Octopus DD... I switched to Variable DD so only pay for what I'm using that month - they sorted it out really quickly. I know some people like to budget, but given seasonal offsetting I prefer to be getting interest on any credit in *my* bank account, rather than theirs. You're making me reconsider North North-East facing panels to capture energy earlier in the day.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100. Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong. I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork this will sound odd, but changing the amount is harder/met with more resistance than switching to variable DD. It's something Martin Lewis/Money Saving Expert suggested to remedy excess credit.
I found Octopus very good about reducing our direct debit. After only having the ASHP and Tracker tariff for 3 months they accepted what I thought our DD should be for the year.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100. Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong. I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
This was £10k of PV kit. I'm not aware of any harmonics issues. I have heard that the Vaillant heat pump I have is extremely sensitive to this and some PV inverters do not play nicely with the heat pump at all, at the minimum causing it to trip out but at worse causing boards to fry. I did investigate SunSynk before going with their products and they do appear to have good stable output. I hope I've correctly relayed the information above. I'm not an electrical engineer and have done fairly basic research on the subject.
So you actually only got £280 credit for exported electricity for a whole year. That will get completely wiped out when the feed in tariffs drop to near zero when the incentives are no longer needed.
Hold on, Mr. Click Bait. You received £280 from exports. The title should read: "How We Received a £1557 Credit from Octopus Energy Due to Our £280 Export Credit from Solar Panels." On the bright side, £280 is still money in the bank.
Apologies for going a bit click baity. Do the ends justify the means? My analytics behind the scenes show that a much broader audience comes in when I use thumbnails and titles like this. It shows me what other videos they have been watching. My viewership has gone from quite a narrow echo chamber of like minded people to a much broader demographic in every respect. I don't want to be here just preaching to the choir as it were. Hope that makes sense and you're not too offended to stick around and support some reassurance of this kind of technology to combat the FUD.
@serraios1989 yes, but we dont have granular data and it is not individual to the user, so i can't see your specific watch history. We have some broad, anonymised data of what our viewers as a group are also watching. The last couple of months ive noticed a few more anti heat pump/solar/EV videos popping up in there. The comments have also seen a trend towards those who don't "believe" in this stuff and think I'm being conned or I'm a con man myself. At Christmas time it will be a year since i was monetised on youtube and started uploading regularly. Around that time I'll do a full behind the scenes youtube tour and show you all how little money we make from these videos. @@serraios1989
Id love a solar install our usage is pretty low in summer about 6kwh a day so exports would be huge. No gas. Now the heat pumps on that's around 12kwh a day Will see when it gets colder Last year Jan was 420kWh for the month but hopefully I have dialed in the weather comp to be more efficient
It's really good to know you were getting higher than peak. I have a 4.7kWp set of solar panels going to a 3.6kW inverter. When it comes time to replace that inverter, I think I'll look at higher power options if I'm allowed to do so at the time!
You will be allowed to do so, but you would have to set the export limit of the inverter. You could even potentially get that limit raised with a G99 application
G99 is the way, if of course you are sure it's worth harvesting that lost clipped power My hunch would be that you'd never see a return by changing now but like you say, if you're changing anyway...why not.
@@UpsideDownFork Yes, I'm thinking down the road when the inverter goes kaputt rather than now. It's only two years old for now. I already have a G99 done for an EVSE V2G charger for which I was allowed a further 3.68kW so unless they upgrade the network, there's probably no scope for increasing my export further, but I think there are battery systems that use a 5kW inverter that can limit export to 3.68kW and presumably they send the rest to the battery (without inverting in that case I guess - for best efficiency that should be a dc-coupled system and I guess it would go through a DC-to-DC converter stage to align the voltages).
@UpsideDownFork did a video on why a battery wasn't cost-effective for him at the time. Maybe with a car (effectively a large battery in terms of demand) and heat pump it still doesn't make much sense?
Essentially if you can cover more than 70-80% of your consumption through a combination of solar and a cheap TOU tariff then the capital invested in a battery is wasted. We load shift as much as we can and a battery would save us a few ££s per year but never pay for itself. We spent the same money we would have spent on a system but instead of 8 panels and a 10kWh battery we went for 22 panels and no battery. Time will tell as we make our way through the winter but so far it's looking very good.
I will be very interested to see how the ratio of generation between your North and South panels changes over the year. I can't remember if the 64% figure for last month was similar to what you were getting in the middle of summer, and I wonder what it will be like in January... BTW, Octopus let me adjust my direct debit on their web site when I built up a credit - and then switched to just billing me the exact amount each month.
Over the course of the year, the split is still above the 64% of September. Hopefully I remember to include a good summary of this in the annual wrap up. I know half the people are just here for the N vs S solar study!
I really enjoyed the update as always and have just joined IOG with my Zappi. A few niggling issues but early days. I really want NW facing PV but I can't convince higher management!!! Help needed!!
Already subbed, but usually "like" your videos as they are well presented, interesting and useful. I am looking forward to starting my journey (waiting to move house) as lessons learnt here are great.
Being able to time-shift his demand would save him some money as he could store electricity from the grid or solar to use when prices are higher on the Agile tariff (especially in the evenings when prices are higher). I have a small 5kWh battery that cycles twice per day, importing overnight for the raised morning peak and in the afternoon for the 4-7pm peak.
If you're already benefiting from off-peak electricity then the payback time is very long. Mine works at around 8 years before the electricity prices rose in October. I'm a low energy user but even if I had double the usage I still wouldn't buy a battery as the battery prices are continually reducing.
Save on the monthly import costs? Yes, a little saving would have been made last month. BUT, I'm not where near a battery having a 10 year pay back. The capital cost is still far too high, even though I have a hybrid inverter and the cost of adding a battery is much lower than for others.
We've had 6kWp with a 9.5kWh battery. Generated 555kWh in Sept with 395kWh home use, 472kWh import and 607 kWh export. So far since May we've been paid £880 for export, against £492 for import including Standing charges, so £388 in profit (£460 excluding standing charge). High import use is because we were on Intelligent Flux until the 1st Oct where is charges and discharges the battery for you for grid balancing at about 7p per kWh to you. We've now switched to COSY with a 12.65p low to buy and a 15p export, so battery is charges in the lows, all solar sold and we live off the battery and solar. It will be interesting to see how much that costs and eats into our £460. So far it's been £15.06 for 10 days including the standing charges.
Good information & informative. I am running 4 5kW solar on 2 roofs with separate 3.6kW battery inverter along with Vaillant 7kw Arrotherm plus no issues ! I also have Solar Iboost to feed hot water cylinder & 200l buffer tank. All working with Octopus Go Inteligent & Kia Eniro4+ charging etc
6 of the 22 have optimisers. I don't have a full data set over a complete year. So far, they will never generate enough extra to pay for themselves. Averaging 1% extra over and above what I would generate without them fitted. We'll see if things change this winter. That's specific to my installation and the hard shading I experience. Scattered and intermittent shading may yield better gains. They do offer panel level monitoring and you cannot objectively put a price on that extra data.
