Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

But then it just screws people who are low users to begin with and are not as much of a burden on the network compared to high usage households. My actual usage is barely £20 per month on electricity and gas, using hardly anything compared to most households, why should I pay the same SC as someone using hundreds per month draining resources?

Many people forget its not just how much you use but when
You can be a low user but doing it all at peak and more of a problem than a high user who is mainly off peak (such as a person charging an EV)

I very rarely use ANY during peak time so my demand is much lower when the grid is closer to capacity and real unit costs are way higher.

I would personally start with getting everyone on TOU tariffs to help reduce the peak demands.
Of course the grid capacity and costs of providing that are made worse to cope with that short spike.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

I don’t know why they split costs by region when it’s a national grid anyway. One unified cost for the national grid makes total sense.

Its a national grid but also not a national grid.
Local DNOs

Plus it costs more in places with low population compared to space. Although big cities can reverse that somewhat.
Right now the imbalance is that a lot of places are paying for grid infrastructure for renewables and not being fairly recompensed for that. East coast and Scotland probably the big two.
Luckily for me I get that balanced, I live in an area where the grid literally cannot pass the generation out when its windy so we get free elec sessions, use as much as you can windows in effect.

 

[Richie]

Plus it costs more in places with low population compared to space. Although big cities can reverse that somewhat.
Right now the imbalance is that a lot of places are paying for grid infrastructure for renewables and not being fairly recompensed for that. East coast and Scotland probably the big two.

Exactly this. The places that are paying more in SC are the very places that are being used to provide renewables for the entire UK but are effectively being penalised for doing so.

I'd imagine there would be an uproar in the "cheaper" regions if the SC was made to be the same throughout the UK with no thought as to where some.of their electricity is produced.

You'll notice gas SC is pretty much the same nationwide whereas Elec can vary by almost 20p/day so there is some.kind of even-ing out with Gas

 

[200sols]

You'll notice gas SC is pretty much the same nationwide whereas Elec can vary by almost 20p/day so there is some.kind of even-ing out with Gas

Just a guess but mains electricity is more widespread than mains gas, in those rural areas most houses are off of the gas grid so the extra costs of supplying them dont exist.

 

[Richie]

Just a guess but mains electricity is more widespread than mains gas, in those rural areas most houses are off of the gas grid so the extra costs of supplying them dont exist.

Yeah I guessed that as well as I was writing my post. I still believe Elec SC should be the same nationwide as well especially when you consider what @Mercenary Keyboard Warrior says a couple of posts up.

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Elec is also in effect more complicated as more involved (higher fragmentation)

This is handy for showing the DNOs, and transmission operators for both Elec and Gas
The more fragmentation the more liklyhood of significant variations

https://www.energynetworks.org/customers/find-my-network-operator

 

[Richie]

Elec is also in effect more complicated as more involved (higher fragmentation)

This is handy for showing the DNOs, and transmission operators for both Elec and Gas
The more fragmentation the more liklyhood of significant variations

https://www.energynetworks.org/customers/find-my-network-operator

Nothing that Ofgem can't help by standardising SC to equal amounts nationwide though.

 

[200sols]

Nothing that Ofgem can't help by standardising SC to equal amounts nationwide though.

They'll standardise everyone on 70p, be careful what you wish for

 

[Richie]

They'll standardise everyone on 70p, be careful what you wish for

That's only a 5p increase for me

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Nothing that Ofgem can't help by standardising SC to equal amounts nationwide though.

Well they could, the question is more should they
IMO no they shouldnt, but also IMO they should look at whether some regions should pay some to subsidise others that may in effect be picking up costs to benefit another region*

*Its possible they already do of course

 

[200sols]

Just because renewables happen to be in one region does not mean the cost of supplying homes is not higher in that same region.

 

[413x]

Reading this stuff is making me wince.
The standing charge is quite potent.
It does seem the rises are excessive. But I haven't looked much into it.

Probably need to start thinking of energy saving methods for next Winter as my bill will probably double in September.

Heating is the main waste. This house leaks heat like a sieve

 

[413x]

That's only a 5p increase for me

70p is a 50p a day increase for me.. RIP

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

Just because renewables happen to be in one region does not mean the cost of supplying homes is not higher in that same region.

This is the issue right.
Because its a difficult equation.
Very low population density means a lot of cabling, maybe a lot of small sub stations.
Low density is same but gains more from economies of scale
Medium density even more so compared to above
High density likely aligns with more expensive land, more access restriction etc so costs will start to go up per head
Very high density (ie main city centres) will be the above again ramped up a lot. Its very hard to do anything cheaply in London for example.

Its the lack of transparency thats the issue, I tried to look into SC and really struggled to find any decent info.

For example local to me there is constant arguments about a new renewables line needed to supply the off shore wind generation down to London.
The local councils unhappy about the high voltage stations, and the overland pylons.
The alternative is to move that closer to London, and keep more cabling offshore. The additional cost of taking it roughly half way off shore is £1BN
Who would pick up that £1BN I don't know, or even the rest of the costs. I mean its of no benefit to this region, we already have generation in excess of capacity to export out of the region.

