Eon Drive

Hello all,
I've had PV panels (18) and all-in-one battery commissioned in the last 24 hours. I've seen another discussion about the Eon Drive tariff but that seemed to go down a rabbit hole about the user's consumption so didn't want to piggy-back on that.
I'm with Eon at the moment paying 27.23p/Kwh but I see that I can transfer to their Drive tariff (quote: 8.0p/Kwh 00:00 - 07:00; 31.04p/Kwh the rest) without penalty.
I have an ASHP for underfloor heating and hot water in a well-insulated house. Over the year average consumption is about 25Kwh per day but obviously that rises in winter to about 37Kwh per day (higher in very cold periods) and falls to 13Kwh when I switch off the heating in May-September.
It seems like a good idea to switch but these are my questions:

• I don't have an electric vehicle. Does that matter? I see that Eon ask me to confirm I own or lease one;

• Do I switch off the overnight charging in the summer and rely solely on the PVs to do the battery top-up;

• I don't yet have an export certificate even though I know my G99 has been approved. Once I receive it, and I agree an export tariff, how does that enter the equation?

Apologies if these are simpleton questions but I'm just trying to get my head around it and to maximise the benefits of my shiny, new kit.

MisterPleasant I'd have a look around, I doubt that's your best option for ASHP.

Various members have been down this route and I think the consensus is that charging the battery overnight won't be anywhere near enough in winter with an ASHP.

I'm sure someone like @geoffreycoan will be along soon to offer specific advice.

MisterPleasant The description on the web makes is sound like you would require an EV. However, in that other thread, they don't have an EV, yet were offered the tariff. You'd need to check with EON about that.

The Drive tariff offers 16.5p export, so there's no particular reason to stop overnight charging, since that's only around 8p. So may as well just export all solar. (That's what I do - I get similar sorts of rates from Octopus.)

37kWh is obviously more than you can fit in the battery. But if, say, 10kWh of the consumption happens overnight anyway, and can run directly from grid, and you can run another 13kWh from battery, that leaves 14kWh at the day rate, giving an upper limit on average unit price of around 16p. On the more typical 25kWh days, it might be 7kWh overnight + 13kWh from battery, leaving only 5kWh to make up. (And of course you might get some of that from solar.)

If you're not strongly tied to EON, or are not offered Drive, then Octopus Agile is another option to look at. 15p-ish export, and a (very) variable import rate. If you are so inclined, installing Home Assistant on a small always-on computer can give you a lot of automation / optimisation. (I don't do that myself.)

Do EON also have a heat-pump add-on tariff ? Not sure.

DD Thanks for the explanation of how I need to look at it; really helpful. No, I don't believe that Eon has a heat pump tariff. I'm only tied to Eon in terms that there'd be a £25 penalty for leaving early so working out whether I gain more than that by switching.

If it helps at all I've been averaging about 12p/unit on Agile over the last 6 months so £25 is trivial.

MisterPleasant Hi there, I have an ASHP so can offer my input.

You have a quite high base load (mine for comparison in summer is about 14kWh for house+ASHP hot water), but conversely your winter consumption is lower than mine - must be the benefits of the well insulated house! My ASHP consumes around 20kWh a day in winter, sometimes up to 40-60kWh on very cold days.

I’m in a similar situation to you, my battery capacity (13kWh, a 9.5+5.2) is nowhere near enough to run the house and ASHP in winter. I spent ages looking at different tarrifs, concluding that I needed to basically buy the cheapest electricity I could as I wouldn’t be able to store enough in the batteries to see me through a day and paying full import rates would be very expensive.

After a lot of spreadsheet pondering I went for Octopus Agile in the end and my average monthly import rate varies between 13 and 18p. This does require active battery management though, I use Home Assistant & Predbat but there are other options like WonderWatt and My Energy Optimiser.

With an underfoor heating ASHP system you may benefit from Octopus Cosy which gives two cheap periods a day and one more expensive - probably need to turn the ASHP off for the peak period, but the thermal mass of the underfloor heating could see you through. For me I didn’t think it was cost effective as I have a radiator system.

