Thanks for sharing that information with me. I could shift some usage of the AC to the afternoon probably because I work from home full time and my wife also works from home 3 or 4 days a week. I was using the rate tools they have on PG&E and it seems like it would be like $1k for the EV and then 600-700 for the electrical. That is based on 15k/miles a year 30% public charging. I guess my concern is how accurate are those PG&E rate tools? We commute for sports and my wife to work a couple times a week on average for about 120-150 miles round trip.
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PG&E Rate Schedules: "Home Charging" (EV2-A) Goes Live vs. Others
- Thread starter SoundDaTrumpet
- Start date
Thanks for sharing that information with me. I could shift some usage of the AC to the afternoon probably because I work from home full time and my wife also works from home 3 or 4 days a week. I was using the rate tools they have on PG&E and it seems like it would be like $1k for the EV and then 600-700 for the electrical. That is based on 15k/miles a year 30% public charging. I guess my concern is how accurate are those PG&E rate tools? We commute for sports and my wife to work a couple times a week on average for about 120-150 miles round trip.
The PG&E rate tools are accurate for comparing your historical usage on different rate plans. I have never used the estimator that tries to add things like EV charging.
Keep in mind that the new EV2 rate has Off-Peak until 3pm, then 1 hour of Part-Peak, then Peak from 4-9pm. You can pre-cool the house until 3pm, but if it gets hot inside in the evening, it's really expensive 4-9pm. EV charging on the E-1 tiered rate gets really expensive because you're adding usage at the highest and most expensive tier.
Just to confirm the rate tools are located here EV Rate | EV Savings Calculator - PG&E ? I just want to make sure I am researching correctly as the wife doesn't want to get a X and I am trying to tell her that I am tired of paying 200-400 a month on gas. She wants to buy the new 2021 Tahoe, but with that payment and cost of gas I can just buy the X and not have to worry about paying for gas.
No, log into your account and press the yellow button shown below.
Before I was pushed out of EV-A to EV2-A, this was my results.
Have you let your wife take. the X for a. test drive? You should do it right after test driving the Tahoe. If she believes in climate change there really doesn't need to be a discussion.
could use some help here y’all - i’m admittedly not very good with this pg&e rate stuff. thanks in advance for any replies.
we have a m3 and a newly installed 4.5kWh solar system.. producing about 18-19kWh per day right now. I drive about 100 miles roundtrip to work and back every single day and primarily charge overnight. otherwise our energy usage is quite low and we have a newer home/energy-efficient appliances. we were recently switched to EV2-A but wondering if this is the best rate plan for us? other options appear to be E-TOU (peak 4-9pm every day) and E-TOU B.
we have a m3 and a newly installed 4.5kWh solar system.. producing about 18-19kWh per day right now. I drive about 100 miles roundtrip to work and back every single day and primarily charge overnight. otherwise our energy usage is quite low and we have a newer home/energy-efficient appliances. we were recently switched to EV2-A but wondering if this is the best rate plan for us? other options appear to be E-TOU (peak 4-9pm every day) and E-TOU B.
aesculus
Still Trying to Figure This All Out
yeah i’ve just read through the entire thread, thanks! but unfortunately hard to use the PG&E historical comparison tool because we haven’t been in this house for over a year and the solar is only a month old.
just trying to wrap my head around which plan makes the most sense for those of us who 1. produce 18kwh a day and barely use daytime electricity. and 2. charge 20% of LR battery every couple days.
the NBC and NEM articles shared are quite confusing for a layperson like myself
aesculus
Still Trying to Figure This All Out
That could be an issue, especially if you have devices such as heat pumps or AC that is seasonal. You might do it manually but I would stay away from any of the Tiered plans with an EV.
You really are not producing a lot of solar and it won't do you much good offsetting your power during the day since you don't consume much. You could simply try to figure out your net during off peak and on peak and treat that as a $ figure for each plan type.
