Solar - Octopus Flux vs Agile vs Tracker?

matt_drummer

waqasahmed said:

BTW how come you're not using Octopus cosy instead, given you have a heat pump

Or are you basically using flux for half the year and cosy for the other half? 

I don't actually have the heat pump installed yet, it's coming soon.

I am on a fix until October this year, I'll decide what to do then.

anon_ymous

Alnat1 said:

It's the Octopus Watch app which costs £1.99 and is definitely worth it.

Ahh I thought it was that but it looked different. I've already got that on android 

[Deleted User]

waqasahmed said:

Alnat1 said:

It's the Octopus Watch app which costs £1.99 and is definitely worth it.

Ahh I thought it was that but it looked different. I've already got that on android 

Can you use the app without an account to check out Agile rates in advance of signing up to Octopus?

[Deleted User]

[Deleted User] said:

waqasahmed said:

Alnat1 said:

It's the Octopus Watch app which costs £1.99 and is definitely worth it.

Ahh I thought it was that but it looked different. I've already got that on android 

Can you use the app without an account to check out Agile rates in advance of signing up to Octopus?

Agile rates for the following day are published at about 4pm.

You can see historical data on this website:

https://energy-stats.uk/dashboards/

Today’s rates for my region - this assumes a 35p/kWh cap which is now £1/kWh.

anon_ymous

[Deleted User] said:

[Deleted User] said:

waqasahmed said:

Alnat1 said:

It's the Octopus Watch app which costs £1.99 and is definitely worth it.

Ahh I thought it was that but it looked different. I've already got that on android 

Can you use the app without an account to check out Agile rates in advance of signing up to Octopus?

Agile rates for the following day are published at about 4pm.

You can see historical data on this website:

https://energy-stats.uk/dashboards/

Today’s rates for my region - this assumes a 35p/kWh cap which is now £1/kWh.

You can also go to https://agileprices.co.uk/ and they have historical as well as current figures

Also fwiw, I'm on tracker because my battery capacity isn't exactly big. I appreciate that it's a difficult tariff to get onto however. I do find that looking at agile prices the day ahead (as of 4pm), does help me guesstimate what the price of electricity will be for the tracker 

anon_ymous

matt_drummer said:

waqasahmed said:

BTW how come you're not using Octopus cosy instead, given you have a heat pump

Or are you basically using flux for half the year and cosy for the other half? 

I don't actually have the heat pump installed yet, it's coming soon.

I am on a fix until October this year, I'll decide what to do then.

Fair. I aim to seriously insulate my house before getting air to air heat pumps (AC)

Cosy does allow you to import at the same price as flux, albeit at different times, but you can do that twice a day. 

Then you can still export out using agile Octopus. I thought that might be decent if you've got the battery capacity that you do. Realistically, I'm looking to get my house super air tight, so at least under 4200 kWh of gas in the year. That then means I'd only need a tiny bit more battery capacity when going to fully electric tbf 

matt_drummer

waqasahmed said:

matt_drummer said:

waqasahmed said:

BTW how come you're not using Octopus cosy instead, given you have a heat pump

Or are you basically using flux for half the year and cosy for the other half? 

I don't actually have the heat pump installed yet, it's coming soon.

I am on a fix until October this year, I'll decide what to do then.

Fair. I aim to seriously insulate my house before getting air to air heat pumps (AC)

Cosy does allow you to import at the same price as flux, albeit at different times, but you can do that twice a day. 

Then you can still export out using agile Octopus. I thought that might be decent if you've got the battery capacity that you do. Realistically, I'm looking to get my house super air tight, so at least under 4200 kWh of gas in the year. That then means I'd only need a tiny bit more battery capacity when going to fully electric tbf 

What is is the import price?

I am currently on E7 and paying 15.11p per Kwh between 00.00 and 07.00.

As my Givenergy system can only charge at 3Kwh I want as long as possible at a lower rate in the winter.

I don't expect to import any electricity now until some point in December.

I have heard that Givenergy are working on being able to have two ac battery chargers, I would go for that as it would mean I would be able to charge and discharge at twice the rate I can now. It would also mean other tariffs might be better for me than E7.

anon_ymous

matt_drummer said:

waqasahmed said:

matt_drummer said:

waqasahmed said:

BTW how come you're not using Octopus cosy instead, given you have a heat pump

Or are you basically using flux for half the year and cosy for the other half? 

I don't actually have the heat pump installed yet, it's coming soon.

I am on a fix until October this year, I'll decide what to do then.

Fair. I aim to seriously insulate my house before getting air to air heat pumps (AC)

Cosy does allow you to import at the same price as flux, albeit at different times, but you can do that twice a day. 

Then you can still export out using agile Octopus. I thought that might be decent if you've got the battery capacity that you do. Realistically, I'm looking to get my house super air tight, so at least under 4200 kWh of gas in the year. That then means I'd only need a tiny bit more battery capacity when going to fully electric tbf 

What is is the import price?

I am currently on E7 and paying 15.11p per Kwh between 00.00 and 07.00.

As my Givenergy system can only charge at 3Kwh I want as long as possible at a lower rate in the winter.

I don't expect to import any electricity now until some point in December.

I have heard that Givenergy are working on being able to have two ac battery chargers, I would go for that as it would mean I would be able to charge and discharge at twice the rate I can now. It would also mean other tariffs might be better for me than E7.

Oh wow. That's actually a lot better than what I'm paying. The current tracker price is 21.26p/kWh

E7 seems really good then, but also again realistically, I need more battery capacity to use it properly 

matt_drummer

I found that a much bigger battery capacity than you think is needed to run entirely off solar for as much of the year as possible.

Some day are sunnier than I expect and have the extra capacity means that I have room to store it for the next day that isn't very sunny at all.

I would expect to average 25 to 30 Kwh per day in December and January, some days will be worse and I would have to accept some peak rate import.

I predict that my average solar generation in December will be around 8Kwh per day.

So, in December I will need to buy 22 Kwh a day on average, I can do that on E7 so I should avoid the peak rate, having the battery capacity makes this possible.

Also, if my heat pump is running 24 hours a day, 7 hours of that will be powered from the grid in the E7 window, so I only need enough battery to power the heat pump and the house for 17 hours.

It should work on most days.

I am also hoping that we will have savings sessions again this year, that will also help.

matt_drummer

waqasahmed said:

Oh wow. That's actually a lot better than what I'm paying. The current tracker price is 21.26p/kWh

E7 seems really good then, but also again realistically, I need more battery capacity to use it properly 

My tariff is from September 2021 when we moved to this house.

27.71p day, 15.11p night and 5.83p for gas with standing charges for both (combined that is) of 50.20p a day.

It seemed a bit expensive at the time, but I thought it would probably work out over the two years so stuck with it, I'm glad I did.

I didn't choose the tariff, it was what Octopus put me on, and I have no idea why the house was on E7, it really shouldn't have been as we weren't using enough at night to justify it.