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Powerwalls in the UK
- Thread starter Timd92277
- Start date
I thought of that but it stops charging before the end of the current off-peak period.
I've tried playing with the powercut reserve. I've found if you extend that before the start of off-peak, then it does charge more. I normally have it at 10%, but I extended to 25% before off-peak and the battery fully charged, so will play around with that to check it's repeatable.
I understand what the Tesla algorithm is trying to do but it's just too harsh for the UK with our unpredictable weather. I'm going to see if the reserve tweaking can help when there is a cloudy day forecast.
Followed zero off-peak charging last night with today's weather forecast showing solid sunshine. It's looking promising but there will be plenty of sunny / cloudy days when forecasts of solar generation will never be very accurate.
scdoubleu
Member
Lucky you. Mine failed to charge at all - previous day's stored solar carried the house until sunrise, then ran out.
Thanks to yesterday's soggy weather I only got 2.4 kWh of solar, so had to rely on the grid all day. Cost me £4.26 in peak-rate leccy instead of the £1.72 it would have cost had the PW2 filled its boots during the overnight off-peak period.
The Powerwall's "Artificial Ignorance" is not fit for purpose.
Perhaps your PW is still at the learning stage? Mine has been in use for a few days over 4 years. However, it's plausible that Tesla is quietly rolling out this feature starting with the oldest. Manual intervention may be needed to turn an address into coordinates input into the solar generation forecast. This would have started very recently as my PW was caught out by the grotty days at the start of March which followed the sunshine of late February.
scdoubleu
Member
I'll admit to it being in Self-Powered mode up until end of January this year, when we finally switched to Octopus Go. System was installed in mid October 2021.
The consensus is the AI has only ever looked back at the last few days to determine what'll happen tomorrow. This matches our experience over the last 6 weeks. If Tesla is in the process of (finally) fixing this behaviour then I'll be a happy camper. I'm not buying a tent just yet though.
I'm in contact with someone else who has had a pair of PWs for nearly 3 years and he's also seeing more intelligent charging behaviour during the last few days so it might be a matter of the time needed to roll out the new feature. Keep fingers crossed! You might end up with somewhat less than the 3 1/2 years (since time-based control was introduced) of frustrations that I've had to tolerate.
We have been forcing our powerwall to charge to 100% in offpeak since early December by adjusting the sell rate; so we have not noticed any changes, but we would be very surprised by this. I would have expected some rumours by people testing this. We have just gone self powered, so I will not be able to make any observations, but look forward to following yours.
That's called the Energy Gateway versus the Backup Gateway, correct? In other words, you don't have backup power during a power cut, correct?
My understanding is that upgrade to the Backup Gateway is possible in the UK. Finding the right Tesla person or 3rd party vendor is the tricky part.
Another sign of the changed charging algorithm: My Powerwall did some charging last night which, given the recent very sunny weather, is contrary to past behavior. However, my interpretation of today's forecast is less sunny, not continuous cloud, so I'm doubting that this top-up charging was needed.
scdoubleu
Member
In anticipation of today's low cloud off the North Sea, I set two alarms last night so I could adjust the backup reserve to at least get something in the Powerwall during the off-peak period. Knowing the Powerwall's behaviour when a bad solar day follows a run of good solar days, this seemed like a reasonable idea. At 1.7 kW, it wouldn't charge to 100% in the 3 hours available, but it would offset some of the expected peak costs today.
Imagine my surprise, at the 2nd alarm, to see the Powerwall was at 100% charge.
Checked the HomeAssistant graph this morning:
It started charging at 1.7 Kw at 00:30, but at around 0:45 it ramped up to the full 3.6 kW (DNO restriction) and stayed there until the battery was at 100%.
So maybe something has changed, as noted by @JohnRatsey. Next time I won't intervene.
Imagine my surprise, at the 2nd alarm, to see the Powerwall was at 100% charge.
Checked the HomeAssistant graph this morning:
It started charging at 1.7 Kw at 00:30, but at around 0:45 it ramped up to the full 3.6 kW (DNO restriction) and stayed there until the battery was at 100%.
So maybe something has changed, as noted by @JohnRatsey. Next time I won't intervene.
Undecided_2
Member
We’re getting a quote for installing a PW and solar and when installed switching to Octopus
Tesla Plan. Is the PW easy to manage? Or can it be set and forget about it?
Our electric bill is going up ~50% in August. So running the numbers we’ll get pay back in a short time unless energy prices fall.
Tesla Plan. Is the PW easy to manage? Or can it be set and forget about it?
Our electric bill is going up ~50% in August. So running the numbers we’ll get pay back in a short time unless energy prices fall.
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