@@UpsideDownFork thanks got the detailed reply. I think with modern half cell panels with their 3 diodes (effectively giving 6 mini panels) a lot of the optimisation by shading is done in panel. It seems like installers still suggest them though.
@@UpsideDownFork I still think you would make massive savings with a battery. You considered a DIY battery like the Seplos or YIXIANG battery boxes? You can get 16kwh for less than £1500.
@@007silverwings I am space limited so it does rule out some battery options. Realistically they will need to be high level wall mounted. The real question is, if I can power my house, car, heating, everything and have a zero bill at the end of it, why would I invest in batteries? Grid independence? There's an argument for that in some areas but not where I live. I don't remember a power cut in 14 years of living here. Reduce grid emissions? That is a noble gesture but most people could cut a lot more from their personal emissions through lots of other means like walking locally, changing diet etc. I'm not saying no battery is the only way, I'm just here to prove that it is a viable route. My plan as it stands is to milk the 15p export until it dies and then I'll probably pick up 20-30kWh of battery storage. Hopefully by then it is much cheaper than now as a bonus. 👍
Have you made a video showing your investment in panels, inverter, heat pump, ancillary electrical equipment (timers etc), car charger, electrician's bills and the cost of the car?
Looks like a fresh video is on the cards. It's approx £30k for -Insulation -Heat pump -Solar -EV Including all costs, fees etc. I could have spent a lot less on insulation (cost twice as much as the heat pump!), but I'm happy that I got good deals on the rest of the stuff.
How are you allowed to generated more than 4kWp on your system. The DNO won’t allow consumers to generate more since it could damage your service cable to your house?
I'd be interested in the payback video. My decision on solar definitely wasn't purely for financial reasons but it's still interesting and makes it easier to encourage others to adopt solar if the payback period isn't too long. I reckon payback for my system is more like 12 years when comparing vs if I'd just gone with tracker tariff and no solar (I don't think comparing with standard tariff is realistic). And as an aside, an average of 12/13p/kWh on agile seems good! I've only just switched to agile but it's more like 16-17p/kWh at the moment. I avoid any grid import from 4-7pm but think I probably need to load shift more to the early hours of the morning. I suspect that is how you've got it so low - the EV probably helps with this too i.e. it ensures a much bigger chunk of your usage is in the cheapest possible periods?
Yes, I agree that some of the payback calculations can be misleading as they compare against the price cap. As you say, not realistic for anyone savvy. We load shift our hot water production, washing machine, tumble dryer and dishwasher. The EV has helped but the rates have just generally been a little higher more recently. We achieved a lower average unit rate in other months when we didn't have the EV. Agile is still the winning tariff for us as of today.
Hi just a bit of advice if possible please I’ve recently just got 6.4 kWh Solar along with sun synk battery 10.4 I’m getting Vaillant aroTHERM plus 7kW Heatpump installed next wk Was wondering if there’s any advice to which tariff is best for all 3 solar battery ASHP octopus still recommend me to stay on octopus flux import export tariff I was planning on moving over to the cosy tariff just thinking with having 3 dips surly this would be cheaper to run ASHP I understand your not able to export on Cosy Once ASHP installed Was also planning to discharge battery from 4pm onwards if staying on flux Thanks
Do you have an EV? I guess not? As solar is so low and things get colder, you will definitely benefit from switching to Cosy. You can still export on the fixed outgoing at 15p. With 10.4kWh you should be able to easily cover the peak rate and for most of winter you should be able to run off the lowest rate for 99% of the time. Let me know how you get on!
@@UpsideDownFork just signed upto Octopus fixed outgoings and cosy thanks for letting us know I never thought your able to export while on cosy tariff. ASHP install next wk Just hoping it does what it says on the tin 😀👍🏻 keep up the vids 👍🏻
I was planning to install four more panels on the garden shed to benefit from the high export prices, however it looks like soon we are going to be penalised for exporting solar energy to the grid.
We still need 3x the solar we have in Britain. I think the fear-mongering is overblown, though the current Octopus/other provider Export rates could always be subject to change. We aren't Australia yet?
Not really an issue. Energy consumption is still higher than energy production. You can always add a home battery later and shift the export to a high demand time if export at noon gets to negative prices. Todays solar panels will work fine for about 25 years, so make some more export profit now and save up for a home battery later.
At the peak of summer, UK solar was only about a third of demand. Solar capacity doubles about every 4 years, so maybe by 2030 we'll be discouraged from exporting at midday. But by then batteries will be so cheap that it'll be easy to time-shift that export to the evening demand peak.
Amazing results for your North array. Well done for being brave!! Now that you have an EV, have you considered IOG?, as it more or less will give you 7ppm 24x7 (if you define your own car / charge rate - albeit in my case in the ohme app, but we also have a small 🔋)
He has that option, but he would need a large-ish battery to use the 7p rate all day with the heat pump. There are battery costs and electricity conversion losses that I'm sure @UpsideDownFork would love to put in a spreadsheet and video!
@@Biggest-dh1vr You're right here, what we do is charge the MG4 at 1.44/Kwh via the Ohme, but also gives electric at 7p/Kw to the house simultaneously, so if we plug in at 15:00, it still charges us at 7p for all power until the car is fully charged = happy bunnies!!
It's a good strategy! Unfortunately the EV is my wife's car and she leaves the house at 7am to return from work at 5:30pm so on balance it looks like agile still has the edge for us. If the car was at home more of the time and/or we had decent battery storage then it may be worthwhile doing.
I think @UpsideDownFork has covered this in a response to @weepz, where he says he wouldn't see anywhere near a 10 year payback time due to his use and tariff?
I have a heatpump with 14 kwh of batteries. I will never be able to cover all the load with batteries but it really does cover most of the usage except for the coldest days.
@UpsideDownFork I don't really know how long it would take I have 4 pylontech us3000c batteries so u could make it out from that but probably a long time. I have a tariff which I can charge at 7 cent euro instead of paying 25 cent so it makes sense if you're getting 300% efficiency from your heatpump it's only costing 2.5 cent per kwh of heat instead of paying 10 cent per kwh of gas which u are only getting 85% efficiency.
I have 20x410w Longi panels with givenergy 5kw hybrid invert + 9.5kWh battery installed December 2023 so slightly less than yours. I have severe winter shading from the house next door which I think essentially makes our south panels act like North panels for 3 months of the year, I'm keen to see how your North face panels work over the winter months because we do have sufficient north roof area for the same again. With the 5kW inverter I do occasionally see clipping but only perhaps over 20 days since install. Looking forward to October stats (hopefully around 3rd of the month) 😉 will that annual 8Mw be achieved! ...it's a nice thought. If you hadn't mentioned the slides errors I wonder how many would have noticed and then commented.
I have solar (30x445W panels) and an EV charger, the DNO (national grid) won't let me install a heat pump or induction hob without paying them £12k for 3 phase :( I have a 100A supply but they won't budge. Not sure how we're supposed to "go green" when the DNOs hold people to ransom.
@@richardskinner6391 this may or may not help but my DNO (SSEN) didn't know that the badges size was heat output rather than electrical input. It usually just ticks long at 600W but does go up to over 2kW when doing the DHW cycle.
