Is 36p a kw expensive

[starquake]

Fix ?

what does that mean ?

Fixed rate for 12 months or 24 months, as in how electricity used to be sold!

Rare electricity has exit fees these days unless on such a fixed rate deal.

But check my edit above if you missed it, if you get a referral for Octopus 50 of the exit fee is covered, so in reality it's a £100 exit fee -> thus if you use more than 2000 units between now and end of your fixed period in 2024, it'll be cheaper to be on Octopus. The average house WILL use more than 2000 units on E7, so I'd say it's an easy choice to switch and save.

 

[scotjimland]

Fixed rate for 12 months or 24 months, as in how electricity used to be sold!

Rare electricity has exit fees these days unless on such a fixed rate deal.

ah ok.. yes, correct

 

[MisterB]

I assume it means a fixed tariff for 12 months

Already resolved lol!

 

[Nanniemate]

Amazing how 1 question can trigger a really thought provoking discussion
Lost of interesting comments

 

[Brains]

What drives me nuts is that we are pulling back from wind and solar that will mean a stable and cheap supply with added gas and nuclear backup. Why it still isn’t in the building regs that solar and inverter systems with a battery storage must be mandatory is beyond me.

Well let me think.

If you are running a country do you let the paroles have free (or cheap) electricity?
OR
Do you sell off the power stations to your mates (and tax it)

Then ensure your mates make money by actively stopping any other form of other electrical generation (and tax it).

Do you then stop any encouragement to improve insulation of existing properties and then remove all rules regarding fitting energy saving building regulations on the pretext it discourages new house building.

Once your mates have a total power monopoly you then hike the cost of electricity way above the actual production cost (and tax it).


First rules of any authoritarian government are:
Never give any real power to the masses. (Either meaning of the word 'power').
Tax the poor. (As nothing they can do about it).
Do not overtax the rich. (If you do, you will be replaced by one of them).
Send your children to selected private educational establishments to ensure these rules are engrained and learned young.

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[Bessy765]

I am still trying to find a company with an off peak tarif that I can charge my 12 kw of storage batteries, that doesn’t hammer me with the peak rate. Scottish power are quoting 16p off peak and 36p peak. But the off peak is midnight to 5 am and if there is no or very little help from my 6 kw solar array that 12 kw doesn’t quite last. It will most days but there are times when it doesn’t

 

[Coolcats]

Why it still isn’t in the building regs that solar and inverter systems with a battery storage must be mandatory is beyond me.

It happened in 2014

It’s official: government to scrap Code for Sustainable Homes​

 

[MisterB]

I am still trying to find a company with an off peak tarif that I can charge my 12 kw of storage batteries, that doesn’t hammer me with the peak rate. Scottish power are quoting 16p off peak and 36p peak. But the off peak is midnight to 5 am and if there is no or very little help from my 6 kw solar array that 12 kw doesn’t quite last. It will most days but there are times when it doesn’t

and therin lies the dilemma. at least you get 5 hours - i only get 4 hours ! my workaround is to get another battery BUT its certainly not cost effective in the short term as its cheaper to buy the few extra kw at a higher rate. My thoughts are though that if any energy my PV system is sent to the grid, then its wasted. as we're on the FiT tariff, it doesnt make any difference if i send it to the grid as we get recompensed for generating it not for selling it back, so i might as well store it! i also have the money available now, but might not have in a few years time and so the longer i actually have the 'system' the more likely it is to pay for itself .....

 

[starquake]

I am still trying to find a company with an off peak tarif that I can charge my 12 kw of storage batteries, that doesn’t hammer me with the peak rate. Scottish power are quoting 16p off peak and 36p peak. But the off peak is midnight to 5 am and if there is no or very little help from my 6 kw solar array that 12 kw doesn’t quite last. It will most days but there are times when it doesn’t

Try Octopus and buy a super cheap EV.

Min of 11:30 to 5:30 with a intelligent charger att 7.5p off peak and 30p peak with same standing fees as a "normal" customer (same as felxible).

Before you ask theres a reason you can only get the super cheap tariffs with a smart meter, and it's down to something called Time of use charges, without one the supplier pays a FIXED rate per unit you use to the local power DNO (up to 12p a unit). With Time of use, ie, a smart meter, that fee is 0p off peak overnimght + /weekends and its' aboout 1.5p for 7:30pm to midnight with only the 4-7pm period at about 18p a unit.

Basically a non-smart meter "assumes" all usage is peak so you get rubbish tariffs.

