PG&E Rate Schedules: "Home Charging" (EV2-A) Goes Live vs. Others

[Ulmo]

From what I can gander, PG&E is telling one and all to build solar systems facing West. South and (ee-gad) East facing systems are useless from an economic point of view.

Adding an East array to an undersized West array and PowerWalls would offset some grid charges and allow the batteries to be in better shape for the peak and evening times. I don't know if it pencils to savings, but I'm just mentioning that. That's why I'm considering adding East facing panels. Our West roof is full, and our East roof is beckoning.

When will PG&E allow us to sell battery power to the grid?

 

[miimura]

I got the 60 day notice today. The PG&E rate comparison tool shows a 35% increase in annual energy charges. This could be partially mitigated by changing behavior to match the new schedule. It's still definitely more than 25% increase. This will probably push me to drastically increase my solar size and give up my NEM 1.0 status.

 

[dailo]

Haven't gotten my notice yet, but after

Hmm. I missed this in the new EV-A Rate Plan Tariff Schedule. I've attached the latest PDF here

"...
Pursuant to D.17-01-006, as revised by D. 17-02-017 and D. 17-10-018, for grandfathered service, certain solar customers will be allowed to continue service on Rate A of this schedule. Specifically, solar customers that interconnected by December 16, 2016, and elected service under Schedule EV prior to July 31, 2017, are allowed to retain service under this schedule for five years after issuance of the permission to operate, but no later than July 31, 2022. In addition, pursuant to D. 16-01-044, net energy metering customers that interconnected after December 15, 2016 and elected service on Rate Option A of this rate schedule may also continue service on this rate schedule for a period of 5 years from the date the customer commenced service on the NEM 2.0 rate, but no later than November 30, 2025. Existing EV-A customers seeking to commence service on NEM2.0 rate and continue service on EV-A for up to 5 years must submit an interconnection application by November 30, 2019
..."​

Basically many of us are screwed... ;(

Ah thanks for pointing this out. Guess I am going to be moved to EVA2 soon. Powerewalls are looking more appealing now..

 

[Braxus]

Well... There goes my yearly bill, a 260% increase:

Now trying to do the math to see if a Powerwall makes sense.

 

[mpmeyer]

Does it say why they are moving you? I had thought EVA rate plan households were grandfathered for 2 or 4 years unless you consumed 800% more this month than the last year then they kick you out to another ToU for a year and then they move you back to EV2A.

To EV2-A

 

[cwied]

I got the 60 day notice today. The PG&E rate comparison tool shows a 35% increase in annual energy charges. This could be partially mitigated by changing behavior to match the new schedule. It's still definitely more than 25% increase. This will probably push me to drastically increase my solar size and give up my NEM 1.0 status.

Do you have enough solar production by 3pm to cover your usage during peak? With Powerwalls, it seems like at least a portion of the increase can be mitigated since off-peak goes all the way to 3pm.

 

[miimura]

Do you have enough solar production by 3pm to cover your usage during peak? With Powerwalls, it seems like at least a portion of the increase can be mitigated since off-peak goes all the way to 3pm.

To me, these are the issues that are raising costs in my situation:

1. Off-Peak is increasing by 13.5% to 16.2% (Winter / Summer) to 15.6c/kWh. So, all EV charging is more expensive.
2. Surplus solar generation after the batteries are full are devalued from Part-Peak to Off-Peak.
3. Peak hours are pushed back from 2pm to 4pm, so even though I will not have much of any consumption during Peak, my Peak solar credits will probably drop by 80%. Since I live near the western hills, my evening solar production drops very quickly.

It seems to me that the only way to deal with this is to produce more solar kWh because the solar-friendly TOU differentials will be taken away as solar penetration increases. It used to be that a small solar system would generate NEM credits worth 20 to 30 cents per kWh. At those prices, solar was a no-brainer. With solar only generating credits at 15 cents, it's not such a slam dunk.

Given this new rate environment, it seems that the Powerwalls will pay back faster, but solar will pay back slower.

 

[SoundDaTrumpet]

I got the 60 day notice today. The PG&E rate comparison tool shows a 35% increase in annual energy charges. This could be partially mitigated by changing behavior to match the new schedule. It's still definitely more than 25% increase. This will probably push me to drastically increase my solar size and give up my NEM 1.0 status.

View attachment 451160

@miimura Your bills are an $200 more across the board compared to mine. I have another 1.5 years before getting the 60 day notice.

Being on NEM 1.0, the PG&E rate comparison tool surprisingly shows E-1 as a viable option at a $200 premium to skip behavior changes with time-of-use. Conceivably, if I add 10% more solar under NEM 1.0 & E-1, I might get better value than 20% more southeast facing solar under NEM 2.0 & EV2-A. This is sounding weird.

 

[jholow]

Given this new rate environment, it seems that the Powerwalls will pay back faster, but solar will pay back slower.

100% correct. Under this plan, there is absolutely no reason to install solar without battery, unless you have west facing exposure.

Even with battery, it seems you just want to become as energy independent as possible through the use of batteries + solar. Using the grid for storage is going to be eliminated slowly (though this was a big step in that direction).

BTW I too got the 60 day notice today. No more EV-A.