@@UpsideDownFork Yeah, I'm looking at a 9kW (heat capacity) ASHP, maximum rated draw is 21A, but I don't suppose it will do that very often. They are not interested at all. Thing is I know I can keep the import load under 100A with CTs on the Zappi etc, so I might just ignore them at this point.
@@richardskinner6391 Have you offered to implement load curtailment on your Zappi? They might be happy if you offer to curtail it to 60A. They won't like it if you propose anywhere near the 100A limit.
I watched your video with interest as it is most helpful and illustrative for many of us🙏 However, I’m having problems fully understanding and making sense of all the data since your system only reports exported and imported energy parameters, and I see no mention of the dwelling’s domestic usage. The generated energy is always marginally superior to that after the conversion, and this, again, is not available from what I can see (or have I missed something?) I imagine that any energy produced by your system and not directly used by the household is diverted to the grid, so would it be safe to assume that the delta between those two is the usage? Being fully off-grid myself, I monitor my production vs my usage, and unfortunately, the photovoltaic will only produce according to the direct demand/storage, so with me I guess it’s a case of “use it or lose it” which would account for my generation being on a flat curve between March and September as opposed to yours that seems to reflect more linearly the season’s atmospheric conditions. Please correct me if I’m wrong, as I’m also new to this “game”, partially since Sept 2023 and fully since April 2024. Once again thank you for sharing 🙏
Why didn't you just lower the DD via the Octopus app? Personally, rather than setting DD to a £, I've left ours at £40pm. This covers our E+G standing charge with a few quid left over. Referral money well earned, but will this be your 1st winter with your panels and heat pump / EV? I've got totally lost in the chronology of events lol
I was thinking the same thing. The app wouldn’t let me lower the direct debit to what I wanted as it said my historic consumption was too high. I just phoned them and said I had had solar installed and my historic consumption was meaningless so they manually lowered it to what I wanted at their end.
@@garethjones2125 Weird, I didn't have an issues, the following month after installation (and the day after the payment went out) I lowered it from £135pm to £40pm. Maybe that was acceptable to them.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100. Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong. I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork I'm curious to try and lower my own down to a £1 via the app and see how it goes.. Currently at £40 as I think I mentioned, enough to cover both SC's with a few quid left over.
Wow I thought our £1100 Octopus credit was substantial but you beat me out of the park. Mine was pretty much all from export payments (and the winter DFS bonus) though, AND I’d already dropped my monthly direct debit to £1. Puts me in good stead for the higher winter consumption with the ASHP. I’m on Agile and have batteries (that are automated for least cost spend), for comparison my average Agile import rate for September was 6.16p. Agile prices really starting to pick up now the weather is turning colder, we had 50p a week ago and its 69p tonight in one slot. Ow.
When people ask/comment about solar panel payback ("I hear that the payback is awful") I reply that grid electricity and grid gas never payback. What was your cost per unit of electricity imported this month?
It's a win win, you've paid for your home winter costs, would be good to separate from the ev state, but even then I'm assuming your not going to go over by £100's
It looks like Octopus do Variable Direct Debit, but you need to contact them for it (rather than through their app/site). Having done variable DD in Sweden for a good few years, it would be odd when I move back to the UK and go back to fixed DD.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100. Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong. I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork This is different to reducing the Direct Debit. This is where you pay the amount the bill shows each month (whether it's £0, £85, or £400), rather than having a fixed amount each month. So worth looking into if you're fine with the bill generally being higher in winter than in summer.
So £280 was because of your solar panels not the £1557 that you quote. I really enjoy watching your videos but please can you stop with the misleading title for views. You could argue that the £777 direct debit over payments are also a result of solar as youve used 'free' electric but i dont understand what the £500 of referral credit has got to do with your panels?
Apologies for going a bit click baity. Do the ends justify the means? My analytics behind the scenes show that a much broader audience comes in when I use thumbnails and titles like this. It shows me what other videos they have been watching too. My viewership has gone from quite a narrow echo chamber of like minded people to a much broader demographic in every respect. I don't want to be here just preaching to the choir as it were. Hope that makes sense and you're not too offended to stick around and support some reassurance of this kind of technology to combat the FUD.
Dude. I want to know why you do not have a battery!!! I have 19 X 465 watt AIKO panels. Total 8.835 kw with predicted generation potential of 7086Kwh per year. 9 of the panels are nearly bang on South. 5 are SW between 70 and 110 degrees and 5 are SE by the same angle from South. I have two inverters with 9 kw capacity. A Fox ESS 1 x H1 6kw and a Fox ESS 1 x H1 3 kw. I have a Fox battery ECS2900-H4 with extra modules to bring it to 14.4 kwh storage. The batteries are set for minimum charge state 10% so effective in/out capacity of 12.96 kwh. The system came live on 13th June and as of 13th October has generated 2228 kwh. I have a plug in hybrid which can take a 16.5 kwh fill from empty to full which charges through a Zappi and mostly has pure sun from the roof in its battery. The house has a gas boiler for hot water and central heating. Cooking is via electric ovens/microwave and induction hobs. Also I can heat water electrically. Before the panels I was with British Gas and paid about 24p per kw and about 5.5p for gas. I Used 14 kwh per day just on electric on average through the year. I am now on Octopus agile. I don't have a full year to measure the savings but since installation I have imported 443 kwh which is 3.63 kw/day. which is better than the 14 from before. But in the first period after installation the charge couplers were reversed by the installer and the system was drawing large amounts of energy and then just sending it back to the grid causing losses in needlessly imported power. Also Octopus told me at end of June that Agile was up and working and so I then got busy importing cheap power and exporting it when the rate was higher. I did this for 3 weeks until I realised Agile had given me false info and that they were still waiting on the DNO before they could set up Agile for me to export so I had been exporting to nowhere. They paid me £150 compensation. The installer gave me £100. There were many other delays after that in setting up Agile which did not actually start until 7th October only 6 days ago. The installer had submitted the wrong paperwork in May 2024 even before the installation was started. The corrected paperwork was not done until August and then the DNO (District Network Operator UK Power Networks) and Octopus were wrangling until 3rd October. I still do not know what the reason for delay was. So I have been unable to export all this time. All the way through I have been load shifting. I heat water using gas during very cloudy periods lasting a few days and when there is no electric cheaper than 5.75 pence it costs I force charge the battery during the very cheapest periods. Since 7th October I have initiated my Agile regime where I fill up in the early hours, anticipate solar production and get to the peak afternoon rates with a full battery which is then sent to the grid at the best export rates. The revenue days lags a couple of days but in 3 days I exported 37.5 kw at about 15-16p which had either come from the roof for free and been stored in the battery or had been purchased cheap on top up rates averaging about 5 pence per unit. My question is, why do you not have a battery so you can do this too and use Agile?