Above tariff is called "Intelligent Go" and is limtied to battery users that are supported (not all) and EV owners. If you don't have a supported battery you can still use it IF you have a supported EV or charger for an EV that charges once a month.

 

[starquake]

It happened in 2014

It’s official: government to scrap Code for Sustainable Homes​

TBH there are also reasons it can't be on EVERY new build as frankly unless it's a new build with lots of legacy issues the transformers will overload on substatial backfeeding.

And theres an issue at moment aiui in micro-gen isn't subject to full G-99 rules that woudl require them to "throttle back" in event the transformer approaching overload, which larger scale gen is subject to preventing the same. Thus lots of little gen in an area is worse than one bigger generator if everyone has it.

But above can be fixed with technology and more expensive inverters, and so it SHOULD be, if G-99 operation was mandatory on all inveters then 100% it would be good.

TBH I imagine most houses could run entirely on a modest battery + solar without the grid these days except for some occasional cold winters days.

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[Coolcats]

TBH there are also reasons it can't be on EVERY new build as frankly unless it's a new build with lots of legacy issues the transformers will overload on substatial backfeeding.

And theres an issue at moment aiui in micro-gen isn't subject to full G-99 rules that woudl require them to "throttle back" in event the transformer approaching overload, which larger scale gen is subject to preventing the same. Thus lots of little gen in an area is worse than one bigger generator if everyone has it.

But above can be fixed with technology and more expensive inverters, and so it SHOULD be, if G-99 operation was mandatory on all inveters then 100% it would be good.

TBH I imagine most houses could run entirely on a modest battery + solar without the grid these days except for some occasional cold winters days.

Why can’t it be on every new build? It’s a genuine question because it can only be down to design.

My home oriention is east west I have a 6 kw system with battery the home requires 12kw per day on average

Year to date 46% of pv generated is self consumed and 54% to the grid.

Since mid October the batteries have started topping up on cheapish electric at night. The Darkest days the battery will support the home, daytime import only happens if I’m drawing more than 4.5 Kw

So far today the panels have produced 5.4 Kw so will draw around 7kw from midnight

But even in these darker days I still export when the sun is shining

Absolutely no reason what a housing development could not have panels wind turbines and battery storage on a new estate

 

[Brains]

TBH I imagine most houses could run entirely on a modest battery + solar without the grid these days except for some occasional cold winters days.

But how, if I'm running an authoritarian government and I've got all my mates in positions where they are making oodles of money flogging overpriced water and electricity to the masses can I make money?

If the majority of dwellings become effectively self-sufficient to heat and light, then the bloody proles will start to install rainfall harvesting systems and that is all my mates investments gone and I'll have to get a proper job.

 

[Nonna]

Is 36p a kw expensive​

Not where I am.
I'm on a pitch with 77p kWh (they got caught for a 2 year fix when prices were sky high)
Others locally have 50p & 40p but, at least in the case of the 50p one, the pitch is £8 per night more than mine.

 

[starquake]

But how, if I'm running an authoritarian government and I've got all my mates in positions where they are making oodles of money flogging overpriced water and electricity to the masses can I make money?

If the majority of dwellings become effectively self-sufficient to heat and light, then the bloody proles will start to install rainfall harvesting systems and that is all my mates investments gone and I'll have to get a proper job.

TBH self-owned infrastructure is a thing now as co-ops -> www.rippleenergy.com -> works with Octopus and other suppliers.

I'm an investor in all 3 of current projects, may go in on the 4th solar farm. They limit purchases to 120% of your consumption.

You can't arguably make (much) money off it, but you can offset the former over-priced authoriatrian goverments prices by buying now at a fixed rate for next 25-40 years. Ref; rainfall harvesting, they'll get you on the sewerage charges (for which they helpfully break the governments own laws without any punishment) anyhow.

In some countrys it's effectively better to "not" be on grid for any utility due to above though. Sadly this one would prefer based on some friends with septic tanks to go after septic tank people over the utilities doing raw sewerage waste to rivers regularly.

 

[starquake]

Why can’t it be on every new build? It’s a genuine question because it can only be down to design.

Absolutely no reason what a housing development could not have panels wind turbines and battery storage on a new estate

It's dependant on if the new build estsate has a newer transformer of if it's going to old infrastructure is the summary as new estate does not always mean new HV infrastructure. The new estate literally next door to where I live goes into same HV transformer as us, and the developer up there was told he couldn't do solar on all (wanted to). Where the other new estate top of hill uses "new" transformers as it's a larger development -> and as new it can handle a higher percentrage of backfeeding and as such all the houses there do get their 4kw of solar.

