put almost as much into their car as they use in their house. and of course, once you have the cheap off peak tariff you will soon find other stuff to move into the cheap hours.. tumble dryer, dishwasher etc.

[paradigital]

Today’s energy use…

[mclwanB]

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

[paradigital]

mclwanB said:

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

I’d never run the tumble dryer overnight, but no issues with the relatively new, and in good working order washing machine, dishwasher, immersion heater or (our big one) the battery for the hybrid solar setup.

Never been a problem with the kids, but their rooms are the other end of the house, not directly over the utility.

[MrTrilby]

mclwanB said:

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

Bedrooms are well away from the utility room.
Utility room has a fire detector and is not the only/main exit from the house.

Appliances are modern and in good order - I’m not keen on them catching fire regardless of the time of day or how much my electricity is costing.

[TheDeuce]

mclwanB said:

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

No problems here. Modern washing machines, unless allowed to knock against something are extremely quiet. Regards fire risks we're very careful to clean out the dust filters each use of our tumble dryer and we have heat and smoke detectors around the house and fire extinguishers. I don't feel we're taking a significant risk.

There's loads of stuff you can shift to nigh time running/charging once you have the tariff. If you don't have the tariff, you understandably won't give it much thought and it will likely sound like a hassle, but it's just not.

Anyway, it's all of little relevance. As I said previously, if you just charge the EV overnight then you're likely using more than enough off peak power to make the sums work.

[mclwanB]

TheDeuce said:

mclwanB said:

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

No problems here. Modern washing machines, unless allowed to knock against something are extremely quiet. Regards fire risks we're very careful to clean out the dust filters each use of our tumble dryer and we have heat and smoke detectors around the house and fire extinguishers. I don't feel we're taking a significant risk.

There's loads of stuff you can shift to nigh time running/charging once you have the tariff. If you don't have the tariff, you understandably won't give it much thought and it will likely sound like a hassle, but it's just not.

Anyway, it's all of little relevance. As I said previously, if you just charge the EV overnight then you're likely using more than enough off peak power to make the sums work.

Unfortunately our 7 year old's bedroom is above the washing machine and in Scotland almost every house has suspended floors downstairs like ours so they're less than quiet. Trying to persuade her to swap bedrooms isn't going to happen 😜

Yup we always clear the dust out of ours before use, have interconnected fire alarms (law here) but was interested in the Staffordshire fire brigade's take. This isn't the only service to say the same thing recently, Devon and Cornwall said this:

"Lots of people think it will never happen to them, but we attend around 115 fires each year caused by domestic appliances. That’s about two every week. If your tumble dryer, washing machine or dishwasher starts a fire at night – the fire may have more time to develop before you’re aware of it"

https://www.dsfire.gov.uk/news/safety/why-you-shou...

Although with the interconnected fire alarms I suspect it wouldn't be long before we were aware of it.

As you say will need to check the sums as my wife works from home mostly but even with only a 38kwh battery to charge it probably makes sense to switch

[JonnyVTEC]

Here we go. The classic the day rate is more to make up for it from people who seem to be incapable of doing basic maths to work out if it’s worth switching.

Pretty boring, no wonder rishi wants everyone doing more.

That’s all.

[TheDeuce]

mclwanB said:

TheDeuce said:

mclwanB said:

Running appliances at night-does no one have:

1) children who may well be woken up by the washing machine spinning at 2am

2) concern re fire risks?

https://www.staffordshirefire.gov.uk/news/posts/fi...

No problems here. Modern washing machines, unless allowed to knock against something are extremely quiet. Regards fire risks we're very careful to clean out the dust filters each use of our tumble dryer and we have heat and smoke detectors around the house and fire extinguishers. I don't feel we're taking a significant risk.

There's loads of stuff you can shift to nigh time running/charging once you have the tariff. If you don't have the tariff, you understandably won't give it much thought and it will likely sound like a hassle, but it's just not.

Anyway, it's all of little relevance. As I said previously, if you just charge the EV overnight then you're likely using more than enough off peak power to make the sums work.

Unfortunately our 7 year old's bedroom is above the washing machine and in Scotland almost every house has suspended floors downstairs like ours so they're less than quiet. Trying to persuade her to swap bedrooms isn't going to happen ??

Yup we always clear the dust out of ours before use, have interconnected fire alarms (law here) but was interested in the Staffordshire fire brigade's take. This isn't the only service to say the same thing recently, Devon and Cornwall said this:

"Lots of people think it will never happen to them, but we attend around 115 fires each year caused by domestic appliances. That’s about two every week. If your tumble dryer, washing machine or dishwasher starts a fire at night – the fire may have more time to develop before you’re aware of it"

https://www.dsfire.gov.uk/news/safety/why-you-shou...

Although with the interconnected fire alarms I suspect it wouldn't be long before we were aware of it.

As you say will need to check the sums as my wife works from home mostly but even with only a 38kwh battery to charge it probably makes sense to switch

Well if something wakes a child up... Obviously avoid it. But as you say, it's not that hard to be generally safe and sensible and absolutely do the sums. It's a high likelihood you can (safely..) move a few things to night time running along with the EV, save a few quid and also be helpful in national grid terms.

Or if it doesn't work out, just carry on as before.