Soldato
But your still not paying full rate for your daily usage…….in essence saving 12p, 1p from the export and 11p from the cheaper rate charge to your battery.
How to getthe best out of Octopus Flux
- Thread starter Ron-ski
- Start date
For me, the Flux import is dropping to 16.858p, with day rate export dropping to 17.097p.
Given efficiency losses, will be almost certainly worse off charging, then exporting, but if the weather is bad and I need to import then I'd be paying 28.97p, so I will still charge my batteries overnight, and maximise the chance of having a full charge come 16:00 (peak export is 28.335p).
Given efficiency losses, will be almost certainly worse off charging, then exporting, but if the weather is bad and I need to import then I'd be paying 28.97p, so I will still charge my batteries overnight, and maximise the chance of having a full charge come 16:00 (peak export is 28.335p).
For each unit I export during the day that I imported overnight, I now lose money, not make. So it's better to use day generation to charge up battery in time for 4.00pm... of course no guarantee that the sun will get the battery full ..
As I said, it's now a little more complicated how to maximise profit from the new prices in my area.
To play it safe, fully charging overnight in winter of course seems the obvious. But these transition seasons are so unpredictable!
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Associate
Flux seems to be getting less competitive with each price change. The latest prices see the day export rate drop 15.0% for me, with the import unit rate dropping by 8.4% and the standing charge static.
The standing charge is the real killer. As I cant force discharge, I now have to export 3.5kWh daily just to cover that. Like others have mentioned, the day export rate is now lower than the 0200-0500 import rate, so along with losses, you now have to choose carefully when you charge.
As the export rate keeps dropping, the only thing making it worth it really is the ability to charge cheaply at 0200-0500 in winter, but there are better tariffs for that.
The standing charge is the real killer. As I cant force discharge, I now have to export 3.5kWh daily just to cover that. Like others have mentioned, the day export rate is now lower than the 0200-0500 import rate, so along with losses, you now have to choose carefully when you charge.
As the export rate keeps dropping, the only thing making it worth it really is the ability to charge cheaply at 0200-0500 in winter, but there are better tariffs for that.
Man of Honour
What alternative tariffs exist that offers better rates? I sort of wonder whether or not flux will.... flux with seasons and costs?
Soldato
Go import is £0.09/kWh 00:30 - 04:30 and Export £0.08/kWh all day. Peak rates are roughly SVR (£0.30/kWh~)
I fully charge the battery no matter the weather currently, lose a little if the day is good as export is a bit lower, but it's probably a couple of pence per kWh I imported that the battery could have had imported from solar instead.
With how flaky Solcast predictions are, I'll take the 100% guarantee of having battery available on a poor day, thus avoiding paying £0.30/kWh as much as possible.
I fully charge the battery no matter the weather currently, lose a little if the day is good as export is a bit lower, but it's probably a couple of pence per kWh I imported that the battery could have had imported from solar instead.
With how flaky Solcast predictions are, I'll take the 100% guarantee of having battery available on a poor day, thus avoiding paying £0.30/kWh as much as possible.
Soldato
- Joined
- 23 May 2006
- Posts
- 6,949
it sucks you cant get on IO but now winter is coming would Go not be better than flux for most people.....
given there is no cool off period if it were me i would likely consider GO from october - march inclusive then the decision is whether to stay on go or move to flux for April through to September (inclusive)
unless your solar array is so large you plan to export significantly even over winter.
zappi owners will very soon be able to join IO. its in closed beta now and sounds like its going ok........
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Without an EV, not a lot. I picked agile over flux for now and it is a lot cheaper so far.
Man of Honour
That's what I suspected. No EV here, and to be honest, as long as I can cover peak with "cheaper" electricity by storing it in the battery that's already saving me a tonne.
Yes absolutely, I’m back on Go now which just makes sense with the EV now that production is tailing off
At least now at 9p in vs 8p out it makes managing the battery packs much easier - very little issue with just fully charging every day through the winter.
