What’s next, an “all you can eat” plan from SDG&E?
Are there any downsides to switching to EV-TOU-5 from EV-TOU-2 other than the $16 fixed monthly service fee? Has that $16 fee changed since the rate plan became available? I’m wondering how much SDG&E is going to be playing with this fee. Also, is there a fee to change rate plans and can you switch back when you want or are you locked into the new plan for X months?
EV-TOU-5 and EV-TOU-2 use the same TOU periods, so it just comes down to the cost per kWh at the different times, unless you're on the EV-TOU-2 grandfathered plan. To make a long story short, SDG&E changes the rates for the peak, semi, and off periods to their advantage -- no surprise. So, if you're on the grandfathered plan, your peak time is still 11-5 pm sure, but the cost of peak is much less than the peak rate for the non-grandfathered plan. So when you're overproducing, you get paid less. I run the numbers on the different plans and for me the best is EV-TOU-5. We have 10 kW solar power, 3 powerwalls, and 2 EVs -- so your mileage may vary.
You should be able to log on to the SDG&E page, then choose plans and it will compute your cost for that plan using your last year's historical data. A BIG caveat though is you will probably change your use pattern to match your new TOU plan so comparing plans with different TOU periods is not accurate. For example, my old SES plan had off-peak starting at 10 pm and ending at 6 am. On TOU-5 off-peak starts at midnight through 6 am. I had both cars set up to start charging at 10 pm so when looking historically that period between 10 pm and midnight (where most of the charging took place) was way expensive on the TOU-5 historical look. Since I switched I charge starting at midnight -- and of course it is a big savings. I go back and compute what my rate would be at these other plans to see how much I'm saving and it's a lot.
Just looking at my last month. This includes the $16 fee for the TOU-5 plan.
EV-TOU-5: $36.55
EV-TOU-2: $160.77
Tiered plan: $190.43
Tiered without solar (oh my!): $678.98
Looking back at a very hot (lots of AC) summer month -- end of July, first 1/2 of August:
EV-TOU-5: $111.89
EV-TOU-2: $265.39
Tiered: $623.03
Tiered w/o solar: $1532.07
Part of my savings is I can charge my powerwalls during semi-peak during the week and during off-peak on the weekends and use that power to coast through peak time. There are times when it's really hot and both ACs are running that it eats through my reserve before peak time is over.