Dad worked in HV for a DNO (SSE but worked for a division covering a UKPN area as he was technically "private networks") and basically said, some transformers can handle 5-10% of load backfill without issues, where newer ones can handle far higher percentages up to beyond their capacity without issue.. In my esttate the (HV) transformer we connected to was put in in the 80's and isn't due to be replaced until 2040 so fits in the latter small percent of backfill so off-grid projects around here are being rejected beyond certain scales.

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[Brains]

TBH self-owned infrastructure is a thing now as co-ops -> www.rippleenergy.com -> works with Octopus and other suppliers.
I'm an investor in all 3 of current projects, may go in on the 4th solar farm. They limit purchases to 120% of your consumption.

Asking for a friend (really!)
Would they be interested in an installation in a water mill ?

My brother has a mill near Oxford, own spring, mill lake etc.
Not affected by droughts.
Constant stream which from memory is about 500 litres a minute.
He has been quoted a silly 5 figure sum to install a turbine which would more than power his house and move the surplus into the grid, which in that area it is not set up to receive.

He has been quoted an even sillier high six or low seven figure sum to install a slightly bigger turbine which could then power not only around 10 local houses (they are all 5-10 bedroom size) but also the local golf club & hotel with it's 30 chalets, including EV charging in the car park.

The main cost appears to regulatory, not mechanical, as to sell the electricity to anyone other than the grid, he needs to set up as a registered limited power company with OffGen approval etc.
Which means in reality it's not worth it, so all that free power, that runs day and night 365 days of the year is going to waste.

If he does install a turbine I have suggested rather than selling his surplus electricity back to the grid, he simply runs cooling cables into the mill lake and heats it up with the spare electricity, an Olympic size heated pool! Which may make the entire venture cheaper for him, as he would then just keep his current electrical connection the the grid.

 

[MisterB]

Asking for a friend (really!)
Would they be interested in an installation in a water mill ?

My brother has a mill near Oxford, own spring, mill lake etc.
Not affected by droughts.
Constant stream which from memory is about 500 litres a minute.
He has been quoted a silly 5 figure sum to install a turbine which would more than power his house and move the surplus into the grid, which in that area it is not set up to receive.

He has been quoted an even sillier high six or low seven figure sum to install a slightly bigger turbine which could then power not only around 10 local houses (they are all 5-10 bedroom size) but also the local golf club & hotel with it's 30 chalets, including EV charging in the car park.

The main cost appears to regulatory, not mechanical, as to sell the electricity to anyone other than the grid, he needs to set up as a registered limited power company with OffGen approval etc.
Which means in reality it's not worth it, so all that free power, that runs day and night 365 days of the year is going to waste.

If he does install a turbine I have suggested rather than selling his surplus electricity back to the grid, he simply runs cooling cables into the mill lake and heats it up with the spare electricity, an Olympic size heated pool! Which may make the entire venture cheaper for him, as he would then just keep his current electrical connection the the grid.

Similar to the home recently featured on Grand Designs where the PV energy produced on their roof can't be fed to other properties...

 

[starquake]

Asking for a friend (really!)
Would they be interested in an installation in a water mill ?

Ask them -> but it sounds a bit small on their project scale.

Project 1 was 2.5MW
Project 2 was I think 12MW
Project 3 was about 20 I think.

Water of that scale is more unfrotunatly in the kw scale AIUI so probably may be too small for their co-ops. But they have all the stuff to sell electricity at scale and distrubute to multiple customers via Octopus. (Octopus are buying project 1 at 29p a kwh this year, distributed to customers at that rate).

Worth asking them but I sense it would need to be of a "larger" scale to interest them -> the owner is available (and CTO) via the contacts on their website, I've had a few chats with both her, the CFO and CTO over the years, as I invested (at a huge risk of total loss of funds) on the idea/premise before they even had the agreements to sell in place. Just ask is the thing, it's a realtively small company with under 10 employees, so you'll likely get a director if you email, despite the fact they have a few thousand customers now.

 

[starquake]

Should caveat that the first project was 2.5MW shared between approx 900 ish customers, so about 2kw average purchase, the turbine was 2.5 million to buy and construct so from that you can work out how much we all had to invest on it without any FCA or any real protection other than a promise they would do what they said (which they did).

