Home Charging - Off Peak Only By Default

[irc]

"Electric car charging points in people’s homes will be preset to switch off for nine hours each weekday at times of peak demand because ministers fear blackouts on the National Grid.

Under regulations that will come into force in May, new chargers in the home and workplace will be automatically set not to function from 8am to 11am and 4pm to 10pm. Public chargers and rapid chargers, on motorways and A-roads, will be exempt".


https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/e-car-chargers-...

The article says owners will be able to override the off peak setting. So is this a sensible nudge to encourage off peak charging or the thin end of a wedge to restrict E charging when demand is high? Could the new generation of off peak chargers have the override switch turned off.

Does it not matter because slow charging from a normal socket is always available anyway?

[Mikehig]

From many comments about charging on this forum, EV users are generally on flexible tariffs and programme their cars' charging accordingly. Although the 08:00 start could be a little inconvenient for pre-heating cars in winter.

Seems like a solution to a non-problem.

Also it rather contradicts assurances that the grid will be able to cope with the extra load of EV charging. What are they going to do with the future all-electric homes that will certainly draw power at peak times and with much greater loads than EVs?

[Frimley111R]

Its classic government. They think of a 'good idea' and then say they are going to do it without any idea if it is even possible! For example...

Thousands of chargers in the UK do not have any data connections
Thousands that do are not connected to any data supply
Once the OZEV grant goes thousands of people will buy cheap dumb chargers
Chargers use different software so how are you going to connect to so many different types of software?

I could go on but the utopian idea is impractical and heavily flawed from a practical basis.

The only way to achieve what they want is to get energy suppliers to offer cheap night time tariffs.

[Dave Hedgehog]

Frimley111R said:

Its classic government.

Thousands of chargers in the UK do not have any data connections - irrelevant

Thousands that do are not connected to any data supply - irrelevant

Once the OZEV grant goes thousands of people will buy cheap dumb chargers - irrelevant

Chargers use different software so how are you going to connect to so many different types of software? - it will be hardcoded into each new unit by the manufacturer, its only for new units

The only way to achieve what they want is to get energy suppliers to offer cheap night time tariffs - many EV buyers do

They are doing this because they have realised the avg uk punter is selfish, entitled and stupid. They are stopping millions of them in the future coming home from work and all plugging in and expecting to charge at peak time.

[JonnyVTEC]

Sounds a good idea to me to be honest.

Unless it’s a PHEV which mid day charging could be a thing.

[phil4]

Seems a reasonable idea to me. We've all heard of the Plugin Hybrid drivers that never plug in... well I'm pretty sure there are plenty of people who buy their EV, or get it as a company car, get a charger fitted as part of it, rock up home after a day at work and plug in with no thought as to when it's best to/not... nor get on a tariff which is cheap off peak.

I suspect that as EVs become more widespread the above will get more and more widespread.

Sure there are plenty of dumb chargers (indeed, it's what I use), but equally more early adopters will be clued up, and be on Octopus Go or similar. And as it can be overridden, seems like a sensible move to me.

[RicksAlfas]

irc said:

Under regulations that will come into force in May, new chargers in the home and workplace will be automatically set not to function from 8am to 11am and 4pm to 10pm.

I can imagine most workplace chargers coming on at 11.01!

[JonnyVTEC]

Almost as if that’s the intention…

[aestetix1]

Dave Hedgehog said:

Thousands of chargers in the UK do not have any data connections - irrelevant

So how are they going to set the time? Rely on the owner to do it?

Do you know what a Midnight Flasher is?

[PF62]

Frimley111R said:

Once the OZEV grant goes thousands of people will buy cheap dumb chargers

Even the smart chargers that you must have to get the OLEV grant are only guaranteed to be smart for three years before the charger manufacturer can levy a fee for the smart features.

Lots won’t pay so the smart chargers paid for by the government will just go dumb.

[JD]

aestetix1 said:

So how are they going to set the time? Rely on the owner to do it?

Do you know what a Midnight Flasher is?

It only applies to NEW chargers.

[SWoll]

Always charge between midnight and 7am when its cheap as do most EV drivers I'd expect. Don't see this causing much of an issue.

[recalluk]

It's worth noting what's in the actual legislation.

“During first use, the user must be given the opportunity to edit or remove this setting. The user must also be able to remove or edit this default setting at a later date. Peak times will be defined in legislation as 8am to 11am and 4pm to 10pm”

[PF62]

SWoll said:

Always charge between midnight and 7am when its cheap as do most EV drivers I'd expect. Don't see this causing much of an issue.

20:30 to 01:30 for me with Octopus Go Faster.

[51mes]

PF62 said:

20:30 to 01:30 for me with Octopus Go Faster.

Yeah, me too... Allows us to get 2 wash loads done off peak a night if needs be, without it sat in the machine all night.

[Howitzer]

A few work colleagues in Norway were angry about this happening over there.

When we ran Diesel engines to put onto the grid in the Triads over here I was sure the argument about the grid being fine with the demand was a bit squiffy.

I believe that with the new (to me anyway) G100 test for new stations coming in that we have gone from…

Grid then - any grid issues or bolt drops, get offline, we’ve got this.

Grid now - whatever you do, don’t come off the grid, we need you.

Dave!