-
Want to remove ads? Register an account and login to see fewer ads, and become a Supporting Member to remove almost all ads.
Just got SCE PTO email today... question if I can start charging during peak?
- Thread starter E46M3
- Start date
I dont understand the question, sorry. PTO doesnt have anything to do with charging during peak time, and even if you have powerwalls, you are not going to want to charge your car during peak hours.
Sorry about the confusion.. I meant since that got PTO, am I banking my excess solar now? I'm just not sure since the email stated that NEM successor tariff will take effect in a few billing cycles. I'm just not sure what this means. I don't want to charge during peak of I'm not banking excess solar. I probably won't charge during peak anyway.. but still would like to know...
Im going to suggest that you dont want to charge during peak, period, unless you have some emergency or something when you have to. You are in CA (on SCE like me). I dont know if you got solar only or solar + batteries, but in neither case is it super advantageous to charge a car during peak time.
As far as your question, if you have PTO, and you have a bi directional meter, you should be getting credit for your energy. That doesnt mean you should be charging during peak energy time though.
I understand that you shouldn't charge during peak.. not sure why I said it that way. I'm actually charging using excess solar at the moment before PTO. But I'd like to stop using excess solar and just charge anytime outside peak hours. I do have bi-directional meter so I guess I can start charging now, thanks!
you can buy energy monitoring device. I have this one. How the Vue Utility Connect Energy Monitor Works
but I also have their charger that supports excess solar charging.
No matter. It makes more sense (but maybe not cents) to charge your car when at night, when there is a tremendous amount of excess energy available, than during the afternoods when the utilities struggle to avoid brownouts.
I'm a little confused. Is the reason for not charging during peak hours 100% purely for conservation and doing our part purposes? I have solar and Powerwall, BUT NO PTO yet. Sometimes I notice I'm hitting 100% on the Powerwalls and I will REGARDLESS OF TIME charge my car because my thought is, the excess energy that could be generating is being stopped (because not PTO yet). Am I wrong in my thinking? I'm still learning.
Not charging during peak recommendation is because of cost. In general, Peak electricity in Southern California costs 2 times to 3 times more than off peak. Your location says "los Angeles" and if you are on DWP (and not SCE ), you will need to check to see if that applies to you.
DWP seems to not be as punitive than SCE / SDGE / PGE in California, so if you dont have a huge delta between peak and off peak, it may not apply.
For some reason, I thought the context was charging from a powerwall at peak. I understand not charging during peak when charging from the grid. Maybe I misunderstood. I couldn't see any reason not to charge from a Powerwall during peak. Guess it was from the grid. Thanks.
Using a powerwall to charge your car is the equivalent of using a triple A battery to charge 3 D batteries. You could charge your car using a powerwall during peak, but a powerwall has 13.5kWh of energy from 100% to 0, and a Tesla has somewhere between 60kWh and 100kWh or energy.
While that may be true, he mentioned he does not have PTO and his PWs were at 100%. If he doesn’t use the solar energy for something, the inverter just turns off. Better to charge the car some with what solar energy is available than to not use the excess available energy at all.
Similar threads
