Surrounded by PG&E electric land, but not in my city (Roseville), we only have PG&E for gas. We have our own electric utility with great rates and they are not part of CA ISO. Which means they can and do buy more expensive electricity when need to avoid black-outs.
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Three weeks post Install Questions
- Thread starter skiingj
- Start date
Sure, no problem at all.
If I was in your shoes, depending on my electricity plan, I would either setup time based controls (if on a TOU plan) or, consider setting a higher reserve. The reason I say that, is because (as alluded to by a couple others in this thread), your reserve is very low for someone with electricity usage you have.
If you were in an actual power outage, you could do things like turn off the pool pump, or run your AC only during the time the sun was shining (and obviously not charge your car), but with your reserve set so low, you wouldnt have too much time to react if you noticed there was an outage or something.
Self powered mode (which is what I also use) will prioritize using as little power from the grid as possible. Its a fairly simple mode. During the day, solar goes to power your home. Any left over after that goes to the powerwalls. Any left over after THAT goes back to the grid.
Still talking self powered mode here......
If an electrical load happens that can not be met by the solar being generated at the time that load starts, the excess will come from the powerwall. You can see this in your provided screenshots. If that load still can not be met between solar and powerwalls, then it will pull from the grid.
The advanced modes can be setup so that your system tries to get through that 4-9pm peak time on only powerwalls, but whether that is correct for you or not depends on your electrical plan, etc.
Anyway, since self powered mode will prioritize using as little from the grid as possible, even overnight, you will likely always draw down to your reserve. If you have your reserve set that low, and there is a power outage in the middle of the night, there is a real chance you might not have power in the powerwalls to cover it.
I personally use self powered mode because I am still on a tiered energy plan, where how much energy total matters, not when I use it. I am incentivized to keep my overall grid draw as low as possible, not just during peak time, but all the time.
The CA utilities dont allow solar users on these plans any longer, because you can basically keep yourself off grid most of the time from march to august or even longer, given an appropriate sized system, and use the grid as a big powerwall, effectively.
Perhaps the six days estimate was for the combined system of Powerwall and solar? As the Powerwalls alone can hardly power AC for a day, let alone six, it's hard to put any other rational explanation of such an estimate.
Seems that if you subtract out the EV charging, then the daily solar production and daily home consumption (AC included) are both the same around 56-57 kwh. So you could almost go indefinitely, i.e. off-grid, discharging the Powerwalls each night - if it weren't for the roundtrip efficiency losses of daily cycling of the Powerwall. But if you started day 1 with relatively full Powerwalls, then that initial 27kwh helps buffer the system losses, and six days seems like it could be feasible. 10% system losses on 56 kwh would be 5.6kwh, for example, and 27 / 5.6 = 4.8 days - but in reality only half, not all 56 kwh, is cycling through daily either.
Seems that if you subtract out the EV charging, then the daily solar production and daily home consumption (AC included) are both the same around 56-57 kwh. So you could almost go indefinitely, i.e. off-grid, discharging the Powerwalls each night - if it weren't for the roundtrip efficiency losses of daily cycling of the Powerwall. But if you started day 1 with relatively full Powerwalls, then that initial 27kwh helps buffer the system losses, and six days seems like it could be feasible. 10% system losses on 56 kwh would be 5.6kwh, for example, and 27 / 5.6 = 4.8 days - but in reality only half, not all 56 kwh, is cycling through daily either.
So Roseville has its own utility? Lucky for you. That said, I wouldn't be surprised that some of your power comes from PG&E grid which is sketchy
From folks I know living in Roseville, nope they are cheaper and way more reliable
There seem to be a lot of smaller power companies in the Valley. A place we used to own in a housing development in the valley got its power from someplace that is/was a farmer's co-op. The rates were pretty cheap.
All you need to get through is one night because the batteries should fill the next day. We generate around the same amount and have 2 Powerwalls, have a 30% reserve, and almost never use power from the grid. Solar fills the Powerwalls by 11AM or so this time of year. We are in the Tri-Valley, so a little cooler, but not a huge amount.
However, one energy sink we do not have is a pool. We had one growing up in the Central Valley and I never want to have one again. Too much maintenance and cost. We have one on an out-of-state rental property and it is by far the largest monthly maintenance expense.
Roseville Power is part of NCPA. Here are their Members. My point is that some of the power to these various Cities must flow over PG&E lines
- Alameda Municipal Power
- Bay Area Rapid Transit
- City of Biggs
- City of Gridley
- City of Healdsburg
- City of Lompoc
- City of Palo Alto
- City of Ukiah
- Lodi Electric Utility (lodielectric.com)
- Port of Oakland
- Redding Electric Utility (reupower.com)
- Roseville Electric (rosevilleelectric.org)
- Silicon Valley Power
- Truckee Donner PUD (tdpud.org)
- Turlock Irrigation District (tid.org)
Yes local, we also have a small power plant. Rates are .09 first 500, .13 after that. No TOU. I'd imagine they run over PG&E lines but for 20 years I don't think we've ever had a large scale outage, even during Gov Davis with the rolling blackouts. In 20 years I don't think I have ever lost power in the two homes I've lived in.
I think the history of many of these municipal utilities is that they at one point were their own power producers, and did not rely on long-distance transmission lines, and probably were grandfathered in to now be able to use PG&E's without having to pay any exorbitant distribution fees to PG&E. At least the two closest to me, Palo Alto and Santa Clara - Palo Alto had steam and diesel plants back in the early1900's, hasn't had a plant in decades but currently has a 40-year contract for hydro power from the Northwest; while Santa Clara (Silicon Valley Power) still operates its own local gas-fired power plant. I'm guessing both can probably use the PG&E lines for importing/exporting long-distance power.
But I think other local municipalities today can't just suddenly say, I going to start my own utility and buy power from outside California, as they would have to shoulder unfavorable costs to use PG&E's long-distance lines. Now if there was de-regulation as in some states or countries to break up PG&E monopoly into separate generation, distribution, and retail companies - different story....
Agree that PG&E is in the provider upstream for many. A PG&E CEO at one time said they were going to get out of the home service providing business and only provide power to the others that would provide power to the end customer.
The place we owned in the Central Valley was getting electricity from the Modesto Irrigation District and I do not know how they are connected to the electricity generators. But, as I said it was pretty cheap. Considerably lower (now shows $0.14 first 500 kWh, $0.18 over 500 kWh) than PGE is for us in the tri-valley on TOU-B ($0.31 off-peak, $0.41 on-peak (M-F 4-9 PM)).
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