PG&E customers. What do you spend/mo to charge your car?

[jboy210]

Hi,

I got the HPWC installed the same month (Dec) I switched to PG&E Time of Use plan. Bill went from $240 (Nov) to over $500 (Dec). Usage doubled. Less than 3% of electricity was at peak rate. Drove about 800 miles that month in my Model X. What are other PG&E customers spending/mo to charge their cars.

That $0.24 off peak and $0.26 on peak rates are high. Can wait for summer (starting April 1) and the $0.25 off-peak and $0.36 on peak rates.

 

[mblakele]

That number is going to be highly dependent on your rate plan and how much you drive. At one point I was driving about 500-kWh/mo on the EV rate plan, so I was spending about $70/mo. Now I'm no longer commuting, so it's less.

If possible, consider switching to the EV rate — especially if your TOU plan has tiers. The EV off-peak rate is around $0.14/kWh. Peak rates are higher, but it sounds like you already avoid using power-hungry appliances like AC so it should work out.

Making sense of the rates

After that you can think about installing solar, and maybe some storage.

 

[jkoya]

I got the HPWC installed the same month (Dec) I switched to PG&E Time of Use plan. Bill went from $240 (Nov) to over $500 (Dec). Usage doubled. Less than 3% of electricity was at peak rate. Drove about 800 miles that month in my Model X. What are other PG&E customers spending/mo to charge their cars.

So, no other changes in appliances, electronics or electricity uses other than the HPWC ? How were you charging prior to the HPWC install ?

 

[ewoodrick]

A TOU isn't a always a better solution for EV charging. You have to look at all your other energy usage to determine the impact.

800 miles is going to be about 250 kWh. At $0.36 peak rate that's $90. So what else was using electricity? If the AC was running during the day, that could be the culprit.

In Georgia we have a TOU rate, but my calculations are that I don't want to go to it!

 

[cwerdna]

Agree with earlier posts.

I'm in PG&E-land but I spend virtually 0 to charge my EVs at home since I almost never do it.

Almost all of my charging is for free at work and some (a lot less now) is from free public L2 charging (e.g. some near home and some at places I shop/might stop at). I got my Bolt at end of Jan 2019 and have charged it 0 times at home, so far. No need. I've had a Leaf since end of July 2013 which was my primary car until the Bolt and it's rarely charged at home (to the tune of maybe <3 kWh a month, on average since it's 0 for many months).

 

[jboy210]

So, no other changes in appliances, electronics or electricity uses other than the HPWC ? How were you charging prior to the HPWC install ?

I was charging a little bit at home, but mostly driving over a Supercharger

 

[mblakele]

I was charging a little bit at home, but mostly driving over a Supercharger

Electric heat? Water heater? Dryer?

 

[miimura]

Hi,

I got the HPWC installed the same month (Dec) I switched to PG&E Time of Use plan. Bill went from $240 (Nov) to over $500 (Dec). Usage doubled. Less than 3% of electricity was at peak rate. Drove about 800 miles that month in my Model X. What are other PG&E customers spending/mo to charge their cars.

That $0.24 off peak and $0.26 on peak rates are high. Can wait for summer (starting April 1) and the $0.25 off-peak and $0.36 on peak rates.

E-TOU-A and E-TOU-B are no good for EVs. Make sure to get the EV rate. Yes, the Peak is $0.32/kWh Winter and $0.48/kWh Summer, but Off-Peak is only $0.13/kWh. Just make sure to set the car to charge after 11pm.

 

[ucmndd]

PGE's bill modeling is pretty effective at showing you what the best rate is for your usage. It's pretty situation dependent.

I drive ~2500 miles/month on EV-A and that costs me $115 at super off-peak rates.

Also, if you're in a situation where solar makes sense, EV-A + solar is a great deal... I have a solar array that offsets basically all of my usage during the day when the EV-A rates are super high and then charge from the grid for $0.14/kwh at night.

 

[miimura]

PGE's bill modeling is pretty effective at showing you what the best rate is for your usage. It's pretty situation dependent.

I drive ~2500 miles/month on EV-A and that costs me $115 at super off-peak rates.

Also, if you're in a situation where solar makes sense, EV-A + solar is a great deal... I have a solar array that offsets basically all of my usage during the day when the EV-A rates are super high and then charge from the grid for $0.14/kwh at night.

Yes, EV-A plus solar is great. EV-A plus solar plus Powerwall is even better because you can avoid the $0.48/kWh Peak rate in the Summer. However, the return on investment purely based on this is quite long. You have to assign a significant value to the backup power provided in order for it to make financial sense. Incentives also help bring in the ROI quite a bit.

 

[bmah]

E-TOU-A and E-TOU-B are no good for EVs. Make sure to get the EV rate. Yes, the Peak is $0.32/kWh Winter and $0.48/kWh Summer, but Off-Peak is only $0.13/kWh. Just make sure to set the car to charge after 11pm.

I set my car to charge after 12am...there are a few weeks (around the Daylight Saving Time change points) where the TOU times are an hour later, due to the inability of PG&E to track a change to the federal DST rules that happened over ten years ago. During those times, if you charge at 11pm, you'd be charging at partial-peak rates for an hour every weeknight.

