How was your month?

Raxiel

For electricity we maintained our recent trend of 40% below the previous year. Solar generation was a real yo-yo of good and bad days, but ended up with just 8kWh of Net Import (abet with a Net cost of about £44 - 164 in 156 out)

The cold snap meant we only managed parity with last year for the first couple of weeks, but as the temperature rose back to more typical levels we were able to end the month 20% below March 2022. Had hoped to get it under a MWh, but went slightly over.

BUFF

March 23
Electricity 131 kWh (+22%, increase due to new use of dehumidifier this year c/w slight decrease in electricity from CH pump due to less use)
Gas          460 kWh (-44%)

March 22
Electricity 107 kWh
Gas          819 kWh

MuckChucker

Very happy with April '23. Although a few very cold days, I think it was milder here in Essex than a lot of other parts of the country.



We were away for the guts of a week around easter which helped.
April '22 was:
Elec 370
Gas 325

Raxiel

Just under £100 for the month.

£77 was gas consumption and SC. We still managed a reduction compared to '22 but lower temperatures made it proportionally smaller than previous months at 76% of last year.

Electricity was good. Imported 46% of last year and exported almost twice as much as that.

Just over £21. Consumption was about £41 but export adds up to about £35, net cost was six or seven quid plus almost three times as much in SC.

That's consumption, in terms of cost, last year's usage on last year's tariff was £155 with £69 for gas and £87 for electricity.

Last years usage at current prices would have been £204

So a saving despite the hikes, which contributes towards paying back all the money spent on energy efficiency last year.

Withdrew £400 credit from our Octopus Energy account this month as well, it had built up quite a lot due to the recommended DD not reflecting our reduced usage. Very easy to do, a couple of clicks to arrange and then it was in my account a couple of days later.

MuckChucker

Raxiel said:

Just under £100 for the month.

£77 was gas consumption and SC. We still managed a reduction compared to '22 but lower temperatures made it proportionally smaller than previous months at 76% of last year.

Electricity was good. Imported 46% of last year and exported almost twice as much as that.

Just over £21. Consumption was about £41 but export adds up to about £35, net cost was six or seven quid plus almost three times as much in SC.

That's consumption, in terms of cost, last year's usage on last year's tariff was £155 with £69 for gas and £87 for electricity.

Last years usage at current prices would have been £204

So a saving despite the hikes, which contributes towards paying back all the money spent on energy efficiency last year.

Withdrew £400 credit from our Octopus Energy account this month as well, it had built up quite a lot due to the recommended DD not reflecting our reduced usage. Very easy to do, a couple of clicks to arrange and then it was in my account a couple of days later.

Got £270 back from BG myself, it did require a phone call but almost zero time waiting on hold which was a complete surprise. I got my DD reduced to much closer to my estimated figure too but still £10pm too high. I'll be looking at moving to Octopus this month, was going to do it last week but too close to a BG DD payment and I just know they'd find some way of messing it up.

EssexHebridean

I'm waiting for the April bill to land from Octopus but all in all I'm not execting it to be too bad. Heating was switched off from middle of the month and we just used the "boost" element of the hallway heater for a couple of odd hours after that when it had got quite chilly. Thanks to the £66/£67 payments and a couple of £50 referral bonuses on top of our monthly DDs though we managed to go through from joining Octopus in October to now without ever dipping out of credit so I'm pleased with that. Now the target of building up additional credit through the summer months begins! 

Raxiel

I've not had my bill from Octopus yet, that typically comes around the 9th. There have been a few delays this year, hopefully its fixed now.

I have a spreadsheet that takes the total import/export and gas readings for the month to date in the App, and then extrapolates them to the full month, then multiplies by the tariff. Obviously on the last day there's no extrapolation, although the gas uses an assumed CV so the actuall bill might be a little different, but unlikely to add up to much.

Other than a spike during the cold week in early April, the projected total was never more than £3 out, so its seems reasonably accurate.

Just for fun, as there's nowhere near enough data yet, I've put in the figures for the first of May in and extrapolated that out to the 31st.

It predicts a total of £35, but yesterday was particuarly low usage even for us so I think it's a bit optimistic.

Using the PV-GIS solar prediction for my setup (which is more) and the typical daily import we saw in April, (also more) Import+SC and export pretty much cancel, leaving just the Gas at £45.

Hopefully things warm up so I'm going to hedge my bets and predict £40 for our May bill, I'll be back in June to see how close I was.

Raxiel

Well, one month later, and both the day 1 prediction and my own prediction were off. I was the furthest out.

Extrapolating May 1st came to £35 for the combined gas and electric, but after a bumper amount of sun, the final total was £25.12.

Or at least it would have been, that's the price with the SVT for import and Outgoing Octopus for export.

What actually happened was that I switched the electric (in and out) to Octopus Flux on the third of may.

Calculating flux costs are a bit more complicated as it requires downloading the smart meter data from Octopus and running it through Excel, but having done so, my Actual final total for may was £3.36

That's 99.52kWh of import (33% of last May), 342.65kWh of export (117% of predicted), and 202.7kWh of gas (52% of last may).

Next month, I expect Octopus will be paying me.

MuckChucker

Not a normal month as we're away (currently posting from my mallorcan siesta bed )

Elec 215
Gas 60

I swapped to Octopus a couple of weeks ago and they've set my DD at exactly what I want/calculated (screw you BG!) and I see with the new rates announced we'll be down to approx £130 per month, which will be very welcome.

scobie

Electricity 83kwh
Gas 16kwh

Lovely jubbly.