Best Electricity Plan for new EV Owners

You probably need to analyse the costs to be able to make an informed decision. The Energia smart data plan will be the same night rate as EI, but a slightly lower day rate. So you'd need to calculate how much that would save you taking into account your solar use. Might not be that much. Also you clearly use most imported electricity at night, so that's potentially where your best savings could come from.

So a combination of a slightly inflated day rate combined with a lower night rate plus a higher export price might work for you.

Don't ask me where to get that. 😂

Well I suppose the first thing you have to do is break out the electricity you imported and paid for. Further broken down by the different rates (day and night). Your bills should give you this info.

Then slot in the different rates on offer and compare.

A DC (aka fast/rapid charger) will always have the lead connected to the unit, and will be the CCS2 connector above on the end of the lead.

You don't need to provide your own lead/connector.

Your home one/granny charger will just be the type 2 connector.

One other thing to melt your head even more. AC cables come in two types, 3 phase and single phase. A single phase cable will only carry 16A(3.6Kw) regardless of what speed the charge point or car can charge at. 3 phase can carry 32A (7.3Kw single phase or 22Kw 3 phase)

THe issue I have with solar charging, seen this as a group but had popped into my head before. The charger switch, I think, went in someone car. High cost repair. The garage said becuase they used solar and it was constantly flicking on/off on days when the sun wasn't strong the switch went. Now that's as technical as I am but when I have solar plugged in and let says someone boils the kettle, the excess is gone and it will turn off, then a minute later turns on.

I noticed before and it could be clicking in/out a lot during the day. I don't use solar much but I don't think I will bother in future. Not a huge gain v night rate anymore

I never knew about taking from storage, I only use direct from solar.

Maybe if coming from storage it might reduce it but I was thinking about it and then seen this case online of it causing an issue

I think anyway I get 18c FiT and I pay cira 16c for night rate, so just stick it on night rate.

Yes our peak solar is just over 4.5kw and unusual to get that as a constant so it won't be a huge charge from solar alone. Just will be handy if I'm the only one home and not using the electricity for anything else just to get some charge for days where I'm not using a lot. More as an option rather than the normal way of charging.

I have heard this alright, something to be mindful of. Im reality as above I probably won't be using it as the main charge source, and if I'm charging during the day I'm usually the only one here so probably would only use it if I don't have other things running at the same time which hopefully might help the issue. If say I need solar for washing machine & drier then I could leave the car unplugged . Will see how it all works out, if I change to night rate I might not need to charge during daytime anyway.

A single phase cable will only carry 16A(3.6Kw) regardless of what speed the charge point or car can charge at.

Unless Im missing some context, thats not accurate.

Single phase can charge at 32A. Its what most people have in their homes!

You can of course have a single phase 16A cable which will only charge at 3.6kW but thats not a rule, just the spec of the cable you buy.

When on a 3-phase charge point with a 3-phase cable, most cars can only take 11kW which is 16A per phase, so maybe thats where you are mixing things up?

Yea, that sounds correct to me. I think VW were one of the few to include a 16A 3 Phase cable with the ID.3 1st. Fine on 3 phase type 2, but only 3.6kW if using on an untethered single phase supply.

Has anyone gone with energia to get the free charger installed? It's an eo charger. I can't find a lot of good reviews for it.

You need to look at your overall usage before making a decision. Say you use most of your electricity in the daytime and there are only a couple of things you can move into a night rate (washing machine for example), then the saving on the 14kWh you would use charging the car may be inconsequential compared to (say) a 5c kWh saving you make during the day.

No, sounds about right By the look of it you'd be better off with the night rate. And as I said, you could move some other stuff into the night rate as well. The more you can get into that 2 hour window, the more you save. A good trick is if you have an immersion heater and use hot water in the morning, stick it on the timer on the bath setting for 2am. Those two hours get it up to temperature and the rest of the night it's just kicking in for a few minutes to keep the temp up. Loads of hot water in the morning.

Would you really be using 108Kw a week in the car? I doubt it. I'm only using around 40Kw per week. I stuck with the Flogas 24hr plan I'm paying 23c per unit. The car accounts for 20% of the electricity consumption.

I'm on the bord gais EV plan and it seems pretty decent so far.

It's a relatively cheap day rate compared to some 28c.

Peak (weekday between 5-7) is 39c so we avoid the washing machine etc going at that time (we just cook as normal, sure what can you do!)

Night rate is not as cheap as others at 20c

But the EV rate is 7c (3 hours, between 2am and 5am) is pretty cheap.

Standing charge is high though €325 a year.

We probably charge the car twice a week, so on the other nights we can throw the dishwasher, dryer and washing machine to come on at the EV rate. Other than cooking and an electric shower, these are the main users of power in our house. We only throw on the dryer at the same time on nights we do charge the car. The charger should back off for it to not be a problem, but I'd rather not be using close to the limit!

Getting the cheap washing done has certainly motivated us to keep on top of the washing a bit better! We have noticed if there are multiple dishwasher loads to put on delaying the dishwasher to avoid peak so it finishes around 8 or 9 is too late though, as the motivation to empty and refill it at that time on the night rate or EV rate just isnt there :D

The Bord Gais EV plan standing charge is high. €100 a year more expensive than Energia EV plan.

There's a gouging rate, sorry I mean peak rate 😎. None, with Energia.

The EV rate is slightly lower with Bord Gais, 7c V 7.5c with Energia, but it's an hour less.

Day rate with Bord Gais also slightly lower, 28c v 33c.

Depending on your usage its definitely worth crunching the numbers.