 

[Bessy765]

Try Octopus and buy a super cheap EV.

Min of 11:30 to 5:30 with a intelligent charger att 7.5p off peak and 30p peak with same standing fees as a "normal" customer (same as felxible).

Before you ask theres a reason you can only get the super cheap tariffs with a smart meter, and it's down to something called Time of use charges, without one the supplier pays a FIXED rate per unit you use to the local power DNO (up to 12p a unit). With Time of use, ie, a smart meter, that fee is 0p off peak overnimght + /weekends and its' aboout 1.5p for 7:30pm to midnight with only the 4-7pm period at about 18p a unit.

Basically a non-smart meter "assumes" all usage is peak so you get rubbish tariffs.

Above tariff is called "Intelligent Go" and is limtied to battery users that are supported (not all) and EV owners. If you don't have a supported battery you can still use it IF you have a supported EV or charger for an EV that charges once a month.

Many thanks for that info

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[starquake]

Many thanks for that info

No probs, worth noting if you worried about Octopus being a small supplier (as they were about 3 years ago) that now they are the number 2 in UK somewhat down to tariffs like the one I mentioned being available. They've gone from nothing to 2nd largest in sub 5 years, which allegedly due to them having a very high percentage of engaged battery and solar and EV owners. They don't publish numbers on this, but it's quite telling that car manufacturers prioritise the octopus integration over any other supplier, ditto charger integrations.

I fully expect them to overtake British gas and become the largest, all without really any major TV advertising, most is from customers reccomendations, as their approach to running call centres and the like is quite revolutionary and even other sectors like banks taking notice of their (unique) approaches here. In case of call centres they actually tag accounts once you have one to a small 6-8 person team typically, so when you ring up, you'll always speak to the same mini-cluster of customer service people -> allowing a better customer experience as everyone can do everything so theres less esclations/other teams to handle than in other large organisation. All I can say is unlike Scottish power who I was with before, their billing works, is accurate, the bills are on time monthly with a smart meter and that has been unique in my 25 years of home ownership.

With a battery they also were PAYING you £2 a unit to export last week for a 2 horu period.

 

[Bessy765]

Thanks again for your helpful and information post.

where I have to be careful about exporting is I have an addition array it’s only 1.12 kw but it is on the roof of my house at 35 degrees due south, where as the main one is at 10 degrees incline facing due south. The small one performs very well and has 59 p per unit income under the old FIT. If I want to export from the new set I would lose this and as the new array and the old both charge my batteries I don't want to upset the apple cart.

 

[starquake]

Thanks again for your helpful and information post.

where I have to be careful about exporting is I have an addition array it’s only 1.12 kw but it is on the roof of my house at 35 degrees due south, where as the main one is at 10 degrees incline facing due south. The small one performs very well and has 59 p per unit income under the old FIT. If I want to export from the new set I would lose this and as the new array and the old both charge my batteries I don't want to upset the apple cart.

Old FIT does make things more tricky.

I have two friends who were unable to move to a smart meter for exact same reason -> and one now has as found it lucrative, the other is still waiting.

The key thing is though you won't get modern cheaper tariffs without the smart meter due to the pesky DNO TnoS charges as they are called ifyou want to read the 300 page guide on how they calculated from each region ! It's annoying, but at least I hope you understand now why you won't get better tariffs due to the fixed elemenet on a non smart meter. (The full market reform which will add even more tariffs is due mid 2025 when EVERYONE on a smart meter will be on the half hour billing as a default with a opt-out). This will likely mean peak prices going up more but ONLY for 4:30-7:30, and offpeak likely going down). That will likely make it even worse for people on non-smart meters with peak fees being likely assessed at higher rates. Not something I agree with the politics on but many commercial properties have been on half hour billing for 20-30 years already so it's something I am familiar with. The date was already put back from mid next year by ofgem due to the current pricing situation as it would be not good in the press right now.

It's probably worth you having a read of THIS page: https://energy-stats.uk/octopus-agile-outgoing-export-eastern-england/ -> the graphs seem broken today but heres yesterdays

The deemed export is what 6-7p now per unit (that you get paid on top of FIT. If you were not aware you lose that deemed export by going smart metered, bt if you can set battery to export at peak time, it's an AVERAGE of 19-22p a unit to export at that time with peaks of 40p (and last week £2 for one day). It's an excellent website and has graphs for all the export tariffs on Octopus (and some others) as well as import to allow a sensible decision to be made. And it's not ran by Octopus or any energy companies, it just consumes their APIs. As both ofgem website attached below and above state "Your generation payments will stay on their inflation linked rates. Some of which are quite lucrative for early solar adopters." -> so you only lose deemed export AIUI not the generation payments (which are the higher rate). Thats how I understand it. (if you check above the min you would be paid for actual export on agile today would be 9p, which is probably above your 50% deemed export rate, but obviously if you export less than 50% you need to do your maths on it).

