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Why pay 11p for EV charging when you can get it free with pod point! I have only paid ounces for EV charge had car for over one year
Going to need more info…

Free public charging charging is mostly disappearing now.
From what I can see;
  1. Where it’s still in place it‘s heavily abused by the freeloaders
  2. A total lottery on charging availability, due to point 1.
 
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So Spring has finally arrived and the Solar production has starting to ramp up.

I start the day with my home storage battery at 82%
I've already got the washing machine & dishwasher on. I'll get the car plugged in after the school run and the water heating will likely start after lunch.

With half a day of sun i'm now running 'off grid' and 'off gas', with some free EV miles in there too :)
 
So Spring has finally arrived and the Solar production has starting to ramp up.

I start the day with my home storage battery at 82%
I've already got the washing machine & dishwasher on. I'll get the car plugged in after the school run and the water heating will likely start after lunch.

With half a day of sun i'm now running 'off grid' and 'off gas', with some free EV miles in there too :)

I've now got an image in my head of your house turning into a weird rube goldberg machine as you try to figure out nw and creative wasted to waste your free electricity.
 
If you have a 5kW inverter and a 7kW charger. How do you charge car from Solar. Does it max out at 5kW ? Same for a house battery to car
 
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If you have a 5kW inverter and a 7kW charger. How do you charge car from Solar. Does it max out at 5kW ? Same for a house battery to car

The max the inverter can supply is the max (its typically higher than the headline number, 10% or so but may drop back over time as it gets warm).
So if you have a 7kw charger and a 5kw capable inverter your going to be capped at 5kw from solar+battery typically.

Can get a little different if its not a hybrid but a solar with its own inverter and a AC couple battery with its own inverter. Potentially more supply there if the systems are all capable of talking together.
 
I have a habit of always being late to the party with deals/offers/promos despite monitoring HUKD often. For once I seemed to have actually managed to benefit from one and managed to get on the Octopus tracker before they started the waiting list. It's just straight out of the box instantly saving us loads at the moment.
 
Newer article here from sky which also indicates its either been dealt with later or undecided. But does say the actual cost is now significantly lower than previously reported.

whole thing is weird .. govt had put aside/expected £5BN to cover Bulb, what ?, additional cost to purchaser for energy that hadn't been hedged, above the EPG cap, they are financing for all consumers,
and, with gas price drop , unhedged energy is cheaper so govt expects to get £1.2Bn profit from buyer instead ?
so, generally, the hedging has cost all consumers lots of money, but no one anticipated the warm winter&lpg re-stock rates (hindsight's a great thing)

article I'd read https://www.reuters.com/business/en...akeover-rival-unlawful-court-told-2023-02-28/
 
If you have a 5kW inverter and a 7kW charger. How do you charge car from Solar. Does it max out at 5kW ? Same for a house battery to car

Charging from solar -> Currently using 3-pin plug which maxes at about 2.3 kW. This works great when WFH, usually get 6+ hours if the sun is good, which is about 40 miles of range per day into the EV battery.
Longer term i'll buy a new wall charger to replace my Pod Point (7Kw) which diverts the solar excess to the car - e.g. Like the Zappi does
 
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ah ok. So if you pull 7kW and inverter is 5kW will the extra 2kW come from the grid?

My cupra has a slow AC mode which only pulls 3.5kW off a 7kW AC charger. I guess that can be useful with Solar.
 
Going to need more info…

Free public charging charging is mostly disappearing now.
From what I can see;
  1. Where it’s still in place it‘s heavily abused by the freeloaders
  2. A total lottery on charging availability, due to point 1.
Free public charging charging is not disappearing in my City I used last week @ocean retail park:D and pod point is 32p for 50 KWH much better then instavolt 75p -50KWH chargers rip-off

And There are thousands of free electric car charge points in the UK, often located in supermarkets, shopping centres, public car parks, hotels and sometimes service stations.
 
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People with Octopus, check your payment amount, they seem to be upping monthly payments as the Gov payment is over.

They increased my payment 3 fold to just under £100, even with over £600 credit on the account, and use less than £25 a month.
 
Free public charging charging is not disappearing in my City I used last week @ocean retail park:D and pod point is 32p for 50 KWH much better then instavolt 75p -50KWH chargers rip-off

And There are thousands of free electric car charge points in the UK, often located in supermarkets, shopping centres, public car parks, hotels and sometimes service stations.

I know free charging exists, but it's disappearing e.g. PodPoint / VW stopped the Tesco free Pod Point charging last year.
Most free chargers remaining are at Hotel's and the others can't be relied upon due to the freeloader's blocking them 24/7.
 
I know free charging exists, but it's disappearing e.g. PodPoint / VW stopped the Tesco free Pod Point charging last year.
Most free chargers remaining are at Hotel's and the others can't be relied upon due to the freeloader's blocking them 24/7.

I know someone that specifically goes to a local hotel and leaves their Tesla there all day charging whilst walking home to continue working. It was always going to be abused so I can see public "free" points going away as well.
What's funny is they're fairly well off - I mean they drive a Tesla ffs - and just do not need to do this. Strange.
 
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People with Octopus, check your payment amount, they seem to be upping monthly payments as the Gov payment is over.

They increased my payment 3 fold to just under £100, even with over £600 credit on the account, and use less than £25 a month.

Thats handy thanks
Just checked mine and they added £67 to it as well. They owe me £800 as it is (deliberate on my part) so I don't want another £67 added to my payments!
 
ah ok. So if you pull 7kW and inverter is 5kW will the extra 2kW come from the grid?

My cupra has a slow AC mode which only pulls 3.5kW off a 7kW AC charger. I guess that can be useful with Solar.

Yes. But if you have a Solar compatible charger, they typically have 3 modes:

Full speed @ 7kw
Eco which will charge the car at 1.4kw or higher if more solar is available up to the max export. If you don’t have 1.4kw from the solar, it will pull from the grid.
Eco plus: only pulls from excess solar and needs a minimum of 1.4kw before it kicks on and uses zero grid.

The latter two modes use a CT clamp to monitor your export and matches accordingly.
 
I used to be a bulb customer and would submit my meter readings on 15th month and 24th month

Now I have been moved over to octopus they seem to sending me emails about weekly charge, wha's this about ?

I submit my readings on the same dates

15th month and 24th with octopus
 
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