They are confusing and really just rounding errors for a system as small as yours. Plus there is absolutely nothing you can do about this. The bigger factors are when you use energy and how much.
If you use a lot of energy when you get home then pay attention to plans that penalize that. If you can defer energy use before 3pm or until after 9PM for example the EVA2 is probably best.
In my particular case my solar is a rounding error. My heat pumps and car are way above what my PV can every do, even in the prime PV months. We also have the flexibility of pushing consumption into non peak periods so our energy usage is fairly high, but our costs are lower because of the rate structure. Hoping that if they adjust the PV repayment with Powerwalls to anytime we want to sell our produced power back it will net out even better,
Hi all,
I just read every single post on this thread. I just got solar this week and really wish I saw this thread before I went in on solar. From what I am reading, I should have probably gotten solar + Powerwall. I am currently on EV-2A, but has anyone looked into the new TOU plans, specifically E-TOU-C and E-TOU-D? Is it still better for me to stay on EV-2A and just change my charging habits to morning instead of late night? I am currently work from home until offices start to open back up so I can charge in the morning. Does it even matter as long as I charge on off peak since it is 1:1 production:EV charge anyway?
Thanks you all for all the informative posts on this matter.
I just read every single post on this thread. I just got solar this week and really wish I saw this thread before I went in on solar. From what I am reading, I should have probably gotten solar + Powerwall. I am currently on EV-2A, but has anyone looked into the new TOU plans, specifically E-TOU-C and E-TOU-D? Is it still better for me to stay on EV-2A and just change my charging habits to morning instead of late night? I am currently work from home until offices start to open back up so I can charge in the morning. Does it even matter as long as I charge on off peak since it is 1:1 production:EV charge anyway?
Thanks you all for all the informative posts on this matter.
mblakele
FSD Beta (99)
YMMV and probably will; but the PG&E rate calculator tells me that I'd be worse off under TOU-C or TOU-D than under EV2-A, to the tune of $100-300 annually.
As far as charging goes, I find that self-consumption is best because it minimizes NBCs (non-bypassable charges). If possible, I charge when the sun is high and my rate is low: say, from noon to 3pm.
NBCs accrue until your annual true-up. However if your bill is like mine, it doesn't always show a running total of NBCs. Most of my bills only show the monthly NBCs, not the year to date total. So I find it useful to track that number myself in a spreadsheet.
NBCs aren't the end of the world, of course. I figure they cost me about $100 annually if I charge at night, and I might be able to cut that in half through self-consumption. However I doubt I could ever completely eliminate NBCs, because I rely on electric heat in the winter months.
GenSao
Member
TheRock66,
Welcome to the TMC. Enjoy your stay.
The PG&E rate calculator uses historic data and does not consider the potential of the user to shift loads to off peak periods. I suggest doing your own estimate. Do a quick check on your current annual usage and see what you could save.
What heavy loads (annual use) can you shfit to off peak times? Take your annual EV mileage and divide by 3 miles/kWh (Model 3) or 4 miles/kWh (Model X) depending on EV type. Say the typical cloths dryer uses 6 kWh per load. Multiply this by your annual estimate (or weekly x 52). Compare the off peak rate difference for EV2-A vs E-TOU-C3 and E-TOU-D.
I like to self consume when practical to minimize NBCs as well. Since I am on the EV-A rate schedule, I take advantage of solar on the weekends and charge EVs and do laundry.
If you are home most of the time and can not shift your peak rate usage, then the Powerwalls may be useful to mitigate your peak usage cost. Compare your usage in the PG&E website. In the below sample, the Powerwalls covered 15.7 kWh of my peak and part peak usage while maximizing solar export during peak period. As a side note, I have the Poweralls switch to self consumption mode for the morning (7 AM to noon) to limit NBC.
You can still add Powerwalls to an existing solar system and claim the 26% federal tax credit. I did this back in 2017. For California, I estimate Tesla would charge the following:
Hope this helps.