With how long ago power was privatised I do wonder if they even really considered the impact of the grid needing to be significantly upgraded over time, and that generation in one area may mean a lot of infrastructure needed there that is of little benefit to that region.
Historically of course a lot of the infrastructure was in place to support generation around the coal mines (so central to northern england).

 

[200sols]

70p is a 50p a day increase for me.. RIP

Lube up.

 

[Richie]

70p is a 50p a day increase for me.. RIP

Your Standing Charge for Elec is 20p/day?

I am guessing you're on an old fix. In that case, and at that price, you'll be coming off it soon no doubt so best to compare SVR than what you are on which is what I did (used SVR SC from April 2024)

Just because renewables happen to be in one region does not mean the cost of supplying homes is not higher in that same region.

I was about to answer this but @Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said everything in posts #25,772 and #25,776 above TBH.

Very high density (ie main city centres) will be the above again ramped up a lot. Its very hard to do anything cheaply in London for example.

Yet they have the lowest Standing Charge (41p/day) by at least 10p/day (£37/year) and as much as 31p/day (£113/year) compared to other regions....

SOURCE

Its the lack of transparency thats the issue, I tried to look into SC and really struggled to find any decent info.

For example local to me there is constant arguments about a new renewables line needed to supply the off shore wind generation down to London.
The local councils unhappy about the high voltage stations, and the overland pylons.
The alternative is to move that closer to London, and keep more cabling offshore. The additional cost of taking it roughly half way off shore is £1BN
Who would pick up that £1BN I don't know, or even the rest of the costs. I mean its of no benefit to this region, we already have generation in excess of capacity to export out of the region.

That's the same here. Have a look at this article - https://www.thisismoney.co.uk/money...reen-power-going-waste-sent-south-border.html

They are building a new subsea powerline to take a lot of this "wasted" energy from Scotland to England - https://www.theguardian.com/busines...able-power-scotland-england-clean-electricity It'll cost £2.5bn. Who will cover this? Scotland is one of the highest payers in SC yet produce a significant amount of energy which is transmitted South. Are Scottish householders paying for this infrastructure for the benefit of other regions?

To be clear - I have no issue with the transfer of electricity to other regions. It has to happen but, as MKW says - there is no transparency on who pays for the infrastructure that allows this. Are some regions reaping the benefits and not shouldering their fair share of the burden?

 

[200sols]

Yet they have the lowest Standing Charge (41p/day) by at least 10p/day (£37/year) and as much as 31p/day (£113/year) compared to other regions....

While the costs of works in a dense city may be more expensive they will serve a vastly denser population so the cost in theory is split between many more people and is thus lower per capita. We see the same in providing essential services, things are just more expensive per capita in less densely populated and more rural areas.

To be clear - I have no issue with the transfer of electricity to other regions. It has to happen but, as MKW says - there is no transparency on who pays for the infrastructure that allows this. Are some regions reaping the benefits and not shouldering their fair share of the burden?

I should think grid wide infrastructure is funded by however the national grid gets their funding for those projects, it would make sense to me for that portion of the charges to be a fixed amount regardless of region. Maybe it is, who knows. Transparency issue again.

Your Standing Charge for Elec is 20p/day?

It was 20p in 2022! Then it went up to like 40p in a month on my last Bulb bills. Now its 63p in this region for standard tariffs. How does ofgem explain it rising something like 8x above general inflation? (answer: They dont)

 

[200sols]

I see some more info here about EGL2 https://www.ofgem.gov.uk/publicatio...ives-provisional-ps34-billion-funding-package

And the funding line is there

The project is financed by the developers with costs later recouped through bills.

Sounds like the costs of these projects are not in bills yet.

 

[413x]

@Richie

I tell a lie. My standing is 24p and my unit is 21p for electric

 

[Mercenary Keyboard Warrior]

While the costs of works in a dense city may be more expensive they will serve a vastly denser population so the cost in theory is split between many more people and is thus lower per capita. We see the same in providing essential services, things are just more expensive per capita in less densely populated and more rural areas.

Typically the very dense are as I said more expensive per head than medium density towns etc
London will probably actually work out similar to pretty low density when you take into account historical costs. (IE some sites will sit on land worth a fortune at current value)

Its difficult since two projects in dense populations can look very very different, mainly down to if land exists already.
Eg the price of creating a substation where land needs to be procured in a densely populated city is a world apart from one where a site already exists and all your talking about its the direct infrastructure costs itself.

HS2 is a prime example of this in regards how much was spent securing the land needed, vs say had we have been able to rip up one of the existing rail lines and installed the HS2 there.

I expect like in many things there will be areas of high density populations where there is space to upgrade to support high electricity usage and other areas where there simple isn't and they will need to either procure space or look at other options (like larger substations further out)

Really these sorts of thing tend to have a cost per head much like an inverted bell curve with both the extremes being expensive per head and the middle ground where the land is relatively cheap and the economies of scale already reached being the low cost per head.

It should be recognised that all the DNOs have a variety of high and low density its just that some lean more to one extreme than the other.

Things like meters, the meter costs the same, but the cost of a meter installer will be more in London than the midlands.