Energy Prices (Strictly NO referrals!)

jonneymendoza said:
how can we when every new tech that comes out is more power hungry then ever?

What about people who wfh?

What about businesses who own shops and use up a lot of energy to power there fridges etc?
Click to expand...

All sorts of examples. If we talk about home, optimising your heating system would be a major one.

More widely, we have huge amounts of energy being wasted. We have buildings that have been designed and installed using double the energy. We have poorly operated heat plant. We have wasteful ventilation systems. We have heat pumps running at excessively high flow temperatures. There’s a huge amount to be done as a nation which will save us collectively a lot more money than nuclear plants ever will.

And guess what. If you reduce our energy consumption, we may only need 5 nuclear power plants instead of 10. That’s a lot of money saved through simple measures.
 
Pawnless Endgame said:
Are energy prices starting to tail off?

I'm with Scottish Power, £80/month dual-fuel fixed until the end of May. A few months ago, I was quoted £260/month if I was to fix again after May. So more than 3 times of £80. I checked the quote again more recently and it has dropped to £215/month. When I checked again this week, it has dropped further to £195/month. £195 is still extortionate compared to £80 but is this a sign of things easing off? I think the general advice on the internet is still to let the fix rate expire then move onto the variable rate.
Click to expand...

It maybe that the energy suppliers see a peak now. And that they are predicting prices will fall in 2023.
 
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
Not really at least for the financial rules they need to comply with (UK Law), within a group its called transfer pricing and you can charge internal companies what you want, its certainly not insider/cartelish behaviour from a finance perspective.
Click to expand...
Considering that the last men standing are those utility suppliers in companies with generation capability, and that the utilities have not made big profits,
seems likely that those utilities named their own energy price with their other half ... perhaps it's self evident that the open market strategy failed

Digging - it's interesting that Centrica hedges their electricity needs by a 20% interest in the EDF reactor generation ..
https://utilityweek.co.uk/centrica-reconsidering-sale-of-nuclear-stake/ - a dividend.
 
Pawnless Endgame said:
Are energy prices starting to tail off?

I'm with Scottish Power, £80/month dual-fuel fixed until the end of May. A few months ago, I was quoted £260/month if I was to fix again after May. So more than 3 times of £80. I checked the quote again more recently and it has dropped to £215/month. When I checked again this week, it has dropped further to £195/month. £195 is still extortionate compared to £80 but is this a sign of things easing off? I think the general advice on the internet is still to let the fix rate expire then move onto the variable rate.
Click to expand...

Have you given meter readings between each of the decreases which indicate to the algorithm your annual usage dropping thereby reducing payments?
 
jpaul said:
Considering that the last men standing are those utility suppliers in companies with generation capability, and that the utilities have not made big profits,
seems likely that those utilities named their own energy price with their other half ... perhaps it's self evident that the open market strategy failed

Digging - it's interesting that Centrica hedges their electricity needs by a 20% interest in the EDF reactor generation ..
https://utilityweek.co.uk/centrica-reconsidering-sale-of-nuclear-stake/ - a dividend.
Click to expand...

Well no because its not just them, and its no surprise that the largest and oldest companies are more able to stand up to a shock than smaller newer ones.
If you were going to setup a new energy company tomorrow would you build the generation to support 1 million customers before you launched, or launch and buy spot energy and maybe in the future invest in generation? ;)

Smaller newer ones will often (in all industries not just power) run at a loss at the start as they are generally using investor finance to try to build a company.
Even companies that launch without investor capital often hit a point fairly soon if successful where they need cash to grow, its the principle of dragons den really, its basically why venture capital exists.

The EDF position is somewhat legacy I would propose. Getting any of these companies to invest in nuclear in the UK has been nigh on impossible, views changing recently with seeming government support, but lets see if that holds firm.
The government have to underwrite the per unit costs since they are above the blended market cost, and as such taxpayers are having to fund these inefficient generation facilities.
I get that its not just unit costs but also many other factors, dependability, reliability, up time % etc that are just as key as the simple unit costs.
 
Richie said:
Have you given meter readings between each of the decreases which indicate to the algorithm your annual usage dropping thereby reducing payments?
Click to expand...

I have a smart meter, so it "phones home" to Scottish Power HQ every hour. On the Scottish Power's web site though, I keep getting a pop-up saying that I can change the hourly meter readings to every half hour. Not sure what different that would make though.
 
I thought the 30minute - isn't it 30s, was to give permission to have more detailed anonymised data in the cloud for permitted 3rd party research authorities,
until we have the next generation of apps where we could access that historic data at home


Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
Well no because its not just them, and its no surprise that the largest and oldest companies are more able to stand up to a shock than smaller newer ones.
....
Click to expand...


