Energy Prices

[guest4871]

BG are a ripoff.

When I needed a new gas boiler some years ago BG wanted just over £3.5k. Johnson & Starleys local agents did it for £1.6k

As for tricky energy suppliers there is an ad in our local paper saying Eon will replace your gas boiler with an 'A' rated new one for 'only £3,800 'a saving of £2000 under the government warm homes scheme' - got a quote from Boxt for the latest Worcester- Bosch greenstar system boiler supplied and fitted for £2500 - some saving Huh, it is a disgrace that they can charge so much for fitting a boiler that only costs about £1000 to buy, and Eon will get it trade price, a lot cheaper.

I have had excellent experience with BOXT (50% owned by Bosch). Very quick, straightforward, fixed price, nil hassle, excellent team. Really good value. Well worth looking at.

[Geordielad]

My fixed energy contract is ending. Currently about £1500 pa.
I’ve no intention of switching but looked at alternatives out of interest.
OVO energy won’t quote me and British Gas quoted £4300.
Be cheaper to burn fiver pound notes!

Try Octopus.... we were with a number of suppliers,  but happiest with Octopus.

Thanks for the info. Guess who I’m already with and very happy with them too.

[Geordielad]

Got my new energy prices from Octopus today. Not quite as bad as I anticipated but bad enough.
Flexible Octopus variable now about £2k, up from £1500.
Anybody think the prices will ever come down in the future?

[culzean]

Got my new energy prices from Octopus today. Not quite as bad as I anticipated but bad enough.
Flexible Octopus variable now about £2k, up from £1500.
Anybody think the prices will ever come down in the future?

Not if we keep going down the present mad renewable route, both wind and solar are weak energy streams and have very unreliable output, and the owners of the facilities get paid whether they are supplying power or not, which is undoubtedly the reason for prices going up.  Basically we are decommissioning reliable energy generation plants,  not planning any reliable replacements ( Nuclear ) and our politicians crossing their fingers that everything will be OK, at if present plan is continued - it will not be OK, as we will undoubtedly find out this winter, 'coming soon to a substation near you - power cuts'....

Many rail freight companies ditching their electric locomotives because they cost too much to run, I have said before on this forum that EV will soon cost more to run than ICE vehicles.

https://politics69.com/2021/10/13/rail-freight-operators-forced-to-dump-electric-trains-for-diesel-due-to-britains-energy-crisis/

[John Ratsey]

Basically we are decommissioning reliable energy generation plants,  not planning any reliable replacements ( Nuclear ) and our politicians crossing their fingers that everything will be OK, at if present plan is continued - it will not be OK, as we will undoubtedly find out this winter, 'coming soon to a substation near you - power cuts'....

I spent a bit of time about 50 years ago in a power station which also served as the substation in the local area. At that time the plan was (i) a 5% voltage reduction then (ii) another 5% reduction (90% of the voltage = 81% of the power) and (iii) finally cutting supplies. These days there are also arrangements with big industrial users to reduce their electricity consumption at times of high grid demand.

Nonetheless, years of inaction in starting new reliable generation (I'd have 3 more nuclear power stations under construction) and reliance on unreliable wind means that the effectiveness of politicians' prayers could soon bes tested. There was much whinging about the Hinkley Point 3 strike price https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/21/hinkley-point-c-dreadful-deal-behind-worlds-most-expensive-power-plant but it seems cheap in the current circumstances. Wind energy looks cheap when the wind blows, but there's no penalty for being unreliable.  This pumped storage scheme https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-57510870 is stuck in the doldrums. Sensibly, it should be funded by an unreliability tax on the wind generators.

[culzean]

Basically we are decommissioning reliable energy generation plants,  not planning any reliable replacements ( Nuclear ) and our politicians crossing their fingers that everything will be OK, at if present plan is continued - it will not be OK, as we will undoubtedly find out this winter, 'coming soon to a substation near you - power cuts'....

I spent a bit of time about 50 years ago in a power station which also served as the substation in the local area. At that time the plan was (i) a 5% voltage reduction then (ii) another 5% reduction (90% of the voltage = 81% of the power) and (iii) finally cutting supplies. These days there are also arrangements with big industrial users to reduce their electricity consumption at times of high grid demand.

