Utility Rate Plans Where are they?

[colovin]

I don't think the average demand plan would be a benefit to me. I don't regularly draw during peak. Rarely do I draw more than once in a rate period, 99% of the time I'm off the grid durning peak (my goal). My most likely draw is in the winter when the ground water is cold and the tankless water heater pulls a tenth or 2 spike. This weeks stupidity, then another stupid move on my part when I mistakenly threw the breaker for the PW durning peak having to reboot and the time that the Storm Watch went off when there was no storm in my area (that option is now off) are the only times I've drawn more that a tenth 2 or 3 durning the billing period. Monday will probably be the only draw I have this billing period. Average would be .9 and I'd be paying more for my .9 since the demand fee is greater on the average plan.

I just don't understand why all my solar was going to the grid and my battery was going to the house this AM. I'd never seen that before. Yesterday and Monday (after I got back on PW) all solar was going to the house with the battery covering what solar wasn't, as it should be. Why was this AM different?

 

[scotsmanswan]

I don't think the average demand plan would be a benefit to me. I don't regularly draw during peak. Rarely do I draw more than once in a rate period, 99% of the time I'm off the grid durning peak (my goal).

That's exactly when the average demand plan works well. That max peak draw in one day gets averaged across all the other days with zero peak and you may end with zero demand charge. e.g. your 0.9kW from this morning averaged with 20 zero's across the rest of month (only peak days count) is 0.043kW which I think is rounded down to 0 before being applied to, an admittedly lager, demand charge (even without rounding demand charge would be $0.34 = 0.043* $8.13)

 

[KyleDay]

That's exactly when the average demand plan works well. That max peak draw in one day gets averaged across all the other days with zero peak and you may end with zero demand charge. e.g. your 0.9kW from this morning averaged with 20 zero's across the rest of month (only peak days count) is 0.043kW which I think is rounded down to 0 before being applied to, an admittedly lager, demand charge (even without rounding demand charge would be $0.34 = 0.043* $8.13)

I’m also on the average demand plan

 

[colovin]

Ahhh, ok, I thought it was the average between the demands you accumulated not everyday. I will definitely give that a closer look.

 

[colovin]

Things went as they should this morning so maybe zeroing out the sell worked, I'll play around with it. I've changed to Average Demand plan. Won't kick in till next billing cycle. I don't feel bad about being confused by it. Called SRP thinking I'm just changing plans, didn't call the solar section. They transferred me to the solar department (2 hold periods) and the person I talked to had the same confusion that I had. Spent lots of time on hold as she conferred with people. Still didn't have a definitive answer but would get back to me if came out different from what was expected. Kind of like talking to Tesla about the rate plan roll out. Guy claimed that firmware would have to be 21.39 before plans would appear. We're all at 21.35.3. I'd also asked if I was way behind, what happened to .36, .37, .38??? Seems like they should know but I guess half the time they are just reading from a script. Ah the good old days when you could go into a hardware store and the guy on the floor could solve all your problems.

 

[alexguichet]

Guy claimed that firmware would have to be 21.39 before plans would appear. We're all at 21.35.3. I'd also asked if I was way behind, what happened to .36, .37, .38???

- Firmware versions are measured with weeks, so there won't be a .36, .37, .38 — Tesla does not have a history of cutting releases that often
- There is some additional functionality available with 21.39, but the overall functionality is already available.

 

[JayClark]

A rather inauspicious start to the brave new world. Kudos to my wife who took care of the twice a day editing of the split peak period while I was out of town. New abilities appeared late last week in my area. Set it up over the weekend. Was paying attention to what it was doing over the weekend but turns out didn’t pay close enough attention. I was happy all solar was going to charging, no discharge Sunday night. Check at 6:30 am and I was drawing from the grid (peak 5a to 9a) WHY!!!! because this dumb ass had the reserve set to backup 100% AHHHHH. Can’t believe it. Any time I have peak draws it usually because of stupid things done by me. I drew 1.4 kWh before I got on battery power. That cost me 6 cents with a .9 demand charge of $3.14 . . . Oh well.

One thing I noticed this morning. All of my solar was being sold to the grid, house was being powered by the battery. I want what little solar there is early in the morning going to the house not the grid, not sure what the thinking is there. Solar was around 1 kWh, house was drawing 1.2 kWh. Would have been a .2 draw on the battery instead of the 1.2 the system was drawing from the battery. Particularly today which is uncharacteristically cloudy, it could be a struggle to get the battery to 100% by next peak at 5p. Anyone seeing this? I’ve set the sell rate to 0 to see if that sends all the solar to the house or battery until fully charged.

I would have given the new app abilities a rave review if it weren’t for this morning. Not much of a sample size yet. Hopefully my changes take care of the problem. It is MUCH better, now if they could get it to work in the landscape mode on an iPad it would be close to perfect.

One thing you want to make sure you do for your peak period if you don't want to be selling back to the grid is set your "sell" value to 0. I actually set it to 0.01 which seems to work fine, because 0.00 values while they effect behavior, don't "Stick" when it comes to editing configurations (i.ie. they have to be reenters to progress through the config screens when ever you make changes.).

I've tested several times over the last week upping the Sell value and then lowering it. In my case I always have my "Buy" value set to 0.05 during peak. When I test with a value of 0.05 as the sell value it will sell pack during peak. In fact, this is true for Mid Peak also, if you have a sell value that is the same as your buy value in my case when I use 0.05. Setting sell to zero or 0.01 has stopped the sell-back of power to the grid after multiple tests during both Peak and Mid-Peak windows.

 

[colovin]

I see what you mean about the reentering when editing. I've gone ahead and put the sell at .01. This AM was still working as expected with it at zero. Will check again on Monday with the new .01 sell value. I just don't want to be selling back during peak unless my battery is full and the house is covered. I don't missing having to edit the peak period twice a day.