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Not going to switch to agile?
Man of Honour
I need to do a comparison. I don't think it's going to be a lot in it.
Associate
- Joined
- 4 Jul 2006
- Posts
- 1,838
Nice history of prices for each of the tariffs here
Octopus Agile South Eastern England | Energy Stats UK
View current and historical tariff data for Octopus Agile South Eastern England. Get £50 of free Octopus Energy credit.
energy-stats.uk
I think im going to stay on flux myself, not sure I want to risk any hassle trying to switch over for the winter and the only one worth it would be "Go" and there is a risk of getting denied as I don't have an EV.
Agile is a tough call, yesterday and today look like they would be pretty good, as forecast is pretty poor for solar and it offered a really good overnight rate, in fact early this morning they would have been paying me about 7.5ppu to import, but then Monday which had good solar I think it would have lost out to Flux quite a bit due to the poorer export rates. I also wonder where agile rates are going to go as we move into winter proper (though possibly wind generation could mean they do OK).
Obviously to get the best out of it though, really needs to be heavily micromanaged i.e. to make use of 7.5ppu import payment you would need to make sure you charged as much as possible in that half hour period in the middle of the night but as that wouldn't fully charge the battery would also need to have been charging in the not quite so good 4.5ppu payment period which was about 23:30 last night and in my case several other periods as well.
I did write an app earlier this year that tried to control that sort of thing by factoring in my historical usage, solcast forecast and agile rates, to try and optimise charging and discharging times for the battery (down to the 30 minute level) and although it worked reasonably well it was always at the mercy of the forecast, so really needed quite a safety margin on the amount charged due to the variability of the forecast versus reality!
May have to consider looking into the app and agile again, but flux was nice in that it used to be set and forget as it was always probably worth fully charging overnight (give or take inefficiencies in charging\discharging).
Edit - Also, over the summer, Agile would have been way worse than flux so you also really need to be doing the switch every spring and summer.
Obviously to get the best out of it though, really needs to be heavily micromanaged i.e. to make use of 7.5ppu import payment you would need to make sure you charged as much as possible in that half hour period in the middle of the night but as that wouldn't fully charge the battery would also need to have been charging in the not quite so good 4.5ppu payment period which was about 23:30 last night and in my case several other periods as well.
I did write an app earlier this year that tried to control that sort of thing by factoring in my historical usage, solcast forecast and agile rates, to try and optimise charging and discharging times for the battery (down to the 30 minute level) and although it worked reasonably well it was always at the mercy of the forecast, so really needed quite a safety margin on the amount charged due to the variability of the forecast versus reality!
May have to consider looking into the app and agile again, but flux was nice in that it used to be set and forget as it was always probably worth fully charging overnight (give or take inefficiencies in charging\discharging).
Edit - Also, over the summer, Agile would have been way worse than flux so you also really need to be doing the switch every spring and summer.
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I expect most people will anyway, flux is a summer tariff really. I will put my name down for intelligent flux next year, over winter it makes no sense.
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Need to start thinking about coming off Flux now my generation is down. slowly exporting less and less and will get shading in the next couple of weeks on one row of my panels. To fully charge my batteries I'd need 6 hours due to inverter limit, but Go only offers the 4 hour cheap window, is there anything else I should be potentially looking at to get a longer cheap window?
Soldato
Cant remember if you have an Ev or not. If you do its intelligent.
Otherwise think Go will be best and your just going to have to accept 4 hours of charging only.
yeah, unfortunately it's not on the supported list and neither is my charger
Soldato
- Joined
- 23 May 2006
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- 6,949
i dont know a huge amount about it but also look at EON Next Drive if you cant get on IO.
main issue you would need to check, am not sure if the discounted electricity is only for car charging or if its all use
main issue you would need to check, am not sure if the discounted electricity is only for car charging or if its all use
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