New Octopus tariff for solar and battery users - Octopus Flux

powerful_Rogue

ABrass said:

As long as you import more during the flux period than you use in the peak time you're better off. If you have a surplus in the peak period then you're quids in. If you have a battery and can reserve the power for the peak period then it's even better.

That will suit me down to ground.

Exactly. I was thinking of topping the batteries up to 100% during the flux period, then you're not far off exporting straight away when the sun comes up and making a little bit of money.

Alnat1

I somehow can't see Flux as so clear cut for me right now, especially as the weather picks up into summer.

Firstly I'd lose the Agile 21p SC that I've got until July, 45p is a big hike. I've only got a 4.8kw battery so not a lot to play import/export games with. Also have to consider the round trip losses if I imported at 20.4p. Most fair days during BST the battery is full by midday and I'm exporting until sundown with my SW facing panels. The battery generally will have enough to power the load until generation picks up next day. If the weather has a poor run I've a chance to pick up cheap slots on Agile overnight. Agile Outgoing could be good or poor rates though.....

Am I talking myself out of something better? Is Flux a winter tariff for me?

Magnitio

Alnat1 said:

I somehow can't see Flux as so clear cut for me right now, especially as the weather picks up into summer.

Firstly I'd lose the Agile 21p SC that I've got until July, 45p is a big hike. I've only got a 4.8kw battery so not a lot to play import/export games with. Also have to consider the round trip losses if I imported at 20.4p. Most fair days during BST the battery is full by midday and I'm exporting until sundown with my SW facing panels. The battery generally will have enough to power the load until generation picks up next day. If the weather has a poor run I've a chance to pick up cheap slots on Agile overnight. Agile Outgoing could be good or poor rates though.....

Am I talking myself out of something better? Is Flux a winter tariff for me?

Just downloaded my data for the past 5 months and applied these rates. I would have been £139 worse off on the new tariff. However, I would have made significant changes to when I bought and sold based on the revised rates. Reworking purchases to make full use of the cheap rate, I still end up £61 worse off (£37 of which is the standing charge). I may also have made some slight adjustments to when I sold electricity, but that would have been trivial.

As a set-up-and-forget tariff, I think it would suit me, but I would miss those days when you can buy super-cheap (or negative) electricity or sell at some very high prices. If the decision was based on the past few weeks, I would probably switch as Agile hasn't been great.

Alnat1

Thanks for that Magnitio, I think you've confirmed with real maths and data what I suspected but don't have the know how to easily prove for myself.

I also enjoy the daily check to see if there's any cheap slots, Flux would be too predictable and not as much fun. I'll think again about tariffs in June when I can see where prices are going

EcoScruples

Had my eyebrows raised in interest, currently on a fixed rate for incoming and agile for outgoing so this does look tempting now I have control of my battery.
I guess the bit that really makes the savings/money back is if I can get the export right at peak time but have enough left to get through until 2am when the battery will charge again.
Interesting option.

JKenH

Flux certainly looks appealing if you have both solar and batteries. If you have solar panels and an EV you are going to have to do a lot of sums. 

If you were on Octopus Go or intelligent Octopus then you could charge your car at 10/12p and still receive deemed export at an effective rate of 3p per kWh generated. Some people also shift some of their other usage on to the cheaper night time rate. 

Being on Go (or a standard tariff for that matter) with deemed export you could charge your car to your heart’s content when the sun was shining and it wasn’t costing you anything. 

On Flux, plug in when the sun is shining and you are forgoing export of 23p so you are effectively paying 23p/kWh to charge your car. You can plug in for 3 hours from 2am to 5am and pay 20p but charging day or night you have to bear in mind you have also lost the 3p deemed export so really charging the car is costing 23 or 26p/kWh compared to 10/12p on Intelligent/Go.

You do of course lose 3p deemed export on all your generation which in my case is around £162, not just for charging your car. The effective rate of export for those of us with legacy FiT systems is therefore 20p not 23p.

If you don’t have a domestic battery then you are also paying more for cooking the evening meal than on Go or a standard tariff and of course if you do have batteries the advantages of time shifting diminish as the window is shorter and the buy in rate higher so there are less opportunities for arbitrage.

mickyduck55

I have solar and batteries, this may work using summer generation but certainly in my case not over winter

yp70479

I think this could be good for late spring through to early autumn, but my concern is the short charge period. My battery is mounted outside and in winter I do a long slow charge over the whole of the E7 period to keep the battery warm and within it's operating range for charging. Those with bigger batteries or plants may find it difficult to fully charge everything in the time frame too. But when there is plenty of sunshine it looks like a winner. Could be E7 and Agile Export (half hourly) in the winter and Flux in the summer?

waqasahmed

Surely agile might still win? 

Oscarmax

The majority of our import is off peak, for us a 3 hour period is not a problem our Solax 5.8kWh battery is internally stored and Mitsubishi Outlander PHEV only requires 9.6kWh both charging up at 3.6kWh.