Our system includes 19 panels and 8.2kwh storage battery and for the last 11 months we have been on intelligent octopus go. During these 11 months the savings from the battery is only £180. It was much better previously on different tariffs, however the total cost of electricity is negative on IOG
Quite simply, the capital invested in a battery will not pay for itself at the current tariff rates. If I can average an import rate of 15p and export at 15p, all I need to do is export as much as I import. When sales people show you how much a battery saves you they do not factor in using smart tariffs like agile and they do not factor in load shifting appliances. If they did, then the case for batteries would flop for a lot of people. All the complexity of importing at cheap rates, correctly anticipating solar and associated techniques are a complicated way to save a few pennies. Apologies if that is blunt. I know it's not a popular opinion but I do have at least 2 videos dedicated to this which show figures and spreadsheets of my theory. I'm currently in month 10 of putting this theory to the test and so far it's looking to be true. There are still use cases where a battery or batteries will be beneficial but I believe those are fringe cases. As more people move to heat pumps, they will quickly see that a battery won't last the day and they will need to go onto tariffs like cosy to survive.
@@UpsideDownFork Thanks for that. I calculate I will make net gain of £1.81 per day on average through the year by dumping the battery into the grid when the export rates are highest and filling is for free form the sun or when overnight rates are the lowest. This is £660 per year. It cost £4531. This is payoff in 6 years and 10 months. The battery life is 15 years. The free energy from the Sun, if surplus, if either dumped into the car or into the battery ready for resale at a higher price. I am using Agile. The export rates I can get when the Sun is shining are very low. So the battery adds value...I think!! Or am I still seeing it wrong?
@@UpsideDownFork if ever the tariffs shift in favour of adding a battery then the Fogstar 15.5kWh is working well for me so far with the same inverter as you. It's in the shed so will see how it performs over the winter with it's built in heater. Did get an email from them the other day as there's an update for use with the Sunsync inverters so after care seems good too. Oddly it could export at 8kW but only import at 5kw ish. Need to apply the updated myself but looks like it shouldn't take long. For £2500 I really don't think it can be beat unless you go the DIY route. I'm going to see how my usage holds over the winter but would consider adding a second one, especially if add some more panels as one of the 2/2 MPPT slots is sitting empty and crying out for more 😉
And your capital investment to achieve the £280 credit was....? Heatpump and 9kw solar system.... It's great what you are trying to do but it takes quite an investment to get here, which is significant. Also if people do start making money from this HMRC will come calling for capital gains, this is essentially income which needs to be declared, including the referrals.
@@Pulpdiction1999 thanks for the comment. The cost of each item was mentioned at the beginning. New boiler was needed anyway, so we saved money by installing a heat pump compared to replacing with a gas boiler. HMRC do have provision for us to generate 120% of our consumption tax free 👍
I don't discriminate and eat any and all waffles! With custard sounds excellent! When I lived in Stuttgart we used to have black cherry topping with vanilla sauce on our waffles in one of the local cafés. To die for.
So you wasn't actually in profit for the month once you include all charges, your costs are about £5, so misrepresentation of the facts. I still can't work out your logic for not including SC, we all have to pay for import, so why are you including that, remove that and just state what you export, that will make it sound even better 😂
I can see where he's coming from, but as an owner of PV + battery, I still pay enough monthly DD to cover by our G+E standing charges. Then I know what is in my Octopus account is thanks to export earnings (or ROI)
@@stuartburns8657 I also have PV, 15.5 kWp, 29 kWh of batteries, gas heating (hopefully heatpump next year) and no EV, I work out my profit/costs based on my entire bill, including standing charges, because that's what I pay, At the end off the year is my bill negative or positive, and that bill includes SC. Last year I was negative by £400, currently this year I'm negative about £330, but I've just added more solar, averaging 31kWh a day for October so far.
@@B0jangle5 I have import shown on my bill, so does that cancel out and I shouldn't include import costs in my savings???. At the end of the year my bill is negative, and that bill has a standing charges on it, which I haven't paid because of what I've exported cancels it all out. Not including the SC just muddies and skews the figures. If I didn't have PV my yearly costs would be circa £3000, as I have PV my yearly costs to have gas and electric are negative. Standing charges are part and parcel of have a grid connection, so should be included in the sums. If you were off grid, well then you wouldn't be factoring them in as they wouldn't exist, but for anyone grid connected they exist, with us having PV means at the end of the year I haven't had to pay anything. They should at the very least be shown, to show the full complete picture. How many people deduct/ignore standing charges when they talk about how much their electric bill is???
The overall figure of credit does of course include the standing charge. The monthly figure does not. My aim is to offset all of the import costs with export. If your aim is to cover all energy costs then of course you can include the standing charge for yourself. I'm not saying this is the way that everyone must do it, I'm just saying that's what I'm doing. It does look as though we may scrape through and cover both the import costs and the standing charge with the solar export alone. Really depends how cold it gets!
Octopus DD... I switched to Variable DD so only pay for what I'm using that month - they sorted it out really quickly. I know some people like to budget, but given seasonal offsetting I prefer to be getting interest on any credit in *my* bank account, rather than theirs. You're making me reconsider North North-East facing panels to capture energy earlier in the day.
@@MrPurle
I do the same. I pay for what I use with a variable direct debit.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100.
Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong.
I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork this will sound odd, but changing the amount is harder/met with more resistance than switching to variable DD. It's something Martin Lewis/Money Saving Expert suggested to remedy excess credit.
@@MrPurleOdd indeed.
Nice and snappy, straight to the point, love it.
Thank you. I've been working hard to keep it under 10 mins!
I found Octopus very good about reducing our direct debit. After only having the ASHP and Tracker tariff for 3 months they accepted what I thought our DD should be for the year.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100.
Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong.
I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
I am on a variable DD with Octopus so only pay for what I use each month no gas just electric
Getting my system from Octopus this month so I found your observations very interesting. Thanks.😊
Congratulations! 🎉
How much have you spent in total, and what level of harmonics are you pushing back into the supply?
This was £10k of PV kit.
I'm not aware of any harmonics issues.
I have heard that the Vaillant heat pump I have is extremely sensitive to this and some PV inverters do not play nicely with the heat pump at all, at the minimum causing it to trip out but at worse causing boards to fry.
I did investigate SunSynk before going with their products and they do appear to have good stable output.
I hope I've correctly relayed the information above. I'm not an electrical engineer and have done fairly basic research on the subject.
I enjoy listening to your stats. Keep on waffling!😂
Thanks, will do!
So you actually only got £280 credit for exported electricity for a whole year. That will get completely wiped out when the feed in tariffs drop to near zero when the incentives are no longer needed.
True and true.
I've also self consumed a lot of solar energy before exporting 👍
Hold on, Mr. Click Bait. You received £280 from exports.
The title should read:
"How We Received a £1557 Credit from Octopus Energy Due to Our £280 Export Credit from Solar Panels."
On the bright side, £280 is still money in the bank.
Apologies for going a bit click baity.
Do the ends justify the means?
My analytics behind the scenes show that a much broader audience comes in when I use thumbnails and titles like this.
It shows me what other videos they have been watching.
My viewership has gone from quite a narrow echo chamber of like minded people to a much broader demographic in every respect.
I don't want to be here just preaching to the choir as it were.
Hope that makes sense and you're not too offended to stick around and support some reassurance of this kind of technology to combat the FUD.
