PSEG and change to RLM time of use Billing

[Ejl80]

Hello Stretch2727, I have been driving a Tesla for 4 years now, 3 with an X and now a Y. My yearly consumption is about 27000 kwh out of which probably 17000 kwh is used at night to charge the car-so off peak. I recently put a 20KW solar system and now I am thinking about switching to RLM. Today while browsing the PSE&G site, I saw this in the Solar Power and Net metering section under FAQs for Time of Use.
"Each Time-of-Use period has its own Energy Credit Bank. Excess generation during a "Peak" period is credited to the "Peak" period energy bank, and can only offset future "Peak" period usage. Similar energy banks are created for other periods. “Peak” and “Off Peak” energy banks cannot be combined."
Does this mean that the energy produced during the daytime-peak period(almost most of it) cannot be used for charging my car at night when it is offpeak? This in my case is 2/3rd of my usage.
Is this what you mentioned in an earlier post that NJBPU does not allow this?

hello.

Any electricity generated during peak hours goes into a peak bank. And is only used during peak hours only. Any off peak generation can only be used during off peak times. During the summer I generated a huge peak overage but it is being used now during the winter since production plummets now.

 

[Devy12345]

Hello Ejl80,
thank you for your reply.
Unfortunately, I expect most or at least 60% of usage at night charging my Y. I have to charge it every weeknight as it depletes to 50 mile, especially in winter.
I guess I will know after a full year. I have the usage calcs on my Solar Edge inverter so will be able to do it from the app.
With some luck, my solar production will negate my usage and then RLM won't matter.

 

[Stretch2727]

Hello Stretch2727, I have been driving a Tesla for 4 years now, 3 with an X and now a Y. My yearly consumption is about 27000 kwh out of which probably 17000 kwh is used at night to charge the car-so off peak. I recently put a 20KW solar system and now I am thinking about switching to RLM. Today while browsing the PSE&G site, I saw this in the Solar Power and Net metering section under FAQs for Time of Use.
"Each Time-of-Use period has its own Energy Credit Bank. Excess generation during a "Peak" period is credited to the "Peak" period energy bank, and can only offset future "Peak" period usage. Similar energy banks are created for other periods. “Peak” and “Off Peak” energy banks cannot be combined."
Does this mean that the energy produced during the daytime-peak period(almost most of it) cannot be used for charging my car at night when it is offpeak? This in my case is 2/3rd of my usage.
Is this what you mentioned in an earlier post that NJBPU does not allow this?

Yes each time of use has it's own energy bank. Yes with most of usage at night you would end up with excess credits during the day.

The way I think of of this is now you have the flexibility to charge your car when you want and only pay for off peak usage. I shifted my charging to the evening peak time to use up my excess day time credits. The simple way to calculate the savings is take your net KwH usage after the solar was installed and reduce the price from about $0.21 to $0.07 per Kwh, add back in the $10 service fee and see if it saves you money. The time of use saved me as much as the solar system per my costs from above.


Standard Rates with electric cars - $230/month. Average 1000KwH Month.
RLM (Time of Use) - $125/month 200Kwh Peak/ 800kwH Offpeak. The cars were using about 400-500kwH per month all off peak.
RLM and Solar -$30/month. 0 peak/ 300KwH - I have actually started charging during peak as I have excess peak credits so this reduced my off peak usage.

 

[USBSeawolf2000]

Sorry to revive this thread but I have good information to save us some more money.

PSE&G launched the Electric Vehicle Charging Program and I have been asking questions and have gather as followed:

• The charger would use RLM rate so it is ~7 cents off-peak vs ~18 cents for RS plan.
• I have a net-metered PV system so I am on RS plan with $4.95 monthly fee. RLM monthly fee ($13.94) will not be added.

For those currently on RLM may be able to switch back to RS plan and enroll in EVCP to save $9 per month. Be sure to check the requirements.

I am unsure how the true-up will work with RLM. If I charge ~300 kWh off-peak, will it net as ~100kWh?

 

[Ejl80]

Sorry to revive this thread but I have good information to save us some more money.

PSE&G launched the Electric Vehicle Charging Program and I have been asking questions and have gather as followed:

• The charger would use RLM rate so it is ~7 cents off-peak vs ~18 cents for RS plan.
• I have a net-metered PV system so I am on RS plan with $4.95 monthly fee. RLM monthly fee ($13.94) will not be added.

For those currently on RLM may be able to switch back to RS plan and enroll in EVCP to save $9 per month. Be sure to check the requirements.

I am unsure how the true-up will work with RLM. If I charge ~300 kWh off-peak, will it net as ~100kWh?

I didn’t see the Tesla wall connector on the list of approved devices.

