Time of Use Power Shifting for Powerwall 2

[eml2]

Can people chime in and indicate whether or not the Time-based Control is available and where they are located?

I am in Colorado and recently turned on my Powerwalls. Originally, I was on 1.17.x before I turned them on but got upgraded to 1.22.1 recently. I do not have Time-based Control. From what I've read, it looks like it is only available in California and Australia.

Any idea on when it will be available in Colorado (or elsewhere)?

I am in Massachusetts and I have TBC for almost 2 months now. From the app, go to CUSTOMIZE, in addition to Backup-only and Self-powered, I also have Advanced (TBC) and Storm Watch. It is currently in 1.22.3, but I think Tesla needs to turn TBC on for you.

 

[MorrisonHiker]

I am in Massachusetts and I have TBC for almost 2 months now. From the app, go to CUSTOMIZE, in addition to Backup-only and Self-powered, I also have Advanced (TBC) and Storm Watch. It is currently in 1.22.3, but I think Tesla needs to turn TBC on for you.

I will be calling Tesla this afternoon to ask if they can turn on TBC. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping it's available here. When they were doing the install, one of the employees said it isn't available here yet but maybe he didn't know about the need to call and ask to have it turned on.

 

[Aegis]

Random question about the GUI for setting up times for peak/off peak-

for some reason I can’t get the iPhone app to let me select Midnight as the end of peak, it just won’t let me move the bar past 1130 and is stuck there and won’t go to midnight

I tried removing and putting in a new time period, but can’t get to midnight

Anyone have any tips? Probably something I am totally missing here

 

[Shygar]

Might be a bug.

 

[montreid]

Random question about the GUI for setting up times for peak/off peak-

for some reason I can’t get the iPhone app to let me select Midnight as the end of peak, it just won’t let me move the bar past 1130 and is stuck there and won’t go to midnight

I tried removing and putting in a new time period, but can’t get to midnight

Anyone have any tips? Probably something I am totally missing here

Same here. Just switched over to TOU5 and couldn't move the off peak to 12mn either

 

[MorrisonHiker]

I will be calling Tesla this afternoon to ask if they can turn on TBC. I'm crossing my fingers and hoping it's available here. When they were doing the install, one of the employees said it isn't available here yet but maybe he didn't know about the need to call and ask to have it turned on.

I called last night and requested they turn on TBC. The agent said it should turn on automatically if the CT sensors are reporting accurately. She tried making some changes but this morning, I noticed everything was reporting backwards (like the house was producing 8.4 kW and solar was consuming 7.5 kW.

I called again today and asked if they could put things back. They gave an additional bit of information and said that TBC will be enabled automatically after the system has been on a few days and the CT sensors report correctly. She said they do a daily sweep around 7:30 in the morning. Since we just got ours officially activated yesterday (even though we got PTO and turned everything on last week), we missed the 7:30 scan. So...it might've started working if we hadn't called.

They made a few changes to the settings. She didn't change them back to be exactly how they were before but said it should correct the issue. She said to way up to two hours to see the change so it sounds like it probably checks every hour around a certain time and if you miss that first check, it can be up to another hour. We'll see...

 

[Aegis]

Same here. Just switched over to TOU5 and couldn't move the off peak to 12mn either

Thanks for confirming, I put in a bug report

 

[Bigtanuki]

Random question about the GUI for setting up times for peak/off peak-

for some reason I can’t get the iPhone app to let me select Midnight as the end of peak, it just won’t let me move the bar past 1130 and is stuck there and won’t go to midnight

I tried removing and putting in a new time period, but can’t get to midnight

Anyone have any tips? Probably something I am totally missing here

I had the same experience. While fooling around with with the times in the schedule editor I noticed that if I pulled the END time indicator to the left it would go to midnight and then I could set the other indicator to the changeover time from peak to partial peak (in my case). Voila' , finally got it set to start at midnight. Give it a try.

 

[Aegis]

I had the same experience. While fooling around with with the times in the schedule editor I noticed that if I pulled the END time indicator to the left it would go to midnight and then I could set the other indicator to the changeover time from peak to partial peak (in my case). Voila' , finally got it set to start at midnight. Give it a try.

Genius! Thanks for posting the solution

 

[MorrisonHiker]

I called last night and requested they turn on TBC. The agent said it should turn on automatically if the CT sensors are reporting accurately. She tried making some changes but this morning, I noticed everything was reporting backwards (like the house was producing 8.4 kW and solar was consuming 7.5 kW.

I called again today and asked if they could put things back. They gave an additional bit of information and said that TBC will be enabled automatically after the system has been on a few days and the CT sensors report correctly. She said they do a daily sweep around 7:30 in the morning. Since we just got ours officially activated yesterday (even though we got PTO and turned everything on last week), we missed the 7:30 scan. So...it might've started working if we hadn't called.