@@UpsideDownFork
Did I understand correctly that every YT channel owner is able to see what other videos their viewers have watched?
@serraios1989 yes, but we dont have granular data and it is not individual to the user, so i can't see your specific watch history.
We have some broad, anonymised data of what our viewers as a group are also watching.
The last couple of months ive noticed a few more anti heat pump/solar/EV videos popping up in there.
The comments have also seen a trend towards those who don't "believe" in this stuff and think I'm being conned or I'm a con man myself.
At Christmas time it will be a year since i was monetised on youtube and started uploading regularly. Around that time I'll do a full behind the scenes youtube tour and show you all how little money we make from these videos.
@@serraios1989
Id love a solar install our usage is pretty low in summer about 6kwh a day so exports would be huge. No gas.
Now the heat pumps on that's around 12kwh a day
Will see when it gets colder
Last year Jan was 420kWh for the month but hopefully I have dialed in the weather comp to be more efficient
May I ask whether you have a matching tariff? Agile, Tracker, Cosy or something else?
@@Biggest-dh1vr I have been on tracker since February 2023
Tracker tariff is great for heat pump life!
It's really good to know you were getting higher than peak. I have a 4.7kWp set of solar panels going to a 3.6kW inverter. When it comes time to replace that inverter, I think I'll look at higher power options if I'm allowed to do so at the time!
You will be allowed to do so, but you would have to set the export limit of the inverter. You could even potentially get that limit raised with a G99 application
The site Easy PV can calculate how much you are likely to be clipping if you want to play with it.
G99 is the way, if of course you are sure it's worth harvesting that lost clipped power
My hunch would be that you'd never see a return by changing now but like you say, if you're changing anyway...why not.
@@UpsideDownFork Yes, I'm thinking down the road when the inverter goes kaputt rather than now. It's only two years old for now. I already have a G99 done for an EVSE V2G charger for which I was allowed a further 3.68kW so unless they upgrade the network, there's probably no scope for increasing my export further, but I think there are battery systems that use a 5kW inverter that can limit export to 3.68kW and presumably they send the rest to the battery (without inverting in that case I guess - for best efficiency that should be a dc-coupled system and I guess it would go through a DC-to-DC converter stage to align the voltages).
Why is the standing charge removed, Solar?
Everyone pays the same standing charge. There is no surcharge for solar installations.
🙏Thanks for this update, it seems pretty good to me 😉
Interested to hear more about why you resisted a battery. I'm thinking the same for a potential install
@UpsideDownFork did a video on why a battery wasn't cost-effective for him at the time. Maybe with a car (effectively a large battery in terms of demand) and heat pump it still doesn't make much sense?
Essentially if you can cover more than 70-80% of your consumption through a combination of solar and a cheap TOU tariff then the capital invested in a battery is wasted.
We load shift as much as we can and a battery would save us a few ££s per year but never pay for itself.
We spent the same money we would have spent on a system but instead of 8 panels and a 10kWh battery we went for 22 panels and no battery.
Time will tell as we make our way through the winter but so far it's looking very good.
I will be very interested to see how the ratio of generation between your North and South panels changes over the year. I can't remember if the 64% figure for last month was similar to what you were getting in the middle of summer, and I wonder what it will be like in January...
BTW, Octopus let me adjust my direct debit on their web site when I built up a credit - and then switched to just billing me the exact amount each month.
I think as summer dominates generation, that'll be the dominant portion. In winter a reduced portion of nothing is still nothing.
Over the course of the year, the split is still above the 64% of September. Hopefully I remember to include a good summary of this in the annual wrap up. I know half the people are just here for the N vs S solar study!
I really enjoyed the update as always and have just joined IOG with my Zappi. A few niggling issues but early days. I really want NW facing PV but I can't convince higher management!!! Help needed!!
🤣🤣; happy wife = happy life
Good luck with that! I've spent all my hard earned capital with the wife.
Trying to take a break from projects but I can't help myself.
Already subbed, but usually "like" your videos as they are well presented, interesting and useful. I am looking forward to starting my journey (waiting to move house) as lessons learnt here are great.
Thank you very much! 😊
I'm wondering if you now got a battery, you would be importing even less, saving even more money?
Being able to time-shift his demand would save him some money as he could store electricity from the grid or solar to use when prices are higher on the Agile tariff (especially in the evenings when prices are higher). I have a small 5kWh battery that cycles twice per day, importing overnight for the raised morning peak and in the afternoon for the 4-7pm peak.
If you're already benefiting from off-peak electricity then the payback time is very long. Mine works at around 8 years before the electricity prices rose in October. I'm a low energy user but even if I had double the usage I still wouldn't buy a battery as the battery prices are continually reducing.
Save on the monthly import costs? Yes, a little saving would have been made last month.
BUT, I'm not where near a battery having a 10 year pay back.
The capital cost is still far too high, even though I have a hybrid inverter and the cost of adding a battery is much lower than for others.
Another good video, thanks.
Glad you enjoyed it
You inspired me to comment to support the algorithm (and you)....thx for the content. Cheers.
@@simonh2679 thank you for the support! 😊
That’s fantastic, UDF - well done! 😀
Thank you! 😊 Here's hoping the seasonal offsetting plan works well into the heating season!
We've had 6kWp with a 9.5kWh battery. Generated 555kWh in Sept with 395kWh home use, 472kWh import and 607 kWh export.
So far since May we've been paid £880 for export, against £492 for import including Standing charges, so £388 in profit (£460 excluding standing charge).
High import use is because we were on Intelligent Flux until the 1st Oct where is charges and discharges the battery for you for grid balancing at about 7p per kWh to you.
We've now switched to COSY with a 12.65p low to buy and a 15p export, so battery is charges in the lows, all solar sold and we live off the battery and solar.
It will be interesting to see how much that costs and eats into our £460. So far it's been £15.06 for 10 days including the standing charges.
Nice! Well done 👍
Good information & informative.
I am running 4 5kW solar on 2 roofs with separate 3.6kW battery inverter along with Vaillant 7kw Arrotherm plus no issues !
I also have Solar Iboost to feed hot water cylinder & 200l buffer tank.
All working with Octopus Go Inteligent & Kia Eniro4+ charging etc
That's great to hear!
Can I ask how many of your panels are optimised and and would you recommend it? Thanks
6 of the 22 have optimisers.
I don't have a full data set over a complete year.
So far, they will never generate enough extra to pay for themselves. Averaging 1% extra over and above what I would generate without them fitted.
We'll see if things change this winter.
That's specific to my installation and the hard shading I experience.
Scattered and intermittent shading may yield better gains.
They do offer panel level monitoring and you cannot objectively put a price on that extra data.
@@UpsideDownFork thanks got the detailed reply. I think with modern half cell panels with their 3 diodes (effectively giving 6 mini panels) a lot of the optimisation by shading is done in panel. It seems like installers still suggest them though.
@@UpsideDownFork I still think you would make massive savings with a battery. You considered a DIY battery like the Seplos or YIXIANG battery boxes? You can get 16kwh for less than £1500.