 

[USBSeawolf2000]

I didn’t see the Tesla wall connector on the list of approved devices.

Right. I got Charge Point Home Flex ($700) to replace my Gen2 Tesla WC.

I am contemplating if it is worth all the trouble to save 11 cents per kWh especially, I'll need to use J1772 to Tesla converter every time I charge (and remove it to hang the J1772 back on Home Flex.

 

[Ejl80]

Right. I got Charge Point Home Flex ($700) to replace my Gen2 Tesla WC.

I am contemplating if it is worth all the trouble to save 11 cents per kWh especially, I'll need to use J1772 to Tesla converter every time I charge (and remove it to hang the J1772 back on Home Flex.

Its like 25,000 miles of driving for you to make up the 700 bucks for the different wall connector to participate in the program. (assuming 4 miles per kWh). I'd say it isn't worth the trouble. I've found the RLM to be a much better money saver for me.

 

[USBSeawolf2000]

Its like 25,000 miles of driving for you to make up the 700 bucks for the different wall connector to participate in the program. (assuming 4 miles per kWh). I'd say it isn't worth the trouble. I've found the RLM to be a much better money saver for me.

30% off $700 with federal tax credit and I can sell the Gen2 Wall Connector and it'll be ~$100 out of my pocket.

 

[Ejl80]

30% off $700 with federal tax credit and I can sell the Gen2 Wall Connector and it'll be ~$100 out of my pocket.

Disregard my math then haha.

 

[hakunamattata]

Right. I got Charge Point Home Flex ($700) to replace my Gen2 Tesla WC.

I am contemplating if it is worth all the trouble to save 11 cents per kWh especially, I'll need to use J1772 to Tesla converter every time I charge (and remove it to hang the J1772 back on Home Flex.

Did you have your wall connector hardwired or on a NEMA 14-50? I am looking for electricians to swap out my Tesla Wall Connector with a Juicebox, any recommendations

 

[gnuarm]

Did you have your wall connector hardwired or on a NEMA 14-50? I am looking for electricians to swap out my Tesla Wall Connector with a Juicebox, any recommendations

I'm curious, are you doing that so you can use a J1772 connector with any EV? I was looking at using an open source EVSE and the guy said it could be fitted with either connector. Maybe your Tesla box could be fitted with a J1772 connector if that's all you need.

 

[hakunamattata]

I have multiple reasons for doing it

a) My utility company is providing off peak charging rates only for Chargepoint & Juicebox, they are working with Tesla however I don't expect Tesla opening their API's any time soon
b) My existing wall connector's cable length is 18 feet and it is a pain to charge my second EV without doing some parking tricks
c) I want to future proof myself by going to an Open source EVSE this way I can charge any EV with it

 

[gnuarm]

I have multiple reasons for doing it

a) My utility company is providing off peak charging rates only for Chargepoint & Juicebox, they are working with Tesla however I don't expect Tesla opening their API's any time soon
b) My existing wall connector's cable length is 18 feet and it is a pain to charge my second EV without doing some parking tricks
c) I want to future proof myself by going to an Open source EVSE this way I can charge any EV with it

Is Juicebox open source? The only open source product I'm familiar with is OpenEVSE.

I'm not sure how much future proofing you need other than a J1772 connector. That is used both in the US and the EU (someone correct me if I'm wrong) supporting up to 80 amp circuits. That should cover nearly any real need for charging... even the Cybertruck can be charged overnight.

 

[gnuarm]

I have multiple reasons for doing it

a) My utility company is providing off peak charging rates only for Chargepoint & Juicebox, they are working with Tesla however I don't expect Tesla opening their API's any time soon

So the utility would have control over the charging or I suppose get info on when you are charging and bill at different rates?

Some (less informed) people talk about needing to expand electrical generation and transmission to accomodate EVs, but there is plenty of spare capacity that is going to waste presently. If EV charging is timed appropriately it not only does not run up electrical costs, by utilizing wasted capacity lowers the amortized costs of capital depreciation and fixed costs such as company overhead. Charging EVs can actually make electricity cheaper! if managed appropriately. The only increased cost is the addition of equipment for communications and control.

My concern is that customers need to be in the conversations and planning about this. Otherwise the utilities have the potential of turning it into a profit center.

 

[USBSeawolf2000]

Did you have your wall connector hardwired or on a NEMA 14-50? I am looking for electricians to swap out my Tesla Wall Connector with a Juicebox, any recommendations

I have not pulled the trigger yet. I want to go hardwire so I get 50 amps instead of 40A with NEMA 14-50 (yea, misleading). Although my SR+ can only pull 32A, I may need to use it for the Cybertruck (preordered).

