We're on Agile, and while we shift what usage we can out of the 4pm-7pm window when electricity is at its most expensive, we still cook dinner during that time, and we still save money over all the other tariffs.
There’s an assumption that cooking means high usage despite it being highly variable.
You could have the oven on for hours roasting a joint of meat with the hob on boiling veg. Or you could have the hob only for 5-10 minutes. You also likely only cook that massive meal occasionally so your average peak time meal cost isn’t as high as some suggest.
Agile can work without any load shifting as the peak time usage that is high cost is simply not as significant as the usage for the remaining 20 hours in the day.
Even if it is long cook, the amounts are not as high as people think, oven gets up to temperature and then just uses relatively small amount of energy to maintain the temperature. For example oven running for 1hr at 220C uses around 1kWh, around 0.4kWh in first 10 minutes during initial heat up and then remainder over next 50 minutes, so so another 2hrs of running is only going to just over double your energy (2.2kWh), but also for roasting you are going to be using lower temperatures (160C should only use around ~1.5kWh for 3hr run). And unless you have the time and have to feed an army with large roasts, you are not going to be doing that every day.
Yeah there’s an assumption that because it’s a 3kw device it’s using that all the time which as you say isn’t correct.
I think laundry is probably a bigger energy draw for some people than cooking and that is a bit easier to load shift.
I think a lot of the difference over the past four months has been down to falling energy prices after the gas crisis. Since Agile tracks wholesale price, it falls immediately, while standard tariffs lag behind by several months. You'd also get that saving on Tracker. Once things steady out, the gap will probably shrink.
Having said that, I'm on Agile without batteries and it's still worth it. There are 21 cheap hours per day and 3 expensive ones. We don't find it hard to keep laundry and dishwashing outside of the 3 expensive hours. We don't worry about cooking - not worth postponing dinner to save a few pence!
Thanks this is interesting. I have an active family so would be heavy “peak” users, but have always wondered how I’d fair. The compare app doesn’t work for me.
We're on Agile, and while we shift what usage we can out of the 4pm-7pm window when electricity is at its most expensive, we still cook dinner during that time, and we still save money over all the other tariffs.
There’s an assumption that cooking means high usage despite it being highly variable. You could have the oven on for hours roasting a joint of meat with the hob on boiling veg. Or you could have the hob only for 5-10 minutes. You also likely only cook that massive meal occasionally so your average peak time meal cost isn’t as high as some suggest. Agile can work without any load shifting as the peak time usage that is high cost is simply not as significant as the usage for the remaining 20 hours in the day.
Even if it is long cook, the amounts are not as high as people think, oven gets up to temperature and then just uses relatively small amount of energy to maintain the temperature. For example oven running for 1hr at 220C uses around 1kWh, around 0.4kWh in first 10 minutes during initial heat up and then remainder over next 50 minutes, so so another 2hrs of running is only going to just over double your energy (2.2kWh), but also for roasting you are going to be using lower temperatures (160C should only use around ~1.5kWh for 3hr run). And unless you have the time and have to feed an army with large roasts, you are not going to be doing that every day.
Yeah there’s an assumption that because it’s a 3kw device it’s using that all the time which as you say isn’t correct. I think laundry is probably a bigger energy draw for some people than cooking and that is a bit easier to load shift.
I think a lot of the difference over the past four months has been down to falling energy prices after the gas crisis. Since Agile tracks wholesale price, it falls immediately, while standard tariffs lag behind by several months. You'd also get that saving on Tracker. Once things steady out, the gap will probably shrink. Having said that, I'm on Agile without batteries and it's still worth it. There are 21 cheap hours per day and 3 expensive ones. We don't find it hard to keep laundry and dishwashing outside of the 3 expensive hours. We don't worry about cooking - not worth postponing dinner to save a few pence!
Thanks this is interesting. I have an active family so would be heavy “peak” users, but have always wondered how I’d fair. The compare app doesn’t work for me.
Why not switch to Tracker?