@@007silverwings I don't blame installers for covering their backs, as long as that's clear and they're not just trying to upsell 👍
@@007silverwings I am space limited so it does rule out some battery options. Realistically they will need to be high level wall mounted.
The real question is, if I can power my house, car, heating, everything and have a zero bill at the end of it, why would I invest in batteries?
Grid independence? There's an argument for that in some areas but not where I live. I don't remember a power cut in 14 years of living here.
Reduce grid emissions? That is a noble gesture but most people could cut a lot more from their personal emissions through lots of other means like walking locally, changing diet etc.
I'm not saying no battery is the only way, I'm just here to prove that it is a viable route.
My plan as it stands is to milk the 15p export until it dies and then I'll probably pick up 20-30kWh of battery storage.
Hopefully by then it is much cheaper than now as a bonus. 👍
Have you made a video showing your investment in panels, inverter, heat pump, ancillary electrical equipment (timers etc), car charger, electrician's bills and the cost of the car?
A summary video for newbies?
Looks like a fresh video is on the cards.
It's approx £30k for
-Insulation
-Heat pump
-Solar
-EV
Including all costs, fees etc.
I could have spent a lot less on insulation (cost twice as much as the heat pump!), but I'm happy that I got good deals on the rest of the stuff.
great content, do you have the daily consumption by the heat pump?
Yes, I can start showing that next month if there's interest.
Last month it used so little.
How are you allowed to generated more than 4kWp on your system. The DNO won’t allow consumers to generate more since it could damage your service cable to your house?
@@robinpeters6647 every area is different. Infrastructure can vary from street to street, not just town to town. 👍
I'd be interested in the payback video. My decision on solar definitely wasn't purely for financial reasons but it's still interesting and makes it easier to encourage others to adopt solar if the payback period isn't too long. I reckon payback for my system is more like 12 years when comparing vs if I'd just gone with tracker tariff and no solar (I don't think comparing with standard tariff is realistic). And as an aside, an average of 12/13p/kWh on agile seems good! I've only just switched to agile but it's more like 16-17p/kWh at the moment. I avoid any grid import from 4-7pm but think I probably need to load shift more to the early hours of the morning. I suspect that is how you've got it so low - the EV probably helps with this too i.e. it ensures a much bigger chunk of your usage is in the cheapest possible periods?
Yes, I agree that some of the payback calculations can be misleading as they compare against the price cap. As you say, not realistic for anyone savvy.
We load shift our hot water production, washing machine, tumble dryer and dishwasher.
The EV has helped but the rates have just generally been a little higher more recently.
We achieved a lower average unit rate in other months when we didn't have the EV.
Agile is still the winning tariff for us as of today.
Hi just a bit of advice if possible please
I’ve recently just got 6.4 kWh
Solar along with sun synk battery 10.4
I’m getting Vaillant aroTHERM plus 7kW Heatpump installed next wk
Was wondering if there’s any advice to which tariff is best for all 3 solar battery ASHP octopus still recommend me to stay on octopus flux import export tariff I was planning on moving over to the cosy tariff just thinking with having 3 dips surly this would be cheaper to run ASHP I understand your not able to export on Cosy
Once ASHP installed Was also planning to discharge battery from 4pm onwards if staying on flux
Thanks
Do you have an EV? I guess not?
As solar is so low and things get colder, you will definitely benefit from switching to Cosy.
You can still export on the fixed outgoing at 15p.
With 10.4kWh you should be able to easily cover the peak rate and for most of winter you should be able to run off the lowest rate for 99% of the time.
Let me know how you get on!
@@UpsideDownFork yep I agree I reckon Cosy would be the better option over the winter months.
No EV as such yet but 100% in the future yes
Cheers
@@UpsideDownFork just signed upto
Octopus fixed outgoings and cosy thanks for letting us know I never thought your able to export while on cosy tariff. ASHP install next wk
Just hoping it does what it says on the tin 😀👍🏻 keep up the vids 👍🏻
I was planning to install four more panels on the garden shed to benefit from the high export prices, however it looks like soon we are going to be penalised for exporting solar energy to the grid.
We still need 3x the solar we have in Britain. I think the fear-mongering is overblown, though the current Octopus/other provider Export rates could always be subject to change. We aren't Australia yet?
Not really an issue. Energy consumption is still higher than energy production. You can always add a home battery later and shift the export to a high demand time if export at noon gets to negative prices. Todays solar panels will work fine for about 25 years, so make some more export profit now and save up for a home battery later.
At the peak of summer, UK solar was only about a third of demand. Solar capacity doubles about every 4 years, so maybe by 2030 we'll be discouraged from exporting at midday. But by then batteries will be so cheap that it'll be easy to time-shift that export to the evening demand peak.
Penalised? I doubt it.
Reduce rate from 15p? Likely.
Timescale? Not sure.
Just remind me, what Octopus import and export tariffs are you on?
He's on Octopus Agile and Octopus Fixed Outgoing
That's it!
@UpsideDownFork Thanks that explains why you are getting more export rate than me!
Amazing results for your North array. Well done for being brave!! Now that you have an EV, have you considered IOG?, as it more or less will give you 7ppm 24x7 (if you define your own car / charge rate - albeit in my case in the ohme app, but we also have a small 🔋)
He has that option, but he would need a large-ish battery to use the 7p rate all day with the heat pump. There are battery costs and electricity conversion losses that I'm sure @UpsideDownFork would love to put in a spreadsheet and video!
@@Biggest-dh1vr You're right here, what we do is charge the MG4 at 1.44/Kwh via the Ohme, but also gives electric at 7p/Kw to the house simultaneously, so if we plug in at 15:00, it still charges us at 7p for all power until the car is fully charged = happy bunnies!!
It's a good strategy!
Unfortunately the EV is my wife's car and she leaves the house at 7am to return from work at 5:30pm so on balance it looks like agile still has the edge for us.
If the car was at home more of the time and/or we had decent battery storage then it may be worthwhile doing.
how much did your solar cost
~£10k
I think if u are only using the figures for export income a battery would make sense for winter.
I think @UpsideDownFork has covered this in a response to @weepz, where he says he wouldn't see anywhere near a 10 year payback time due to his use and tariff?
Due to the heat pump, I would really need 20-30kWh of battery which just won't pay for itself.
I have a heatpump with 14 kwh of batteries. I will never be able to cover all the load with batteries but it really does cover most of the usage except for the coldest days.
@@gwen0437 how much did your battery cost you and when do you think you'll see a payback?
@UpsideDownFork I don't really know how long it would take I have 4 pylontech us3000c batteries so u could make it out from that but probably a long time. I have a tariff which I can charge at 7 cent euro instead of paying 25 cent so it makes sense if you're getting 300% efficiency from your heatpump it's only costing 2.5 cent per kwh of heat instead of paying 10 cent per kwh of gas which u are only getting 85% efficiency.
Great video as always. "Talking absolute Rubbish" should be your catch phrase 😂
Absolutely
Sorry, did you say you dont pay standing charge?
I pay the same standing charge as everyone else, whether they have solar or not.