 

[Bessy765]

Old FIT does make things more tricky.

I have two friends who were unable to move to a smart meter for exact same reason -> and one now has as found it lucrative, the other is still waiting.

The key thing is though you won't get modern cheaper tariffs without the smart meter due to the pesky DNO TnoS charges as they are called ifyou want to read the 300 page guide on how they calculated from each region ! It's annoying, but at least I hope you understand now why you won't get better tariffs due to the fixed elemenet on a non smart meter. (The full market reform which will add even more tariffs is due mid 2025 when EVERYONE on a smart meter will be on the half hour billing as a default with a opt-out). This will likely mean peak prices going up more but ONLY for 4:30-7:30, and offpeak likely going down). That will likely make it even worse for people on non-smart meters with peak fees being likely assessed at higher rates. Not something I agree with the politics on but many commercial properties have been on half hour billing for 20-30 years already so it's something I am familiar with. The date was already put back from mid next year by ofgem due to the current pricing situation as it would be not good in the press right now.

It's probably worth you having a read of THIS page: https://energy-stats.uk/octopus-agile-outgoing-export-eastern-england/ -> the graphs seem broken today but heres yesterdays

The deemed export is what 6-7p now per unit (that you get paid on top of FIT. If you were not aware you lose that deemed export by going smart metered, bt if you can set battery to export at peak time, it's an AVERAGE of 19-22p a unit to export at that time with peaks of 40p (and last week £2 for one day). It's an excellent website and has graphs for all the export tariffs on Octopus (and some others) as well as import to allow a sensible decision to be made. And it's not ran by Octopus or any energy companies, it just consumes their APIs. As both ofgem website attached below and above state "Your generation payments will stay on their inflation linked rates. Some of which are quite lucrative for early solar adopters." -> so you only lose deemed export AIUI not the generation payments (which are the higher rate). Thats how I understand it. (if you check above the min you would be paid for actual export on agile today would be 9p, which is probably above your 50% deemed export rate, but obviously if you export less than 50% you need to do your maths on it).

View attachment 837525

Thank you yet again for this excellent info, I do have a smart meter had it for about a year, had to have it fitted when I informed Scottish Power I was having extra solar panels fitted. But I stated I did not wish to go on an export tariff as I get I feel a very good return on the original 1.12 kw set at 59 p per unit for half of what the panels generate plus 4 p a unit balance. This gives me around £600 a year.

 

[starquake]

Thank you yet again for this excellent info, I do have a smart meter had it for about a year, had to have it fitted when I informed Scottish Power I was having extra solar panels fitted. But I stated I did not wish to go on an export tariff as I get I feel a very good return on the original 1.12 kw set at 59 p per unit for half of what the panels generate plus 4 p a unit balance. This gives me around £600 a year.

I think based on my friends you'll still get 59p per unit, but won't get the 4p -> but it really depends what scheme you on, as one FIT tariff didnt' come with export meters for the fixed 59p portion.

Without a generation meter you may unfortunatly lose entire FIT basis and at 59p you definitely need that.

If you have a smart meter then iin my opinion a likely easy option is to just move import tariff to Octopus or someone else (anyone) as import and export do NOT need to be with same supplier. That should allow cheap imports at 7.5p assuming an EV or eligability for the itelligent tariff (and if not they have "other" cheaper tariffs to). And avoid touching your excellent export deal. That should as I understand it be possible and give you best of both worlds.

One of my FIT friends was using octopus agile for import and SSE (before takeover by Ovo) for their FIT export payments. So it has at least been possible in past (and they done this because in 2019-2020 Octopus agile was usually sub 6-9p average most of time, so consuming from the grid was paying considerably less than the FIT was paying). At time Octopus would only pay 1p a unit fit export rate if you had the good import rates, so many custoemrs on the smart tariffs group on facebook were using 2 providers to get the better 4-6p export rates from other providers.

It's annoying it's all so complicated on the older fit schemes -> though it's telling you can get solar today without any FIT and still repay the system in a small amount of years just on the rates you gain.

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