They made a few changes to the settings. She didn't change them back to be exactly how they were before but said it should correct the issue. She said to way up to two hours to see the change so it sounds like it probably checks every hour around a certain time and if you miss that first check, it can be up to another hour. We'll see...

After a couple of days, the TBC option showed up automatically as they said it would.

I tried it out today. I do see it is...different. I wish there was a little more flexibility. I guess I'll give it a couple weeks to decide if I like TBC or Self-powered better.

 

[montreid]

So TOU5 for a month -- nice results:

Prior: NEM 1.0 and Grandfathered into EV-TOU2 until 4/2019 - so Peak 12p-6p
Total 1237
PK -198 @0.417 = -82.65
Off pk 637 @0.36 = $203.84
Super off pk 798 @0.22 = $175.56

--NEM charges 442.43 - 82.65 for credits = 359.78 monthly = 0.29/kwh average

New: : TOU-5 with Peak 4p-9p ---remember we have Powerwall 2 to allow time-shifting -
Total 1199
Pk -56 @0.5955 = -33.35
Off pk 259 @0.211 = $54.58
Super off pk 1007 $90.63 + 16 = 105.63

-NEM Charges: 160.21 – 33.35 for credits = 126.86 monthly = 0.11/kwh average

So after a month on TOU5, we really saved a bundle. We did move 200 kwh over to the superoff peak because of that the off pk savings were huge too. Though we were significantly less on the pk since 4p-9p and only a little period 4-6p for the negative net flow to the grid. So if you have a very large array, you may still be ahead in the TOU2 GF mode. In our case, the return of the low 0.09 is significant and still cheaper with the $16 monthly fee. Anyone using over 125kwh on super off pk will be ahead on TOU5.

 

[jesseasi]

Question - I just had two powerwalls installed. They set it up where pretty much my whole home is backed up. The only items outside the backup are EV charging circuits (which I use at night) and one of my two solar systems.

I have two solar systems - one 11.6kw and one 13.2kw. Tesla put the 13.2kw system on the backup to charge the batteries. The 11.6kw system is outside just to back feed the grid. (I have a total of 76 panels on my roof - I should be able to way over produce during the year).

I live in Southern California (SCE is my service provider). I switched to Time of Use A just before the March 1st cut off.

I have been trying to figure out what is the best way to setup my powerwall.

Based on this information - SCE Rate Changes (Time of Use for Solar) . - If I overproduce during peak ours I am earning credits at the peak rate. Then if I use electricity in off peak time my rate is drastically cheaper. .51 peak, .29 shoulder, and .13 super off peak.

However - SCE is not going to pay me at the end of the year for all my over production at a rate of .51 during peak or .29 during shoulder. (These are the only times I would over produce)

Based on this information - Net Surplus Compensation Rate . My over production will be paid back to me at a wholesale rate of about .03 per kw.

I probably did not need the powerwall for any cost savings based on the first link above. But I got the powerwall for piece of mind and hopefully some cost savings.

So my basic question - how should I configure my powerwall setup? I find that Time of Use will start sending all my solar production back to the grid during peak time and power the house off batteries. This seems counter intuitive because as soon as it gets dark my batteries may already be depleted by 50% when it could have saved all that power for evening / shoulder times?

The Peak rates are from 2pm-8pm M-F. In the winter it gets dark by 5pm and in the summer it will be nearly dark between 7-8pm. For sure the powerwall should save energy for Peak times when there is little to no production.

How are the rest of you dealing with this? I almost feel like self powered makes more sense - but at night when rates are .13 it does not make much sense to use the powerwall - and power should be saved for the shoulder time at 8am the next morning when rates are more but solar production is not enough to cover the current needs.

Any tips / ideas?

 

[cwied]

If you have a surplus of power no matter what you do, I don't think it makes a difference whether you offset during peak or shoulder rates. At the end of the year when you true up, you're going to be paid back at the wholesale rate for the surplus production. Any extra credit you generated by offsetting shoulder rather than off-peak will be wiped out at that point.

I do think that self-powered may make the most sense for you.

 

[ohmman]

If you have a surplus of power no matter what you do, I don't think it makes a difference whether you offset during peak or shoulder rates. At the end of the year when you true up, you're going to be paid back at the wholesale rate for the surplus production. Any extra credit you generated by offsetting shoulder rather than off-peak will be wiped out at that point.

I do think that self-powered may make the most sense for you.

Agreed.

 

[NuShrike]

You should do whatever you can to get the PowerWalls to offset your NBCs. You'll be pulling NBCs whenever you use the grid.