I have 20x410w Longi panels with givenergy 5kw hybrid invert + 9.5kWh battery installed December 2023 so slightly less than yours.
I have severe winter shading from the house next door which I think essentially makes our south panels act like North panels for 3 months of the year, I'm keen to see how your North face panels work over the winter months because we do have sufficient north roof area for the same again.
With the 5kW inverter I do occasionally see clipping but only perhaps over 20 days since install.
Looking forward to October stats (hopefully around 3rd of the month) 😉
will that annual 8Mw be achieved! ...it's a nice thought.
If you hadn't mentioned the slides errors I wonder how many would have noticed and then commented.
Thanks for commenting...and your patience! 😉😁
Looking for something similar myself
Where in the world are you?
@@UpsideDownFork west midlands
I have solar (30x445W panels) and an EV charger, the DNO (national grid) won't let me install a heat pump or induction hob without paying them £12k for 3 phase :(
I have a 100A supply but they won't budge. Not sure how we're supposed to "go green" when the DNOs hold people to ransom.
@@richardskinner6391 this may or may not help but my DNO (SSEN) didn't know that the badges size was heat output rather than electrical input.
It usually just ticks long at 600W but does go up to over 2kW when doing the DHW cycle.
@@UpsideDownFork Yeah, I'm looking at a 9kW (heat capacity) ASHP, maximum rated draw is 21A, but I don't suppose it will do that very often. They are not interested at all.
Thing is I know I can keep the import load under 100A with CTs on the Zappi etc, so I might just ignore them at this point.
@@richardskinner6391 Have you offered to implement load curtailment on your Zappi? They might be happy if you offer to curtail it to 60A. They won't like it if you propose anywhere near the 100A limit.
I watched your video with interest as it is most helpful and illustrative for many of us🙏
However, I’m having problems fully understanding and making sense of all the data since your system only reports exported and imported energy parameters, and I see no mention of the dwelling’s domestic usage.
The generated energy is always marginally superior to that after the conversion, and this, again, is not available from what I can see (or have I missed something?)
I imagine that any energy produced by your system and not directly used by the household is diverted to the grid, so would it be safe to assume that the delta between those two is the usage?
Being fully off-grid myself, I monitor my production vs my usage, and unfortunately, the photovoltaic will only produce according to the direct demand/storage, so with me I guess it’s a case of “use it or lose it” which would account for my generation being on a flat curve between March and September as opposed to yours that seems to reflect more linearly the season’s atmospheric conditions.
Please correct me if I’m wrong, as I’m also new to this “game”, partially since Sept 2023 and fully since April 2024.
Once again thank you for sharing 🙏
Good assumptions! If I failed to mention it in this video. I see a 6-7% conversion loss when going from DC on the roof to usable AC power.
Very interesting video.
Glad you enjoyed it
Why didn't you just lower the DD via the Octopus app?
Personally, rather than setting DD to a £, I've left ours at £40pm. This covers our E+G standing charge with a few quid left over.
Referral money well earned, but will this be your 1st winter with your panels and heat pump / EV?
I've got totally lost in the chronology of events lol
I was thinking the same thing. The app wouldn’t let me lower the direct debit to what I wanted as it said my historic consumption was too high. I just phoned them and said I had had solar installed and my historic consumption was meaningless so they manually lowered it to what I wanted at their end.
@@garethjones2125 Weird, I didn't have an issues, the following month after installation (and the day after the payment went out) I lowered it from £135pm to £40pm.
Maybe that was acceptable to them.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100.
Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong.
I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork I'm curious to try and lower my own down to a £1 via the app and see how it goes..
Currently at £40 as I think I mentioned, enough to cover both SC's with a few quid left over.
Wow I thought our £1100 Octopus credit was substantial but you beat me out of the park. Mine was pretty much all from export payments (and the winter DFS bonus) though, AND I’d already dropped my monthly direct debit to £1. Puts me in good stead for the higher winter consumption with the ASHP.
I’m on Agile and have batteries (that are automated for least cost spend), for comparison my average Agile import rate for September was 6.16p. Agile prices really starting to pick up now the weather is turning colder, we had 50p a week ago and its 69p tonight in one slot. Ow.
Nice work! You're beating me by a country mile by the sounds of things.
When people ask/comment about solar panel payback ("I hear that the payback is awful") I reply that grid electricity and grid gas never payback. What was your cost per unit of electricity imported this month?
13.7p.
Shared at 2:20 👍
Thanks for commenting!
@@UpsideDownFork looks good compared to my 12p ish on battery
It's a win win, you've paid for your home winter costs, would be good to separate from the ev state, but even then I'm assuming your not going to go over by £100's
That's how things are looking!
What a guy 🤝 ❤
Thanks for commenting!
@@UpsideDownFork I’m Corban’s mate barney
It looks like Octopus do Variable Direct Debit, but you need to contact them for it (rather than through their app/site). Having done variable DD in Sweden for a good few years, it would be odd when I move back to the UK and go back to fixed DD.
@@BenIsInSweden
Octopus do variable DD. I have it.
Once I had 1 month's heat pump consumption I tried to reduce our DD from ~£200 down to ~£100.
Octopus refused because they said a heat pump wouldn't save us money. They were wrong.
I had 3 months of heat pump savings and then once the solar was installed they reduced the DD to £60ish. A month later the app allowed me to lower it to £1 DD and that's where it has stayed.
@@UpsideDownFork This is different to reducing the Direct Debit. This is where you pay the amount the bill shows each month (whether it's £0, £85, or £400), rather than having a fixed amount each month. So worth looking into if you're fine with the bill generally being higher in winter than in summer.
So £280 was because of your solar panels not the £1557 that you quote. I really enjoy watching your videos but please can you stop with the misleading title for views. You could argue that the £777 direct debit over payments are also a result of solar as youve used 'free' electric but i dont understand what the £500 of referral credit has got to do with your panels?
Apologies for going a bit click baity.
Do the ends justify the means?
My analytics behind the scenes show that a much broader audience comes in when I use thumbnails and titles like this.
It shows me what other videos they have been watching too.
My viewership has gone from quite a narrow echo chamber of like minded people to a much broader demographic in every respect.
I don't want to be here just preaching to the choir as it were.
Hope that makes sense and you're not too offended to stick around and support some reassurance of this kind of technology to combat the FUD.