Otherwise, concur.

Bruce.

 

[miimura]

I set my car to charge after 12am...there are a few weeks (around the Daylight Saving Time change points) where the TOU times are an hour later, due to the inability of PG&E to track a change to the federal DST rules that happened over ten years ago. During those times, if you charge at 11pm, you'd be charging at partial-peak rates for an hour every weeknight.

Otherwise, concur.

Bruce.

Quite right. In fact, that transition back to the aligned time periods just happened this past Sunday.

 

[Watts_Up]

Hi,

I got the HPWC installed the same month (Dec) I switched to PG&E Time of Use plan.
Bill went from $240 (Nov) to over $500 (Dec). Usage doubled.
Less than 3% of electricity was at peak rate.
Drove about 800 miles that month in my Model X. What are other PG&E customers spending/mo to charge their cars.

That $0.24 off peak and $0.26 on peak rates are high.
Can wait for summer (starting April 1) and the $0.25 off-peak and $0.36 on peak rates.

If you have PG&E you can look in very detail to daily and hourly consumption using the "Energy Usage Details" from "Your Account" Webpage.

For example, typically I can see that I have an average 500 W hourly consumption with a peak around 7 pm, and a total 12 kW daily consumption.

When my car get charged, the hourly consumption jump to 5 kWh.

I was travelling for a week, and my daily consumption went to 3 kW, there was only a 600 W fridge running during that time.

Also from your bill, you can check the percentage usage during Peak, Part Peak, and Off Peak. (in my case last month was 22%, 28%, 50%)

If you would like getting a more detailed consumption on your various appliances, HPWC, or HVAC, I would recommend connecting a Wattmeter.

I installed the following device next to my charger, so I can compare the monthly "energy" measurement to my consumption bill.

I hope this can help you understanding and analysing your monthly PG&E bill.

 

[jboy210]

If you have PG&E you can look in very detail to daily and hourly consumption using the "Energy Usage Details" from "Your Account" Webpage.

For example, typically I can see that I have an average 500 W hourly consumption with a peak around 7 pm, and a total 12 kW daily consumption.

When my car get charged, the hourly consumption jump to 5 kWh.

I was travelling for a week, and my daily consumption went to 3 kW, there was only a 600 W fridge running during that time.

Also from your bill, you can check the percentage usage during Peak, Part Peak, and Off Peak. (in my case last month was 22%, 28%, 50%)

Thanks for pointing out the Energy Use Details link. I was able to download the data and get some interesting information.

1) It definitely shows a large spike in energy usage when we installed the HPWC. Prior to installing from 12AM-4AM, the usage was very low. 0.7 KW/h. Now, this 12AM-1AM is usually 8-10KW, and sometimes that 10KW/hr extends until 3 AM.
2) Most of the rest of the hours are under 1 KW except,
3) a spike in the morning 6AM-10AM up to 2K/hr and late evening 9:30-11PM up to 2.5Kw/h. This is likely our heated bathroom and closet floors.

All this helps explain we are now using up to 42 KW/day during February when it was cold (for Northern California) and things like the heated floors were running for long periods of the morning and evening to get to 80 F.

Very neat to be able to analyze data this closely.

Now I need to get one of those meters to measure the power usage of my NAS, server, and network gear.

 

[Boatguy]

We have two EVs that we drive a total of about 20,000/yr. They charge during the off hours and cost about $750/year for the last four years. This year it is essentially free because we bought a new Tesla last Decdember and claimed the $800 PG&E rebate which we received last month.

 

[KSilver2000]

You should get on the EV rate pronto. That’s the simplest thing to do in cutting some of that bill. Then make sure to use as little energy as possible from 3-9pm. Otherwise, you’re basically negating the benefit of the EV rate.

Since getting our solar panels and Teslas, many of friends and neighbors ask me about solar and Powerwall. And I always tell them a Powerwall is not worth the cost at this moment, especially since net metering with PG&E is available.
For those with utilities that provide net metering, there are only a few reasons to get a Powerwall—mainly for blackout instances. Investment wise, it’s much better to use the money for a Powerwall to buy extra solar panels if one’s roof allows. Net metering basically works as the battery.

Of course, eventually, net metering will probably go away. Awhich point a Powerwall will make sense.

Luckily for me, I live within less than 3 to 5 minutes from almost 3 dozen supercharging stalls, and another 5 minutes from another dozen stalls.

 

[turtlebud]

based on the info I could glean from your post, I would guess that you have quite a bit of electric usage aside from charging your X. there are a couple of things to pay attention and consider on your bill with TOU plans:

1. Since you probably using more than the baseline, your rates for everything over ~300kwh/month will be roughly 50% higher. Ex. if the rate for off peak is 24c/kwh, then anything over 300kwh will probably be closer to .36c/kwh.
2. Find out how much non-EV charging electricity you are using. I assume you weren't charging much at home before you got the L2 charger in Dec right? If so, I'd check your Nov bill to see what your usage was before charging your X to figure out how much non-EV charging electric usage you had.
   (btw, if you were on the E-1 (tiered) rate, it gave you a lower rate on the first 300kwh (~100% usage) used and then high on the next 100-400% usage and then even higher if you went over 400%)
3. Since you said that only 3% of your usage is peak, the moving to the EV plan should be fine - the peak usage aligns pretty well with the TOU peak usage and the partial peak rates are the same of less than the part-peak rates for TOU. The advantage is that your off-peak rates (after 11pm) are quite a bit lower.

