Lowest night time rates to charge a battery, if you do not have an EV ?

michaels

So at night we might have a 3kw immersion, 5kw car charger, 2.5kw granny charger, 2kw(?) dishwasher, 2kw (?) washing machine. 5kw heat pump (or 3 2kw room heaters) = 20.5A

Obviously the washing machine and dishwasher heater don't run for long but we are possibly using a fair chunk of what is available to our street...and if DW comes home a bit the worse for wear and decides to use the induction hob then we might be warming the 100A fuse as well....

JSHarris

michaels said:

So at night we might have a 3kw immersion, 5kw car charger, 2.5kw granny charger, 2kw(?) dishwasher, 2kw (?) washing machine. 5kw heat pump (or 3 2kw room heaters) = 20.5A

Obviously the washing machine and dishwasher heater don't run for long but we are possibly using a fair chunk of what is available to our street...and if DW comes home a bit the worse for wear and decides to use the induction hob then we might be warming the 100A fuse as well....

Most single phase charge points can supply 32A to the car onboard charger.  A 3kW immersion is about 13A.  A 5kW output heat pump is probably drawing about 6 or 7A.  The dishwasher and washing machine are, as you say, only on for a short time and in practice can be ignored, as they only draw full power for a very short time, maybe 5 minutes or so.  Short duration overloads are not an issue for the LV network as it takes time to heat up transformers and distribution cables.

The concern that is being expressed by DNOs and the grid, and what has driven the smart charging law and to some extent the smart metering programme, is that we are shifting to a usage pattern where homes will draw a lot of power for prolonged periods of time.  There's a need to phase these loads so they aren't all on at the same time (hence the reason that smart chargers can be remotely controlled, as can smart meters).  If push comes to shove car charging can be centrally reduced in an area, via the smart control.  In a really dire situation smart meters can turn off power to homes to avoid a gross overload (or allow graceful recovery from a major outage).

1961Nick

QrizB said:

JSHarris said:

1961Nick said:

On the rare occasion that my car needs more charge than the 6 hour Intelligent Octopus can deliver, the off peak period starts earlier to ensure the target charge is met. So far I've never paid peak rate to charge even if I've needed 70kWh.

If, as happened recently, I arrive home with only 15% charge remaining (yes, I know, I was cutting it a bit close!) then a 6 hour charge is only going to get my car up to 65%.

But 1961Nick specifically states that, under those conditions, Intelligent Octopus will give him more than 6 hours at the cheaper rate.

A friend has a looped supply so his car charger is limited to 3.6kWh & that's what he put on his Intelligent Octopus application. Whenever he plugs in, the charging schedule is calculated using 3.6kWh & he often gets 12+ hours a day off-peak. Since he works from home, it's been very advantageous.

greyteam1959

OP
Are you absolutely sure that you can't get a smart meter ?
You say you are in a mobile dead spot but so am I.
No mobile signal with any provider.
My gas & electric smart meters work very well.
You do know that smart meters do not  need a mobile phone signal ?

michaels

greyteam1959 said:

OP
Are you absolutely sure that you can't get a smart meter ?
You say you are in a mobile dead spot but so am I.
No mobile signal with any provider.
My gas & electric smart meters work very well.
You do know that smart meters do not  need a mobile phone signal ?

Generally the smart meter network coincides with the o2 network.

JSHarris

greyteam1959 said:

OP
Are you absolutely sure that you can't get a smart meter ?
You say you are in a mobile dead spot but so am I.
No mobile signal with any provider.
My gas & electric smart meters work very well.
You do know that smart meters do not  need a mobile phone signal ?

In the South of the UK smart meters need a mobile signal.  In the North they don't.  There are two smart meter networks.  The North uses the Arqiva low frequency network (433MHz I believe) that is dedicated to smart meter data and control.  The South uses the mobile phone network (I believe 2G at 800MHz, but I may be mistaken).

The reason for this was that the topology of the North of the UK tends to be less favourable for high frequency mobile network propagation, particularly in rural areas.  The lower frequencies used by Arqiva are much better at "terrain following" and allow reception in valleys a lot better than the higher frequencies used by the mobile network.

Bone of contention for me, as I'm in the South and live at the bottom of a steep sided valley.  Most villages around here are the same, at the bottom of valleys.  Very few have any mobile reception as the mobile service providers put masts in towns and cities and along main roads.  They don't bother putting masts near small villages as there aren't enough customers to cover the cost.  We've been trying to get a community-funded "microcell" installed, but it would cost each of us around £3k initially, plus around £100/month to run, so it's a bit of a non-starter.

QrizB

michaels said:

greyteam1959 said:

OP
Are you absolutely sure that you can't get a smart meter ?
You say you are in a mobile dead spot but so am I.
No mobile signal with any provider.
My gas & electric smart meters work very well.
You do know that smart meters do not  need a mobile phone signal ?

Generally the smart meter network coincides with the o2 network.

... in the south of GB, at least.

In the north it has a dedicated Arqiva radio network.