 

[SoundDaTrumpet]

To me, these are the issues that are raising costs in my situation:

1. Off-Peak is increasing by 13.5% to 16.2% (Winter / Summer) to 15.6c/kWh. So, all EV charging is more expensive.
2. Surplus solar generation after the batteries are full are devalued from Part-Peak to Off-Peak.
3. Peak hours are pushed back from 2pm to 4pm, so even though I will not have much of any consumption during Peak, my Peak solar credits will probably drop by 80%. Since I live near the western hills, my evening solar production drops very quickly.

It seems to me that the only way to deal with this is to produce more solar kWh because the solar-friendly TOU differentials will be taken away as solar penetration increases. It used to be that a small solar system would generate NEM credits worth 20 to 30 cents per kWh. At those prices, solar was a no-brainer. With solar only generating credits at 15 cents, it's not such a slam dunk.

Given this new rate environment, it seems that the Powerwalls will pay back faster, but solar will pay back slower.

@miimura Do you charge your EVs at 11pm or 12am? This may have a large impact with the PG&E rate comparison tool since it uses past history.

 

[miimura]

@miimura Do you charge your EVs at 11pm or 12am? This may have a large impact with the PG&E rate comparison tool since it uses past history.

I almost never charge between 11 and midnight. Usually they start at midnight or 2am. I actually pushed the Model 3 out to 4am so that there would be less overlap.

 

[BobCio]

Holy geez... My bill will go from $2,330 yearr to $3,005 per year, a whopping 30% increase!!!!

 

[Oyinko]

Well... There goes my yearly bill, a 260% increase:

View attachment 451179

Now trying to do the math to see if a Powerwall makes sense.

Have you figured out why you will see so much increase?

 

[shs1]

I just checked my PG&E account and my current True Up under EV A is $181, but the compare rate plans suggests my Yearly Cost for EV A is listed at $1,445. I am not sure why those are so different. EV A2 is $3,060.

 

[Hsuester]

What about installing a 2nd meter--one on the EV-B rate plan for EVs and another on a rate plan like ETOU-A/B with less delta in peak/off-peak prices?

 

[KSilver2000]

Adding an East array to an undersized West array and PowerWalls would offset some grid charges and allow the batteries to be in better shape for the peak and evening times. I don't know if it pencils to savings, but I'm just mentioning that. That's why I'm considering adding East facing panels. Our West roof is full, and our East roof is beckoning.

When will PG&E allow us to sell battery power to the grid?

I have close to 2kW facing East. They start generating at 7:00-7:15am these days. It’s been doing real well for me on EV-A, generating credits at the partial peak rates. So, the EV-2A schedule would be crud for me.
I like to build up credits for use in the winter time when we turn on the heat throughout the house, including overnight, and use the dryers more frequently.

 

[JPP]

New EV2-A plan sucks. Yes, longer off peak, but about $0.03/kw more. peak time now shifted well into the afternoon/evening, so major offset with respect to solar production. So your solar cranks but is NEM at the partial peak rate, then you come home and use AC, etc at the peak rate. I just spent 30 minutes on the phone with a very nice PG&E rep on this, since I am being closed out of my EV-A in November (after 5 years). They offered EV2-A, which actually will add $1500/year to my bill, assuming my usage is basically the same as it is now. Believe it or not, the next 2 most expensive plans are the 2 alternate TOU plans, and the least punitive is the old E-1 tiered NON-TOU plan, which theoretically adds about $400/year to my bills. No good answer. Yes, maybe use Powerwalls, but you must charge them from solar to get the tax break (you can't charge from PG&E overnight on the off-peak rate). All just a way for PG&E to extract more $$ and screw solar producers. The only saving grace is that my panels are east-west, so i get a bit of a later afternoon boost.

 

[FlatSix911]

Adding an East array to an undersized West array and PowerWalls would offset some grid charges and allow the batteries to be in better shape for the peak and evening times. I don't know if it pencils to savings, but I'm just mentioning that. That's why I'm considering adding East facing panels. Our West roof is full, and our East roof is beckoning.

This is exactly what I did with my Solar System... both South/East and South/West facing panels to optimize the new TOU schedules.

 

[Oyinko]

I took my energy consumption data since April 1 and put everything into a spreadsheet to simulate my costs on the new EV2-A. Even with the slight increase for off peak and partial peak rates, it looks like I will end up paying a bit less overall despite charging about 35kWh every night.

 

[flamaest]

I just got the notice to move to EV2-A from EVA too.

"It seem as if PG&E programmed (via careful analysis) the solar benefits out of existing rate schedules after the advent of EV-A"

I have been on solar since 2010. I remember when I did my installation, PG&E would not let you install more than a certain amount of solar generation, leading you to a system that was slightly better than netzero.

PG&E is effectively now stealing almost all our produced Solar KWHs by forcing us into EV2-A from EVA.

Many of us were sold on SOLAR by the state of California to achieve Net-zero in our homes while helping the environment and getting into EVs, and are now providing almost all our solar KWHs to PG&E for nothing, for PGE to resell at a huge markup back to you, and we took on huge bank loans to install this equipment in our homes and now we are being ripped off and stuck with the monthly loan bill and a huge PGE true-up bill. Someone should sue.