Nonetheless, years of inaction in starting new reliable generation (I'd have 3 more nuclear power stations under construction) and reliance on unreliable wind means that the effectiveness of politicians' prayers could soon bes tested. There was much whinging about the Hinkley Point 3 strike price https://www.theguardian.com/news/2017/dec/21/hinkley-point-c-dreadful-deal-behind-worlds-most-expensive-power-plant but it seems cheap in the current circumstances. Wind energy looks cheap when the wind blows, but there's no penalty for being unreliable.  This pumped storage scheme https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-scotland-highlands-islands-57510870 is stuck in the doldrums. Sensibly, it should be funded by an unreliability tax on the wind generators.

I have no doubt that the ultimate aim of smart meters will be to manage demand,  with a smart distribution board being part of the plan.  When some load needs shedding the smart distribution board ( responding to a signal to smart meter by your energy supplier, or even national grid ) will cut power to water heating circuit, so no immediate disruption to house occupants, next step, if any EV plugged in the grid will siphon off power from battery.   I have no doubt that smart meters will also allow electricity being used to charge vehicles to be charged at a higher rate than general household electricity - maybe via a chip in the vehicle that can communicate with smart meter and sense current flow ( a bit like economy 7 in reverse ).

[JimSh]

I have no doubt that the ultimate aim of smart meters will be to manage demand,  with a smart distribution board being part of the plan. 

Sounds like a sensible idea to me allowing supply to match demand more closely.

[John Ratsey]

I have no doubt that the ultimate aim of smart meters will be to manage demand, with a smart distribution board being part of the plan.

While that may come, the system already exists using smart devices which can be programmed, along with a suitable time-of-use tariff, to use electricity when it is cheap and not when it is expensive. One example is to have a household battery which charges using the cheap period of the Octopus Go tariff https://www.energy-stats.uk/octopus-go-tariff/ but there are plenty of other options. See https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-58898999 for example.

The big benefit of smart meters is the logging of consumption in 1/2 hour blocks which go into a database which the billing system can utilise to add up the cost according to the tariff and time of use. There's no need for separate meters and changing the tariff is a matter of instructing the billing system to do some different sums.

[culzean]

I have no doubt that the ultimate aim of smart meters will be to manage demand, with a smart distribution board being part of the plan.

While that may come, the system already exists using smart devices which can be programmed, along with a suitable time-of-use tariff, to use electricity when it is cheap and not when it is expensive. One example is to have a household battery which charges using the cheap period of the Octopus Go tariff https://www.energy-stats.uk/octopus-go-tariff/ but there are plenty of other options. See https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-58898999 for example.

The big benefit of smart meters is the logging of consumption in 1/2 hour blocks which go into a database which the billing system can utilise to add up the cost according to the tariff and time of use. There's no need for separate meters and changing the tariff is a matter of instructing the billing system to do some different sums.

I heard a discussion about smart meters many years ago when they were first talked about,  one expert said they only made sense if you used them for differential pricing at different times of day ( now the meter would have to know if wind was blowing or whether it was cloudy or not ).  The bloke form department of energy or whatever said there were no plans to introduce differential pricing,  to which the expert replied 'so they are just a fancy device to tell you that your kettle uses 3KW then, no more than that. The expert also criticised the decision to use mobile phone network to carry data,  a lot of other countries had decided to use the power lines themselves to carry data,  which meant that even people with bad phone coverage could use the system and costs would be lower.   

[John Ratsey]

I heard a discussion about smart meters many years ago when they were first talked about, one expert said they only made sense if you used them for differential pricing at different times of day ( now the meter would have to know if wind was blowing or whether it was cloudy or not ). The bloke form department of energy or whatever said there were no plans to introduce differential pricing,  to which the expert replied 'so they are just a fancy device to tell you that your kettle uses 3KW then, no more than that.   

The world has moved on and companies have figured out how to make money and enable customers to save money by utilising differential pricing by utilising what has become cheap technology with almost every home having internet connectivity. For example, if you want an EV charger then get one of these https://myenergi.com/product/zappi/ and use an app on your phone to tell it what to do.