The other alternative I’d look for winter is Octopus Tracker. Single market-rate price per day, 24x7. With that you’d only need to charge your batteries when the next-day price is significantly more expensive than the today price.
You can see price history for all the Octopus tariffs on https://energy-stats.uk/octopus-tracker-tariff/

For summer most people (myself included) were on Octopus Flux because it has such a good export rate of 28p/kWh in the evening peak. Your battery should see you through the evening peak so you’ll never need to pay the 40p peak import rate https://energy-stats.uk/octopus-flux-eastern-england/

Just roughly running the numbers you shared:

37kWh winter consumption, summer 25kWh

Eon variable 27.23x 37 = £10.08/day winter, £6.80 summer

Eon drive 13.5 (AIO capacity) x 8 + (37-13.5) x 31.04 = £8.37/day winter, £4.65 summer
[assumes you don’t run the heating at all overnight, in reality could be a bit lower]

Octopus tracker average over the last month is around 18p/kWh 18*37= £6.66 winter, £4.50 summer

All excluding solar generation. In summer you should be roughly self sufficient from solar as long as its not a cloudy day.

geoffreycoan The other alternative I’d look for winter is Octopus Tracker.

Only thing to add is that, while Octopus are generally happy for you to switch back and forth between tariffs (so Flux for the summer, Agile or Cosy for the winter), Tracker seems to be an exception - when you leave, you can't go back on for 9 months.

DD Tracker seems to be an exception - when you leave, you can't go back on for 9 months.

Thanks, I knew that and forgot to mention it. That was another reason for me that I didn’t go onto Tracker for the winter. Realistically I’d want to be on the “winter tariff” from mid October to end March-ish so couldn’t swap between say Tracker and Flux every year.

Having said that, could stay on Tracker all year. Can only get the 15p Octopus export rate though so if you generate lots of spare PV it wouldn’t be the best tariff

MisterPleasant I'm only tied to Eon in terms that there'd be a £25 penalty for leaving early

Don't forget that, with a referral code, you'll get £50 from Octopus to join. (Anyone on here will be delighted to refer you - they get £50 too.)

geoffreycoan Thank you, this is an incredibly helpful forum. I'll just mention that my ANNUAL average is 25Kwh; summer I run similar to you, about 12/13Kwh.

The EON Drive tariff is definitely available to you, I’m on it (having moved from the “Flex” tariff when I was temporally put on). No EV here and they were aware of that

I was advised I’m able to have this, the caveat here is I don’t know if this only applies to customers who have had the aisles system fitted by EON (as u did) on3 to ask them or Chris in the screen grab

Midlands_Solar Thanks. I am an existing Eon customer and I've asked for a transfer to Drive which appears to have been approved. Just awaiting a date now. In the short term this will make a difference - my panels aren't generating enough to charge batteries AND run the house so filling up at 8p/Kwh suits me fine. Once I receive my export permission I'll be looking at alternatives.

MisterPleasant You should bear in mind that EON pay 16.5p on their SEG for EON customers. Fill your battery during the night and export during the day - no brainer!

Coys68 Just for info - Eon Drive V3 now available. 6.9p between midnight and 7.00.

Still exporting using their SEG @16.5p

MisterPleasant See this video - Next Drive V6

CW Confusing how much of this is new news and how much isn’t because as earlier Eon have allowed solar owners onto the Next Drive tariff.

Still a great tariff if you have enough battery storage to see you through the day

geoffreycoan Yea - V4 included battery owners, V5 didn't (and they are supposedly working on a Solar tariff specifically for battery owners with no EV). Now V6 has popped up, looking suspiciously like V4 😃 I for one am happy with this - I don't have an EV but do have a large (AIO) battery and sadly Octopus don't have great tariffs for battery owners

CW thanks for the extra detail, I thought something like that had happened

Agreed about the lack of Octopus battery specific tariffs, its a surprising gap in their portfolio. I may try Go this summer even though no EV (yet)

I have been on Eon Drive v3 for 6 months, that said it as for EV and battery owners. Just switched to V5 as it works out cheaper for me. V5 requires an EV (I don’t have one) but they said they are allowing battery users to sign up to Drive until they release a specific new tariff for solar/battery users without EV.

geoffreycoan Agreed about the lack of Octopus battery specific tariffs, its a surprising gap in their portfolio

Let's hope that they respond to Eon by introducing a battery tariff.

Rob

Rbor It's why I moved away from Octopus - Their Drive tariff is a) cheaper; b) Longer (7 hours); c) export is 16.5p/kWh AND they don't require you to have a battery on wheels!
As geoffreycoan said, it is suprising that Octopus don't have something similar to this to allow people to fill up overnight and then consume during the day

Rbor
Ah, just replied on the other thread - sorry

Rbor Let's hope that they respond to Eon by introducing a battery tariff.

They won't. Heatpumps and EVs are all they're interested in.

I've been on EON Drive V5 for a few weeks now, and it's looking cheaper for sure!