Octopus Energy tariffs??

k6chris

We now have solar panels and a battery, and looking at a tariff that will allow us to "sell" excess energy to our provider, and top up our battery over winder with lower price electricity.  Having been on the Octopus website I am completely confused about which tariff does this??  Help!

powerful_Rogue

k6chris said:

We now have solar panels and a battery, and looking at a tariff that will allow us to "sell" excess energy to our provider, and top up our battery over winder with lower price electricity.  Having been on the Octopus website I am completely confused about which tariff does this??  Help!

Octopus Flux is a good tariff, but really only suitable for the summer.

If you have an electric vehicle, Octopus Go or Intelligent Octopus will be ideal.

Failing that, Economy 7 or some people talk about Octopus Agile if you're happy to keep checking the prices as the change every 30 minutes.

Reed_Richards

I agree that Octopus has a confusing multiplicity of tariffs.  But the correct answer for you will probably depend on how much electricity you use in winter; do you use electricity to heat your house or your hot water?  Or cook with electricity in the early evening?

k6chris

Reed_Richards said:

I agree that Octopus has a confusing multiplicity of tariffs.  But the correct answer for you will probably depend on how much electricity you use in winter; do you use electricity to heat your house or your hot water?  Or cook with electricity in the early evening?

We heat water / home using gas, but yes cook on electric early evening. 

Magnitio

k6chris said:

We now have solar panels and a battery, and looking at a tariff that will allow us to "sell" excess energy to our provider, and top up our battery over winder with lower price electricity.  Having been on the Octopus website I am completely confused about which tariff does this??  Help!

It does depend a lot on your usage, battery size and solar generation. Also on whether you want a tariff that is the same every day, or like to gamble a bit and be on a tariff that changes every half hour. For example, the Agile tariff had an hour of negative rates today when you would have been paid to charge your battery, but on a dull, windless day in winter, it can be expensive. @Alnat1 has recent experience of both Flux and Agile, so may be able to provide input.

jneill

I've just combined the main import and export tariffs into a couple of charts (excluding Agile, obv).

Alnat1

Flux worked great for me over summer, decent prices for export which means I've built up some credit to get me though the next few months. In winter there are quite a few days when you won't even generate 1kWh so the import price is what you need to focus on. The import prices on Flux were too high and our battery is only small so I switched last week to Agile and Fixed Outgoing (15p) for the winter months (was on these tariffs last winter too).

When the wind is blowing, Agile has plenty of cheap slots overnight and early afternoon so I simply top up the battery whenever costs are low. You do have to be prepared for some calm spells with no sun, when prices will be much higher, it's a very weather dependent tariff which needs close monitoring, so not for everyone.

If you have the time and interest in fiddling about with settings, Agile can save you quite a bit (I actually find it fun) but if you're looking for a tariff where you can set battery charging times and forget about it until next spring, then you probably need something like E7.

ispookie666

I'm on E7 along with SEG, I do need at least 6 hrs to charge my batteries to full in winter due to the limitations of the inverter. 

The current night rate is approximately 1p above SEG. 

I also have no interest in energy arbitrage - keep it simple and setup automation using Home assistant and forget(was what I was after). 

Luke80

jneill said:

I've just combined the main import and export tariffs into a couple of charts (excluding Agile, obv).

From those graphs, why would anyone go with Go or E7 vs Intelligent? The latter seems to have a longer 'offpeak' period than Go and a lower import rates vs E7 as well.

Sorry to hijack this thread but I had a new Solar and 4.8kW battery system installed in late June so have been on Flux but looking to switch for Autumn/winter and would appreciate some advice.

Estimated consumption is around 5900kWh but this is heavily biased to the winter as we have outdoor enclosures for animals with electric heaters from Nov to March (ish), going overnight only to start but then 24/7 for a several months. Our main heating is gas. We also have a plug-in hybrid (10.8kW usable battery) which is charged twice a week throughout the year - the 2-5am flux rate was great for this.

pensionpawn

Does anyone know if Octopus has published the new electricity rates from 1st Oct? I haven't received any information yet. I'm pushing on with Flux until at least GMT to see what happens, with fixed export and variable import being my potential bolt holes if my deficit looks like going exponential from mid November. I have 4kWs facing due east and 3.12 kWs facing due west, so I can rinse the maximum out of the day at the sacrifice of a higher midday peak. Are you planning on updating / publishing your graphs with the new rates, the overlay is very helpful.

Boffinboy24

The standard variable rates are published here: https://octopus.energy/blog/energy-price-cap-oct-2023/ You can work out Cosy from this as it’s a fixed % discount / increase for the low and high rates. Others are not published yet, I don’t think