Wow GenSao - you are awesome! That was so informative. After looking at the hourly rates, wouldn’t it be better for me to do e-tou-c since I get more credit for the times I produce the most (12pm - 4pm) to offset the cost of the time I use the most (5pm - 9pm)? I should be covering over 100% of the energy I use in a year...just don’t want the true up to screw me!
GenSao
Member
A disclaimer, my chart simplifies the rates by combining the baseline credit for E-TOU-A and E-TOU-C. I assumed with solar that one may not go beyond the monthly baseline. If you use electricity to heat your home, then you may go over the baseline in winter. Check to be sure:
https://www.pge.com/tariffs/assets/pdf/tariffbook/ELEC_SCHEDS_E-TOU-C.pdf
If you produce 100% of your annual usage, what matters more is to mitigate peak usage cost.
Nosken
Active Member
Great App if you have PG&E and an iPhone. It will link to your account and show you what fees would be on each plan. Additionally, it will calculate the effect on you bill with PowerWall. My PG&E Toolkit
Well... my turn to get The Letter. They are kicking me off EV-A on July 10th. By default they will change me to EV2-A. We've got two plug in cars, 6.38 kW of solar (8 somewhat south facing panels, 17 somewhat west facing panels) and no Powerwall or other battery system. We are also on the SVCE CCA.
According to the PG&E guesstimator, my annual costs would be:
EV-A - $610/year
E-1 - $1515/year
TOU - $1530/year
E-TOU-D - $1550/year
EV2-A - $1630/year
So I'm looking at a $900-1000 increase per year. Note that I've been starting EV charging at midnight, rather than 11 PM, for about the past year in anticipation of this. Hopefully it has made the guesstimate more accurate. We could probably load shift things like laundry and summer A/C a little more, though not a lot. Lighting is already almost all LED with a little fluorescent.
Where to go from here? I've been thinking about another 4 kW or so of solar. The panels would be facing somewhat eastward, and be shaded in the late afternoon. I figure the 4 kW would be enough to balance out the total kWh use of our house on an annual basis. But of course these new TOU rates/times still make the dollars come out on the bad side. So some sort of battery system would be helpful to time-shift my excess generation.
Life was so much easier when we had E-7 rates...
According to the PG&E guesstimator, my annual costs would be:
EV-A - $610/year
E-1 - $1515/year
TOU - $1530/year
E-TOU-D - $1550/year
EV2-A - $1630/year
So I'm looking at a $900-1000 increase per year. Note that I've been starting EV charging at midnight, rather than 11 PM, for about the past year in anticipation of this. Hopefully it has made the guesstimate more accurate. We could probably load shift things like laundry and summer A/C a little more, though not a lot. Lighting is already almost all LED with a little fluorescent.
Where to go from here? I've been thinking about another 4 kW or so of solar. The panels would be facing somewhat eastward, and be shaded in the late afternoon. I figure the 4 kW would be enough to balance out the total kWh use of our house on an annual basis. But of course these new TOU rates/times still make the dollars come out on the bad side. So some sort of battery system would be helpful to time-shift my excess generation.
Life was so much easier when we had E-7 rates...
JPP
Active Member
Unless you commit to Powerwalls, there is no good solution. I was where you are now back in November 2019--after 6 years switched off of EV-A (my solar was installed in 2013). Pending my Powerwall install (technically complete March 2020), I actually switched to E-1. The least painful from the list of bad choices you listed. Once PWs went in, I switched to EV2-A. Still a bad deal, but more tolerable when I can time shift the solar.
Interesting discussion of NBCs that I was not aware of. I'm on EV-A with PG&E under NEM 2.0. I had been charging my EVs religiously during off-peak hours but have naturally accrued a fair amount of NBCs. Would I have a lower total true-up if I instead charged my EV during peak solar production, regardless of the prevailing EV rate? What if the rate of charge exceeds the rate of solar generation by my panels?