 

[Cupidchild]

Honestly this is not what I have seen. Off peak is $0.06-0.08. Peak is 0.22-0.26 depending on summer winter. If you have an electric car and can shift to off peak you can save a lot. Here is my experience.


Standard Rates with electric cars - $230/month. Average 1000KwH Month.
RLM (Time of Use) - $125/month 200Kwh Peak/ 800kwH Offpeak. The cars were using about 400-500kwH per month all off peak.
RLM and Solar -$30/month. 0 peak/ 300KwH - I have actually started charging during peak as I have excess peak credits so this reduced my off peak usage.

Time of use actually saved me more than solar and costs nothing except the extra $10/month service fee. All the info above includes the monthly service fee.

This is the latest RLM rates I found on PSE&G and looks like if you have Solar + RLM it will indeed be worth it.

 

[Ejl80]

View attachment 739103
This is the latest RLM rates I found on PSE&G and looks like if you have Solar + RLM it will indeed be worth it.

I saved about 400 bucks my first year on RLM (I have solar but it doesn’t cover everything). I’d actually have saved more pushing some more stuff to peak times.

 

[Olly_]

I recently asked to switch to RLM and PSE&G swapped out my meter a few days ago - the only thing is I'm not 100% convinced it's the right meter because it doesn't count peak/off peak separately.

Can anybody else who has RLM and solar confirm if their meter is a Landis+Gyr Focus FAXRe-SD?

There are only 3 registers shown on the display, import, export and what I think is peak demand. It does appear to be a smart meter so I'm hoping this doesn't matter and PSE&G get interval data to bill correctly but there's no way of knowing until my next bill is generated...

 

[gnuarm]

View attachment 739103
This is the latest RLM rates I found on PSE&G and looks like if you have Solar + RLM it will indeed be worth it.

Those are some crazy transmission rates. 14 cents per kWh on peak and a quarter of a cent credit for off peak??? I don't get why they would do the same peak rate jack up for distribution. The idea of peak rates is that generation is high at peak time since it is using facilities that are shut down or run at low levels the rest of the time, requiring high charges to cover the amortization and fixed costs. Distribution costs are all fixed costs, so why charge more at peak times since there is no change in the cost?

The actual numbers are not as high as I was paying. My usual rate is 10 or 13 cents per kWh (under/over 800 kWh). ToU off peak is 7 cents per, on peak winter is 21 cents and on peak summer is 38 cents per kWh. The only way I could save money on my electric bill with ToU was to literally cut off heat or cooling during the peak times.

I thought about getting solar since it would make lots of money, but I found they would not allow net metering at ToU rates. Yeah, I get that for sure! I gave up on the ToU last year and recently had some conversation with them about it. Seems they only have about 50 customers using it. However, they are adding a new program benefiting EV owners. Promise to not charge during peak times, and they will give you a flat $7 a month. Considering I seldom charge at home, that's not a bad deal. Even if I did charge the car at home, the entire cost would be around four times that, so around 25% savings.

I think, down the road, there will be enough EVs charging that they will want to have more control over the scheduling. They may require meters with a separate connection for the car, so they are in the loop on the schedule, and you have to pay different rates like a ToU, but in real time with respect to demand and supply. It could be done with the EVSE or even the car itself, but you know how utilities are, they want control.

 

[Ejl80]

Those are some crazy transmission rates. 14 cents per kWh on peak and a quarter of a cent credit for off peak??? I don't get why they would do the same peak rate jack up for distribution. The idea of peak rates is that generation is high at peak time since it is using facilities that are shut down or run at low levels the rest of the time, requiring high charges to cover the amortization and fixed costs. Distribution costs are all fixed costs, so why charge more at peak times since there is no change in the cost?

The actual numbers are not as high as I was paying. My usual rate is 10 or 13 cents per kWh (under/over 800 kWh). ToU off peak is 7 cents per, on peak winter is 21 cents and on peak summer is 38 cents per kWh. The only way I could save money on my electric bill with ToU was to literally cut off heat or cooling during the peak times.

I thought about getting solar since it would make lots of money, but I found they would not allow net metering at ToU rates. Yeah, I get that for sure! I gave up on the ToU last year and recently had some conversation with them about it. Seems they only have about 50 customers using it. However, they are adding a new program benefiting EV owners. Promise to not charge during peak times, and they will give you a flat $7 a month. Considering I seldom charge at home, that's not a bad deal. Even if I did charge the car at home, the entire cost would be around four times that, so around 25% savings.

I think, down the road, there will be enough EVs charging that they will want to have more control over the scheduling. They may require meters with a separate connection for the car, so they are in the loop on the schedule, and you have to pay different rates like a ToU, but in real time with respect to demand and supply. It could be done with the EVSE or even the car itself, but you know how utilities are, they want control.

Huh????