Dude. I want to know why you do not have a battery!!! I have 19 X 465 watt AIKO panels. Total 8.835 kw with predicted generation potential of 7086Kwh per year. 9 of the panels are nearly bang on South. 5 are SW between 70 and 110 degrees and 5 are SE by the same angle from South. I have two inverters with 9 kw capacity. A Fox ESS 1 x H1 6kw and a Fox ESS 1 x H1 3 kw. I have a Fox battery ECS2900-H4 with extra modules to bring it to 14.4 kwh storage. The batteries are set for minimum charge state 10% so effective in/out capacity of 12.96 kwh. The system came live on 13th June and as of 13th October has generated 2228 kwh. I have a plug in hybrid which can take a 16.5 kwh fill from empty to full which charges through a Zappi and mostly has pure sun from the roof in its battery. The house has a gas boiler for hot water and central heating. Cooking is via electric ovens/microwave and induction hobs. Also I can heat water electrically. Before the panels I was with British Gas and paid about 24p per kw and about 5.5p for gas. I Used 14 kwh per day just on electric on average through the year. I am now on Octopus agile. I don't have a full year to measure the savings but since installation I have imported 443 kwh which is 3.63 kw/day. which is better than the 14 from before. But in the first period after installation the charge couplers were reversed by the installer and the system was drawing large amounts of energy and then just sending it back to the grid causing losses in needlessly imported power. Also Octopus told me at end of June that Agile was up and working and so I then got busy importing cheap power and exporting it when the rate was higher. I did this for 3 weeks until I realised Agile had given me false info and that they were still waiting on the DNO before they could set up Agile for me to export so I had been exporting to nowhere. They paid me £150 compensation. The installer gave me £100. There were many other delays after that in setting up Agile which did not actually start until 7th October only 6 days ago. The installer had submitted the wrong paperwork in May 2024 even before the installation was started. The corrected paperwork was not done until August and then the DNO (District Network Operator UK Power Networks) and Octopus were wrangling until 3rd October. I still do not know what the reason for delay was. So I have been unable to export all this time. All the way through I have been load shifting. I heat water using gas during very cloudy periods lasting a few days and when there is no electric cheaper than 5.75 pence it costs I force charge the battery during the very cheapest periods. Since 7th October I have initiated my Agile regime where I fill up in the early hours, anticipate solar production and get to the peak afternoon rates with a full battery which is then sent to the grid at the best export rates. The revenue days lags a couple of days but in 3 days I exported 37.5 kw at about 15-16p which had either come from the roof for free and been stored in the battery or had been purchased cheap on top up rates averaging about 5 pence per unit. My question is, why do you not have a battery so you can do this too and use Agile?
Our system includes 19 panels and 8.2kwh storage battery and for the last 11 months we have been on intelligent octopus go. During these 11 months the savings from the battery is only £180.
It was much better previously on different tariffs, however the total cost of electricity is negative on IOG
Quite simply, the capital invested in a battery will not pay for itself at the current tariff rates.
If I can average an import rate of 15p and export at 15p, all I need to do is export as much as I import.
When sales people show you how much a battery saves you they do not factor in using smart tariffs like agile and they do not factor in load shifting appliances.
If they did, then the case for batteries would flop for a lot of people.
All the complexity of importing at cheap rates, correctly anticipating solar and associated techniques are a complicated way to save a few pennies.
Apologies if that is blunt. I know it's not a popular opinion but I do have at least 2 videos dedicated to this which show figures and spreadsheets of my theory.
I'm currently in month 10 of putting this theory to the test and so far it's looking to be true.
There are still use cases where a battery or batteries will be beneficial but I believe those are fringe cases. As more people move to heat pumps, they will quickly see that a battery won't last the day and they will need to go onto tariffs like cosy to survive.
@@UpsideDownFork Thanks for that. I calculate I will make net gain of £1.81 per day on average through the year by dumping the battery into the grid when the export rates are highest and filling is for free form the sun or when overnight rates are the lowest. This is £660 per year. It cost £4531. This is payoff in 6 years and 10 months. The battery life is 15 years. The free energy from the Sun, if surplus, if either dumped into the car or into the battery ready for resale at a higher price. I am using Agile. The export rates I can get when the Sun is shining are very low. So the battery adds value...I think!! Or am I still seeing it wrong?
@@agritrend4812 You can move your export to fixed at 15p and still use Agile for import.
@@UpsideDownFork if ever the tariffs shift in favour of adding a battery then the Fogstar 15.5kWh is working well for me so far with the same inverter as you. It's in the shed so will see how it performs over the winter with it's built in heater. Did get an email from them the other day as there's an update for use with the Sunsync inverters so after care seems good too. Oddly it could export at 8kW but only import at 5kw ish. Need to apply the updated myself but looks like it shouldn't take long. For £2500 I really don't think it can be beat unless you go the DIY route. I'm going to see how my usage holds over the winter but would consider adding a second one, especially if add some more panels as one of the 2/2 MPPT slots is sitting empty and crying out for more 😉
And your capital investment to achieve the £280 credit was....? Heatpump and 9kw solar system.... It's great what you are trying to do but it takes quite an investment to get here, which is significant. Also if people do start making money from this HMRC will come calling for capital gains, this is essentially income which needs to be declared, including the referrals.
@@Pulpdiction1999 thanks for the comment.
The cost of each item was mentioned at the beginning.
New boiler was needed anyway, so we saved money by installing a heat pump compared to replacing with a gas boiler.
HMRC do have provision for us to generate 120% of our consumption tax free 👍
I’m hoping for some waffle 😅
Stroopwaffles are to die for
Don't tell the Dutch/Belgians, but waffles are delicious with custard!
I don't discriminate and eat any and all waffles! With custard sounds excellent!
When I lived in Stuttgart we used to have black cherry topping with vanilla sauce on our waffles in one of the local cafés. To die for.
🙂🙂🙂
Thanks for stopping by!
So you wasn't actually in profit for the month once you include all charges, your costs are about £5, so misrepresentation of the facts. I still can't work out your logic for not including SC, we all have to pay for import, so why are you including that, remove that and just state what you export, that will make it sound even better 😂
I can see where he's coming from, but as an owner of PV + battery, I still pay enough monthly DD to cover by our G+E standing charges.
Then I know what is in my Octopus account is thanks to export earnings (or ROI)
@@stuartburns8657 I also have PV, 15.5 kWp, 29 kWh of batteries, gas heating (hopefully heatpump next year) and no EV, I work out my profit/costs based on my entire bill, including standing charges, because that's what I pay, At the end off the year is my bill negative or positive, and that bill includes SC. Last year I was negative by £400, currently this year I'm negative about £330, but I've just added more solar, averaging 31kWh a day for October so far.
Because it's a comparison of having PV versus not having PV. The SC cancels out as it's common to both scenarios.
@@B0jangle5 I have import shown on my bill, so does that cancel out and I shouldn't include import costs in my savings???. At the end of the year my bill is negative, and that bill has a standing charges on it, which I haven't paid because of what I've exported cancels it all out. Not including the SC just muddies and skews the figures. If I didn't have PV my yearly costs would be circa £3000, as I have PV my yearly costs to have gas and electric are negative. Standing charges are part and parcel of have a grid connection, so should be included in the sums. If you were off grid, well then you wouldn't be factoring them in as they wouldn't exist, but for anyone grid connected they exist, with us having PV means at the end of the year I haven't had to pay anything. They should at the very least be shown, to show the full complete picture. How many people deduct/ignore standing charges when they talk about how much their electric bill is???
The overall figure of credit does of course include the standing charge.
The monthly figure does not.
My aim is to offset all of the import costs with export.
If your aim is to cover all energy costs then of course you can include the standing charge for yourself.
I'm not saying this is the way that everyone must do it, I'm just saying that's what I'm doing.
It does look as though we may scrape through and cover both the import costs and the standing charge with the solar export alone. Really depends how cold it gets!