Ok a few outliers but the survivors have access to generation , Bulb had been in the market long enough to be beyond startup point, too.
The low profits, across the utlity board, may be due to the responsibility of installing 'smart' meters,maybe they will pay their way.

The older edf nuclear inventory appeared to have pre-dated CFD's , not sure how they were funded ... or the decommisionng finances,
but are maybe more lucrative than CFD's ; I don't know if france has cfd's, but as discussed they give socialisation of losses, profits to shareholders.
 
jpaul said:
I thought the 30minute - isn't it 30s, was to give permission to have more detailed anonymised data in the cloud for permitted 3rd party research authorities,
until we have the next generation of apps where we could access that historic data at home





Ok a few outliers but the survivors have access to generation , Bulb had been in the market long enough to be beyond startup point, too.
The low profits, across the utlity board, may be due to the responsibility of installing 'smart' meters,maybe they will pay their way.

The older edf nuclear inventory appeared to have pre-dated CFD's , not sure how they were funded ... or the decommisionng finances,
but are maybe more lucrative than CFD's ; I don't know if france has cfd's, but as discussed they give socialisation of losses, profits to shareholders.
Click to expand...
When Brown pushed through the sale of BNFL to EDF for his cut they also committed the Government to picking up the decommissioning costs so a superb subsidy of sorts. He also pushed through the sale of Westinghouse to a Japanese company. Imagine how useful owning a company with an up to date PWR design would be right now.
 
Well I've been "battening down the hatches" for several months now as well as canceling things that cost money and are not really necessary and we are being told that things will get much worse and energy unit prices will increase much further than even predicted.

I've got to a point where I no longer care. Basically I have no hatches left to batten down and it will just be what it is. I literally cannot do any more than that.

We live in a really messed up time right now and there is no let off at all and things actually are getting worse in many many different respects. If we keep going like this I expect riots within a 2 year period.
 
Mercenary Keyboard Warrior said:
Not really a fair comparison you have to look at energy/work completed which for most goods improves constantly
eg a fridge you would look at cooling/energy input.
If new fridge uses 10kwh per week and old fridge used 15kwh per week then as long as they both cooled adequately great news.

GPUs do this as well generally, take an old 1080 and a new 3080 and the 3080 will produce the same output using less energy (typically)
Click to expand...
Isn't Intel the same chip just clocked higher each year anyway :cry:.
 
Pawnless Endgame said:
I have a smart meter, so it "phones home" to Scottish Power HQ every hour. On the Scottish Power's web site though, I keep getting a pop-up saying that I can change the hourly meter readings to every half hour. Not sure what different that would make though.
Click to expand...
I hear you can even change it to daily or weekly. Why does it want to phone home so often? Once a month should be fine? But maybe I am missing something?
 
30mins is still pretty useless if you want to track device energy, like my hob/oven, and .. take back control, like the smart meter adds promise
I thought the likes of octopus (maybe you have to email them) were already offering less than a minute option which Consumer Access Devices can exploit


jpaul said:
Getting data on the washing machines/appliances power consumption is still a pain with limited data from smart meters/IHD ... I need a Consumer Access Device

Consumer Access Devices | Real-Time Energy Data |Chameleon Technology

A Consumer Access Device (CAD) securely accesses real-time smart meter data & sends that data to a cloud service, unlocking key benefits for consumers.
chameleontechnology.co.uk chameleontechnology.co.uk

Access to smart metering data without a CAD is limited. Energy suppliers and other parties may allow consumers to opt into half hourly data collection. This may be viewed using an online portal, where the consumer must log in to the supplier’s website to view data. This is generally limited and there is no option to download the data. This has recently been supplemented by apps, some of which already make use of CAD functionality, that allow the viewing of ‘live data’.

However, these solutions have several disadvantages, as half-hourly readings: • May not offer the same resolution as provided by a CAD solution, which can offer reads between <10 seconds and 15 minutes • May not allow third parties to integrate with the data • May not allow for local storage of data or portability of data when changing supplier • May not allow for easy analysis of the data by the consumer.
Click to expand...
 
jpaul said:
30mins is still pretty useless if you want to track device energy, like my hob/oven, and .. take back control, like the smart meter adds promise
I thought the likes of octopus (maybe you have to email them) were already offering less than a minute option which Consumer Access Devices can exploit
Click to expand...
Agreed but the grid can't react that quickly anyway, so it is looking for trends across a time sample that it can actually do something with (I guess).
 
Simon said:
What we need is investment in power generation. Hand outs won’t solve the problem

Even £20billion wouldn’t cover the average increase that’s coming to 30m houses
Click to expand...
Exactly - the potential windfall tax will maybe raise about £7bn. People will no doubt be moaning about how little financial help their household receives from this.
As £7bn divided by 25 million households is only £250 each, or £21 a month.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top Bottom