You may set your "peak" TOU times to be from some time before sunset to sunrise/8am (which includes the 2-8pm peak, and 8-10pm shoulder). Then have your PWs offset through the night ...

 

[miimura]

The way it is behaving during Peak (discharging batteries to match household consumption) is designed to maximize your solar NEM credits during the Peak hours. If you don't want it to do this, then eliminate the Peak period from your schedule and leave it Off-Peak and Part-Peak. I think this will cause it to be like Self-Powered during the day and disallow any discharge during Off-Peak.

You can also look to see if there is a CCA starting up in your area. They usually have better compensation for solar surplus than the major utilities. I just heard about Clean Power Alliance, which is starting up in areas served by SCE in LA and Ventura counties.

 

[MIT_S60]

I was originally interested in Powerwalls for TOU shifting, but now that SCE changed up the rates it looks like the benefit is much smaller with TOU-PRIME. The delta between on-peak versus not is much smaller, as are the number of on-peak hours. 4-9pm is an easier schedule not to use the AC, then crank it the rest of the day.

 

[NuShrike]

I was originally interested in Powerwalls for TOU shifting, but now that SCE changed up the rates it looks like the benefit is much smaller with TOU-PRIME. The delta between on-peak versus not is much smaller, as are the number of on-peak hours. 4-9pm is an easier schedule not to use the AC, then crank it the rest of the day.

When they do that? This is the first time I've heard of TOU-Prime, and I check their site daily.

Looks like I would want to stay on TOU-D-A to maximize the ~51c-2c peak FiT, as their new FiTs are much lower while off-peak rates haven't changed much. Wow, but removing the TOU-D-A and TOU-D-B plans, they're basically almost doubled the off-peak/shoulder rates for everybody.

23c for (super)off-peak summer for TOU--D-4--9 (8pm to 5pm) vs TOU-D-A's summer 13c for super-off-peak (10pm to 8am) ...

 

[jesseasi]

When they do that? This is the first time I've heard of TOU-Prime, and I check their site daily.

Looks like I would want to stay on TOU-D-A to maximize the ~51c-2c peak FiT, as their new FiTs are much lower while off-peak rates haven't changed much. Wow, but removing the TOU-D-A and TOU-D-B plans, they're basically almost doubled the off-peak/shoulder rates for everybody.

23c for (super)off-peak summer for TOU--D-4--9 (8pm to 5pm) vs TOU-D-A's summer 13c for super-off-peak (10pm to 8am) ...

For SCE Customers: New plans become available April 30 . Time-Of-Use Residential Rate Plans

TOU-D-Prime - need to have an EV or Electric Storage. .49 4-9pm .13 9pm-4pm. Weekend .27 4-9pm, .13 9pm-4pm.
This seems pretty good but there is a .40 Daily Charge.

My current grandfather plan - SCE Grandfathered Rate Plans
TOU-D-A

Off-Peak: 29 cents from 8 a.m. to 2 p.m., and 8 p.m. to 10 p.m.
Super Off-Peak: 13 cents from 10 p.m. to 8 a.m.
On-Peak: 51 cents from 2 p.m. to 8 p.m.

With minimum daily charge of .35. But you get a 200kw allowance or $14 credit each month.

Not sure - but the TOU-D-Prime seems pretty good. Especially in the winter months when days are shorter and there are more cloudy days. .13 for all the off peak time seems like a great deal.

With the Powerwall I could easily wipe out any grid use during 4-9pm.

Not sure - but the Prime rate seems pretty good.

 

[BrokerDon]

We don't have solar or a Powerwall and use very little AC (we live near the ocean) but we do have a Tesla Model S P85D. Our SCE bill averages $75 (SDP months) to $175 a month for our 2007 built 3,300 sq. ft. single family home (with including a SubZero refrigerator and 2 beer fridges in our patio BBQ island. We got estimates to install a 6.87 kW (DC), 6.00 kW (AC) SunPower solar system on our fragile Spanish tile roof 2 years ago but the $26,000 (after 30% tax credit) under NEM 2.0 that pushed the the R.O.I. way out... and would detract from our high end home's Tuscany design. Now that TOU-D-PRIME reduces solar generation creditsfurther, solar and Tesla Powerwall(s) appears even less attractive. 8-(

We're on TOU-D-B-SDP (Summer Discount Plan) which SCE's Rate Calculator shows is better than either the new TOU-D 4-9 or 5-9 plans... but SCE still doesn't have their Rate Calculator showing TOU-D-PRIME. Sure seems like SCE doesn't want their customers to switch to PRIME... but I'd still like their Rate Calculator to show a comparison of our actual usage of TOU-D-B-SDP to TOU-D-PRIME-SDP... Hopefully soon.