Energypal.ie calculates that non-smart plans are best (Nightmeter)

elcato

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I just put last months figures energypal and, lo and behold, three out of the top four say Day/Night plans are cheapest. I know it's different courses for horses but it appears the perceived shift to better plans on smart over the last while is abating.
 
I don't really understand what this means. Maybe you can clarify?
The general thoughts I was getting on AAM in the last few months was that the smart plans are getting more competitive than they were at first.
 
My Energia day/night contract is ending next month and energypal (now that I have over a year of smart meter data) is showing that, unlike last year, smart time of day plans are likely to be significantly more cost effective going forward. I'll have to have a proper look closer to the end of contract and maybe take the leap and switch to a smart/time of day plan. I definitely owe the energypal guy another coffee! :)
 
I just put last months figures energypal and, lo and behold, three out of the top four say Day/Night plans are cheapest.
One month's usage is probably not that representative. Ideally you need at least a year's usage data from My Smart Data and upload that to energypal to get a proper analysis.
 
Last time I looked it doesn't consider changes you can do. E.g. you can shift the time of day off your usage. And that will change which plan is best.
 
E.g. if you charge your car or battery at 2am it may be that a smart plan wins. But if over the last year you have been charging to it at 5pm you will not see that suggested.
 
Last time I looked it doesn't consider changes you can do. E.g. you can shift the time of day off your usage. And that will change which plan is best.
It (and, in particular, the HDF data from ESB Networks My Smart Data) provides the information needed to do that. You could probably even hack the HDF file to mimic an arbitrary usage pattern if you really wanted to.
 
E.g. if you charge your car or battery at 2am it may be that a smart plan wins. But if over the last year you have been charging to it at 5pm you will not see that suggested.
Isn't that stating the obvious? Most or all day/night or time of day plans are such that night units are significantly cheaper than day/peak units. So charging an EV other than at night would usually be a dumb move unless absolutely unavoidable.
 
Yes, but for example, I'm with Energia, they have a 4hour window (2am-6am) at ~7c
All the other companies have a 3 hour window.
I take advantage of the 4 hour window for charging the car, but could modify my behavior to fit into the 3 hour window if I was switching.
But EnergyPal won't be able to predict that. So it will likely always recommend Energia to me.

Still a great resource though. Thanks Energypal.
 
Last time I looked it doesn't consider changes you can do. E.g. you can shift the time of day off your usage. And that will change which plan is best.
I looked hard at this and I could shift about 10% of my household’s electricity use without a lifestyle impact.

That’s maybe 650kWh for me a year at a night rather than day tariff.

I just don’t think it’s a panacea.
 
Last time I looked it doesn't consider changes you can do. E.g. you can shift the time of day off your usage. And that will change which plan is best.
I switched on my smart meter a few years ago, I used Bord Gais smart plans, the free electricity on Sunday and the EV plan even though I don't have an EV and I compared it to a non smart plan and a normal smart plan, I summarised my findings here
Bottom line for me was with the energy prices today, the smart meter is cheaper then the dumb but after that there's very little in the savings between the other two plans which don't warrant the lifestyle changes to get those savings
 
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Last time I looked it doesn't consider changes you can do. E.g. you can shift the time of day off your usage. And that will change which plan is best.
You can play around with the data in Excel to model what kind of difference some changes might make. Most car chargers allow you to at least view historic data, so it should be reasonable straightforward to see what effect moving that number of units to a reduced rate period might make.
 
I agree, one can modify data, and play scenarios.

I prefer having a natural experiment.

My approach is to switch loads prefernetially to the 2am, and then nightime hours, and to avoid loads at peak evening times. Not to the extent of sacrificing lifesytle. That's helping the grid, but it also means energypal will give a good estimate out of the box!
 
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