Best Electricity Plan for new EV Owners

I was thinking the solar would offset my daytime use for WFH and new baby on the way. The night meter could pick up the appliances and the car. The only solar provider I got a call back from told me not to let anyone sell me a battery. I'll ask them (if anyone shows up) about the complexity of leaving it battery-ready.

Okay so first off, that guy to told you not to get a battery, don't call him back or answer his phone calls, he's at best an idiot and at worst a scam artist

This is a discussion more suited to the Renewables forum, so I suggest heading there for advice

But to get you started, you need to go and do your own calculations around how much energy you're using and how much you can generate. Installers will just try to sell you a standard kit they have with some vague promise of savings

Figure out how many panels you can fit on your roof within the planning guidelines and use a site like below to figure out how much power this will generate

https://re.jrc.ec.europa.eu/pvg_tools/en/

Then it's a question of how much of that generation you can consume. You're correct that the best way is to shift your consumption to when the array is generating power. There's plenty of folks who have done this on solar alone but it takes a lot of planning and effort.

And small babies tend to work on their own schedule and aren't will to wait around until the sun is shining before wanting to be fed or vomiting all over their clothes necessitating a clothes wash and a bath 😩

Batteries make self consumption easier and this maximise your savings, so you'll want to plan to have one in the system at some point

There's a bunch of ways to do this but probably the simplest is to connect the solar panels to an inverter/charger (also called a hybrid inverter) which can also charge the battery. Then you can add the battery on later as the budget allows, but it helps a lot to plan is from the beginning

Another trick you can do with a battery is charge from the grid at night time, ensuring it's got enough to power you through the day even in winter. This could shift most of you remaining consumption to the cheap rates, saving more money. I think that's what landed @unkel over the night rate limit 😁

Final bit of advice, beware of anyone pushing systems that depend on selling power to the grid. There was great excitement about Ireland finally paying people who export power to the grid but the truth is that you can't make money from it. All the providers so far who have published rates have also hiked the prices for buying electricity, so you end up losing money. Self consumption is always best, anything you sell to the grid is either a nice bonus, or a loss if you just end up buying it back at a higher price

😤Just seen that,what are the new rates i wonder?,at least we got the winter out of them.watch all the other suppliers follow their lead i assume.

Well they did make a big show of not raising prices over winter, so maybe the others won't raise prices by the same amount

You're not going to be left on that rate until August, you'll get notified from your supplier that the variable rates are going up but you will just get the contracted discounts (your contract is for the discounts, not the variable rate). But your bill will be going up similar to the Bord Gais increase no matter who you are with.

I'll be

Just out of my 2 week cool off period.

But look, in the great scheme of things, I may not have saved much by moving as they will just be the 1st of many to increase their prices. I was on a 25% off deal, that offer has just been negated by the news today.

Yes man, I have just left their plan, until a few days ago I still paid 4.78c / kWh incl VAT for the night rate. Many people on here and in the renewables forum didn't believe me until I showed them screenshots 😁

graemek is on the same fixed rate plan (but he got in a bit later, so not quite the above rates I enjoyed)

Stupid question, with electricity day prices now getting so high is it now worth it getting a battery, charging it on night rate to cover all day time consumption needs? Ie just the battery and whatever you need to connect it and not getting solar at all

This is the contract small print from the Energia EV tarrif.

The only thing that can go up is the standing charge.

Are those rates correct 20c/5.8c.?,i thought somebody said 24c/6.95c 🤔

I called enerigia today the EV tariff I was quoted was 24.13c day, 6.95c night (was also given a 20.98/10.07 option) and was told the rates are not fixed. . only the discount, so unless it's changed. I signed up to Bord Gais on Monday and cancelled the switch today, think Energia is a better deal .. for now

They were fixed a year ago, my rates haven't gone up despite Energia increasing prices several times over the past 10 months

For new customers they don't seem to be fixed. I don't think we'll be seeing another fixed rate tariff for a long, long time 😭

i was told 21.5 - day, 10.94 - night, 24.67 - peak by Energia for smart meters.....and this was after 30% discount (incl manager's discretion) ..for long time existing customer...wonder they have diff rates :)

BG Smart EV 12 months seems cheaper than Energia - though i am not sure if website have prices to reflect 27% recent hike?

Did you shop around EI, SSE, Panda, etc ?

Yes, I had a good look at the Energia website just now (at their Electric Car offer) and there is no mention anymore of any fixed rates. I must have made them too poor over the last year, they can no longer afford to offer it 😂

I signed up with SSE airtricity a few days ago, night rate now 9.35c and day rate 18.98c incl. VAT, they were the best rates available on bonkers.ie when I checked

My night rate has gone up by 96% compared to last week 😨