Octopus Flux

[Swwils]

"Being there when needed" is a very large width issue.

When you are calculating this, multiple entities have got this very wrong; your storage reserves will never be at 100% when needed and never at 0% when done - if you could do that you literally would have to have perfect weather and utilisation foresight over the entire electrical grid. Its an order of magnitude mistake with almost all evaluations of such systems.

The only way to counter balance this would be cost deflation (not happening), cheap overbuilding (not happening) or some magic event that we are all suddenly alot smarter.

[nowty]

Just realised that irrespective of whether I can get 15p export SEG from Octopus with IO, I could apply for 12p SEG with Scottish Power and still arbitrage with the 7.5p IO import from Octopus.

Me thinks I'm going to bite the bullet and opt out of FIT export. In any case I suspect it will be advantageous sooner or later to get an Export MPAN number associated with my Smart meter.

[Joeboy]

"Being there when needed" is a very large width issue.

When you are calculating this, multiple entities have got this very wrong; your storage reserves will never be at 100% when needed and never at 0% when done - if you could do that you literally would have to have perfect weather and utilisation foresight over the entire electrical grid. Its an order of magnitude mistake with almost all evaluations of such systems.

The only way to counter balance this would be cost deflation (not happening), cheap overbuilding (not happening) or some magic event that we are all suddenly alot smarter.

We'll see how it plays out?Early days.
Again, your negativity is SO . Who spoke about 100% or 0%?

[Joeboy]

Just realised that irrespective of whether I can get 15p export SEG from Octopus with IO, I could apply for 12p SEG with Scottish Power and still arbitrage with the 7.5p IO import from Octopus.

Me thinks I'm going to bite the bullet and opt out of FIT export. In any case I suspect it will be advantageous sooner or later to get an Export MPAN number associated with my Smart meter.

Have you run the sums Nowty, do you (can you) export that much to be worthwhile dropping a dead cert payment? I'll be interested to see over time if the microgeneration plants are evenly distributed in relation to population density & demand.

[nowty]

Just realised that irrespective of whether I can get 15p export SEG from Octopus with IO, I could apply for 12p SEG with Scottish Power and still arbitrage with the 7.5p IO import from Octopus.

Me thinks I'm going to bite the bullet and opt out of FIT export. In any case I suspect it will be advantageous sooner or later to get an Export MPAN number associated with my Smart meter.

Have you run the sums Nowty, do you (can you) export that much to be worthwhile dropping a dead cert payment? I'll be interested to see over time if the microgeneration plants are evenly distributed in relation to population density & demand.

I don't actually even need to arbitrage through the battery. All I need to do is ALWAYS charge the EVs and heat the water from the grid during cheapslot hours, and export as much of the the excess power from the Solar as possible. That way there is no extra degradation of the batteries / battery inverter and no loss of efficiency cycling the power through the batteries.

In other words do exactly the opposite of what I do now in the main solar generating months.

On FIT deemed export I currently get 4.82p on just over 2000 kWh = £100

I currently export around 1,300 kWh so I would need at least 7.5p to get the same amount. So 12p SEG with Scottish Power that is worth it at circa £150. But with a change in behaviour there is 2,000 kWh of EV charging and about 1,000 kWh of hot water heating which could be flipped. There is also an unknown amount currently diverted to storage heaters in spring time. The balance of heat would be replaced with my A2A HPs which are more efficient.

So maybe a potential 3000 kWh extra could be exported, probably not all of it because of my export constraint. Seems to be a no brainer even if power prices drop further.

And in terms of carbon, I would be importing more dirtier grid power but I would still be offsetting that carbon with an almost equal amount of exported zero carbon leccy and used locally.

Interesting, very interesting.

[Swwils]

"Being there when needed" is a very large width issue.

When you are calculating this, multiple entities have got this very wrong; your storage reserves will never be at 100% when needed and never at 0% when done - if you could do that you literally would have to have perfect weather and utilisation foresight over the entire electrical grid. Its an order of magnitude mistake with almost all evaluations of such systems.

The only way to counter balance this would be cost deflation (not happening), cheap overbuilding (not happening) or some magic event that we are all suddenly alot smarter.

We'll see how it plays out?Early days.
Again, your negativity is SO . Who spoke about 100% or 0%?

Almost every study and hence downstream calculation for feasibility or installation scale is done on the erroneous basis that the available storage will be at 100% filled just when its needed and then exactly at 0% when the intermittency event is over. This obviously ignores that we do not have perfect foresight nor is it even economic to leave storage reserves at 100% (decreasing response efficiency) regardless.

Don't confound this with a plunge event putting some money in your pocket.

It is not negativity it just looking at the idealized assumption. You experience this at a small scale with a home installation, in particular with carbon intensity, importing dirt grid power but *thinking* you will offsetting that later with export or local use - which is the not a clear cut case counterintuitively.

[Mart]

"Being there when needed" is a very large width issue.

When you are calculating this, multiple entities have got this very wrong; your storage reserves will never be at 100% when needed and never at 0% when done - if you could do that you literally would have to have perfect weather and utilisation foresight over the entire electrical grid. Its an order of magnitude mistake with almost all evaluations of such systems.

The only way to counter balance this would be cost deflation (not happening), cheap overbuilding (not happening) or some magic event that we are all suddenly alot smarter.

We'll see how it plays out?Early days.
Again, your negativity is SO . Who spoke about 100% or 0%?

Hi Joe, actually that isn't technically negative, it's possibly the most positive statement in favour of storage that I've ever heard.

Think about it, he states that storage will never be at 100% when needed - not 'might not be', but 'never'. And also states that it will never be at 0% when done - not 'might not be', but 'never'.

So even though storage won't be completely full ('never'), it'll still be enough to cover any event, as it won't reach zero ('never').

So, the statement is actually saying that we'll always (opposite of never) be able to operate within the storage capacity. So no curtailment due to full storage (as it won't reach 100% before we need it), and no concerns about meeting periods of low generation due to zero storage (as it won't reach zero before the event is done).

Excellent news.

[Joeboy]

I am quite taken with the idea of existing infrastructure which is also being continually added to at micro level being utilised in a more efficient manner in local areas where its needed.

It's not a silver bullet by any means but it is a better utilisation of assets with the micro investors being rewarded.

There is cleverness in these actions.

[richbee]

There is mass hysteria breaking on the Octopus Facebook groups with many saying they are on Intelligent Octopus tariff (inferring a import cheap rate 7.5p) and having their SEG export upgraded from 4.1p to 15p.

That made me think its got to be a mistake as there is no way they would allow 7.5p import and a 15p fixed export.

Just wondering if it is a mistake or a more sinister morph of IO into this new tariff of IO Flux which would be a bummer.

Hopefully not sinister as the use timings will be different for the two scenarios? Fingers

Yeah, thinking about it a bit more, the IO still gives Octopus extra revenue from controlling the demand side, so it should still remain a better deal than Go.

If it is true about fixed 15p export with IO though, I'll be signing up for the Octopus Outgoing in a flash.

I've just read it on energylivenews.com - appeared on my google curated news feed, so might be true

[nowty]

https://www.energylivenews.com/2023/09/ ... -annually/

Feck.

Or Boom.

"The customers can now integrate the ‘Outgoing Octopus’ export tariff with the ‘Intelligent Octopus,’ a flexible EV charging tariff.

The energy supplier will boost the rate from the current 4.1p per kilowatt-hour (kWh) to 15p/kWh.

In a statement, Octopus Energy emphasised the importance of its customers in advancing towards a zero carbon future."