Octopus Rewards for Peak Demand Time-Shift

[Ferdinand]

Octopus had a trial in the Sprring where they rewarded customers for timeshifting their demand away from the Peak Period when requested. Results were modest and the average loadshift was only 0.7kWh, but across 100k customers that was a larger number.

 

This now seems to be going ahead in a more formal manner, as reported by the BBC here:

 

Quote

Octopus Energy said it expects to pay on average £4 each time a customer responds to a request to cut back.

National Grid will announce full details of the scheme, which can be adopted by all energy suppliers, later this month.

The grid operator said some customers might get as much as £10 a day.

The cash incentive is to persuade people to wait until later on to run their washing machine, tumble dryer, or dishwasher, and to not charge their electric car if demand is already high.

The scheme, set to start next month and run until March 2023, aims to help the UK avoid blackouts, by reducing energy consumption at peak times.

On Thursday National Grid warned homes could face three-hour rolling blackouts, if the UK is unable to secure enough gas and electricity imports, as demand rises over the colder months.

https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/business-63175030

 

Perhaps potentially of interest to people who can timeshift their export energy? A small extra return on existing facilities.

 

Suspect that on the whole many BHers can't shift very much energy as we use relatively little. Personally I am totalling about 28-30 kWh per week at present.

As I only have solar not a battery yet, this is not me.

 

Ferdinand

 

[SteamyTea]

6 minutes ago, Ferdinand said:

Results were modest and the average loadshift was only 0.7kWh

About a quarter of my daily usage in the non heating season.

 

We already have this system up and running, called E7/10.

The driver was different when it started in the 1960s. Then it was because electricity was going to be too cheap to meter.

[Radian]

From that beeb article:

Quote

Under the National Grid-backed scheme, customers, including businesses, will receive an email or text a day ahead, outlining the time slot when they would be paid if they reduce their energy use, usually between 4pm and 7pm.

How would that reduction be evaluated? I'm struggling to think of a way. A smart meter can provide half-hourly consumption figures but reduction has to be relative to something like the previous day or some longer term average? Seems loopy to me. Now a temporary change in tariff over the period could have the same effect but only by shifting the price up.