Octopus Free Power Hours

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nowty
Posts: 6480
Joined: Mon May 31, 2021 2:36 pm
Location: South Coast

Re: Octopus Free Power Hours

#261

Post by nowty »

SimonSays wrote: Thu Jun 12, 2025 8:56 pm Well, someone from Octopus replied. Not sure that I'm "buying" their explanation though.
I think a summary of their reply is "tough". :?
19.6kW PV > 117MWh generated
Ripple 6.6kW Wind + 4.5kW PV > 34MWh generated
7 Other RE Coop's
105kWh EV storage
90kWh Home battery storage
40kWh Thermal storage
GSHP + A2A HP's
Rain water use > 530 m3
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Stinsy
Posts: 3749
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2021 1:09 pm

Re: Octopus Free Power Hours

#262

Post by Stinsy »

The screw really is turning against us. On a number of fronts!

Saving sessions are now a joke, all that effort was fun when you got a few pounds, but now it is a few pence. What’s the point? The power hours were supposed to be a way to deal with excess renewable generation, instead of paying Dale Vince billions to turn off his wind turbines, they incentivise consumers to use it. Brilliant idea IMO. And us battery-owners are best placed to do so. But no, it is now “EV charging only”.
12x 340W JA Solar panels (4.08kWp)
3x 380W JA Solar panels (1.14kWp)
6x 2.4kWh Pylontech batteries (14.4kWh)
LuxPower inverter/charger

(Artist formally known as ******, well it should be obvious enough to those for whom such things are important.)
Yuff
Posts: 619
Joined: Sat Dec 31, 2022 1:18 pm
Location: East Midlands

Re: Octopus Free Power Hours

#263

Post by Yuff »

Stinsy wrote: Fri Jun 13, 2025 6:28 am The screw really is turning against us. On a number of fronts!

Saving sessions are now a joke, all that effort was fun when you got a few pounds, but now it is a few pence. What’s the point? The power hours were supposed to be a way to deal with excess renewable generation, instead of paying Dale Vince billions to turn off his wind turbines, they incentivise consumers to use it. Brilliant idea IMO. And us battery-owners are best placed to do so. But no, it is now “EV charging only”.
I think there needs to be a balance between paying customers ie us and turbine owners/gas power stations.
2 years ago some of us were earning £100 in a 1 1/2 hour saving session, now it’s £1, whereas the big power stations are getting £12m for a 3 hour window……it just doesn’t seem right plus where is our incentive to inconvenience ourselves to help the grid out in an emergency.
A lot of customers are being stitched up by the greed of big companies and our government continues to let this happen. We know something could be done but they choose not to.
When I look at our savings, not taking into the capex spent etc, we are saving a lot on home energy use and car usage mainly because I find it interesting and it keeps me out of mischief. But there us a bit of inconvenience having electric cars when using public chargers, which I try to avoid like the plague, although the Tesla free 1 year charging us handy on the model Y.
14 kW Mitsubishi Ecodan ASHP
12 x 460w Solar panels
9.5kWh GivEnergy
Batteries x 2
EVs x 4 240 kWh Batteries
Ripple 5.8 kW PV 0.547 kW Whitelaw Brae
AE-NMidlands
Posts: 2319
Joined: Wed Jun 02, 2021 6:10 pm

Re: Octopus Free Power Hours

#264

Post by AE-NMidlands »

Stinsy wrote: Fri Jun 13, 2025 6:28 am Saving sessions are now a joke, all that effort was fun when you got a few pounds, but now it is a few pence. What’s the point? The power hours were supposed to be a way to deal with excess renewable generation, instead of paying Dale Vince billions to turn off his wind turbines, they incentivise consumers to use it. Brilliant idea IMO. And us battery-owners are best placed to do so. But no, it is now “EV charging only”.
It's not only EV people, I got
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It will be interesting to see how and when (or if) it works: I wonder whether they will be at times when my battery is already full and I am dumping power to the grid anyway?
2.0 kW/4.62 MWh pa in Ripples, 4.5 kWp W-facing pv, 9.5 kWh Givenergy batt
30 solar thermal tubes, 2MWh pa in Stockport, plus Congleton and Kinlochbervie Hydros,
Veg, fruit - and Bees!
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