If you are have very high electric usage, I'd suggest two things. First, find out where the usage is going (aside from EV charging) and see if it's something that you can reduce. If it's normal usage (and it's a lot), then definitely consider going solar. You will recoup the costs faster since you have high usage.

here are the current rate plans I found from PGE for your reference. https://www.pge.com/tariffs/ResTOUCurrent.xls

hope this helps!

 

[jboy210]

You should get on the EV rate pronto. That’s the simplest thing to do in cutting some of that bill. Then make sure to use as little energy as possible from 3-9pm. Otherwise, you’re basically negating the benefit of the EV rate.

Since getting our solar panels and Teslas, many of friends and neighbors ask me about solar and Powerwall. And I always tell them a Powerwall is not worth the cost at this moment, especially since net metering with PG&E is available.
For those with utilities that provide net metering, there are only a few reasons to get a Powerwall—mainly for blackout instances. Investment wise, it’s much better to use the money for a Powerwall to buy extra solar panels if one’s roof allows. Net metering basically works as the battery.

Of course, eventually, net metering will probably go away. Awhich point a Powerwall will make sense.

Luckily for me, I live within less than 3 to 5 minutes from almost 3 dozen supercharging stalls, and another 5 minutes from another dozen stalls.

Are you getting just $0.03 from PG&E for each KWh you send them? I just could not ever see the net metering working out for me at that low rate unless I had a really massive and thus expensive solar array.

I could go to free Supercharging to offset some of the costs since there are 5 Supercharger locations (soon to be 6) (maybe 70-80 stalls) within 15 minutes of me. But, that does not have the convenience of home charging while you sleep.

 

[jboy210]

based on the info I could glean from your post, I would guess that you have quite a bit of electric usage aside from charging your X. there are a couple of things to pay attention and consider on your bill with TOU plans:

1. Since you probably using more than the baseline, your rates for everything over ~300kwh/month will be roughly 50% higher. Ex. if the rate for off peak is 24c/kwh, then anything over 300kwh will probably be closer to .36c/kwh.
2. Find out how much non-EV charging electricity you are using. I assume you weren't charging much at home before you got the L2 charger in Dec right? If so, I'd check your Nov bill to see what your usage was before charging your X to figure out how much non-EV charging electric usage you had.
   (btw, if you were on the E-1 (tiered) rate, it gave you a lower rate on the first 300kwh (~100% usage) used and then high on the next 100-400% usage and then even higher if you went over 400%)
3. Since you said that only 3% of your usage is peak, the moving to the EV plan should be fine - the peak usage aligns pretty well with the TOU peak usage and the partial peak rates are the same of less than the part-peak rates for TOU. The advantage is that your off-peak rates (after 11pm) are quite a bit lower.

If you are have very high electric usage, I'd suggest two things. First, find out where the usage is going (aside from EV charging) and see if it's something that you can reduce. If it's normal usage (and it's a lot), then definitely consider going solar. You will recoup the costs faster since you have high usage.

here are the current rate plans I found from PGE for your reference. https://www.pge.com/tariffs/ResTOUCurrent.xls

hope this helps!

Thanks. Regarding your items,
1) I did not notice a restrictions/bumps for consuming more than a specified amount on our TOU plan. We are on the "PG&E Residential Time-of-Use Rate schedule E-TOU Option B (4.9 PM)" listed on the first tab of the spreadsheet. Under our old plan which had 3 tiers and got successively more expensive, especially when we went to the 3rd tier.

2) We work from home, so do have usage throughout the day and often into the evenings. 3-4 computers running, 6 or so monitors, NAS, routers, etc. Based on the PG&E data it looks like these consume around 1.0 KW per hr. I am planning on adjusting the amount we charge the company for the home office rent to partially offset these costs.

3) Yes, after 11 PM or so we are in bed and thus are not using much power. But, we do see a large spike of 10KW for each hour of charging. Usually this is only for an hour or less, but some days when we drive a lot it can run for 2-3 hours. So the EV charging can be a large electricity consumer for us.

 

[ucmndd]

Are you getting just $0.03 from PG&E for each KWh you send them? I just could not ever see the net metering working out for me at that low rate unless I had a really massive and thus expensive solar array.

With net metering, excess energy produced is credited at the price you’re currently paying for electricity. For example, during the summer my solar panels over produce during the peak of the day when my peak rate is ~$0.50/kWh on the EV-A ToU plan. That is credited to my account during they day and I then “buy it back” at $0.12/kWh at night to charge my car.

The $0.03/kWh wholesale buyback rate only comes into play at your annual true-up. If over the course of the entire YEAR you produce more energy than you consumed, PGE buys that excess production from you at the wholesale rate.