I have a solar array installed May 2011 with the highest feed in tariff, and recently had a GivEnergy 5.2 kWh battery installed, my provider is Octopus flexable. My question is can I benifit from Octopus Flux without losing my good feed in tariff payment?
megabite You should be able to give up the export element of your current FIT scheme and therefore benefit from the flux export rates. However, if your self consumption figure is high you might find it's best keeping deemed export rate as your effective export rate works out higher and flux export rates will fall and will continue to fall. Having said that the current minimum flux day rate is 21.36p so a rough calculation would mean you will benefit if your self consumption is below 90% ish.
I'm also on max fit payments and my average self consumption is 87% so I'm keeping the deemed export payment and keeping things simple.
You need a spreadsheet.....
It's almost certainly a no-brainer to keep your FIT.
Doesn't sound as though flux will work for you - but why not give Octopus a call and see if one of their other tariffs may offer you cheaper incoming electricity whilst still keeping your FIT payments - depending on how much you import and when in the day, you may find you can sign up for a different tariff like Agile Octopus Incoming, the Octopus tracker or even Economy 7.
Why wouldn’t Flux work for the OP when @cluelesscris ’s rough calcs showed that he would be better off on Flux as long as his self-consumption was below 90%? He would keep his generation payments, it would only be the export part that would be lost in favour of Flux payments.
I'd suggest waiting until July to see how changes to the price cap affect things. Also, waiting list for Tracker tariff is being removed in July, so that's definitely one to consider, though some are saying Agile is better still. Best tariff for you may well be different in summer and winter.
AFAIK best way to exploit deemed export is to self-consume as much as possible. Have you had the battery long enough to have a feel for its effect on level of self-consumption ? Are you typically home all day, or out ? To what extent does the battery cover your typical daily use?
(What is the highest feed in rate ?)
DD Self consumption over the summer is the one to manage as it's quite easy to self consume everything over the winter. In summer we have an above ground pool and use a pool heater to kick in when excess solar is generated and our hot water tank is hot and our car is charged as we need. The pool doesn't very often get 'warm' but it is very pleasant to get into and since we added this heater to use excess solar we use the pool very much more than we used to and usually end the evening with a dip!
Dougm11
because another post today has quoted that you cant keep fit payments on flux.
positor1 The wording is quite specific though. It refers to export FIT payments. The original fit had two elements: Generation and Export. They can be treated differently and with different suppliers. Moving to flux will require the export fit payments to cease altogether in order to benefit from the flux export tariff but not the generation fit payments.
cluelesscris
not at all confusing then ?!