Tesla introduces time-of-day Supercharger rates at select locations

[MarcoRP]

Moderator note (bmah): This thread was originally started in the California Supercharger Locations sub-forum, but is being moved to Superchargers & Charging Infrastructure / North America because it feels likely to eventually have impact beyond California.

Just got notified of this by Drive Tesla Canada. It seems Tesla is adding time of day rates to some Californian Superchargers. For now, any paid charge from 4-9pm costs more than any other time of day. For now, the selected location seem random, or maybe Tesla is doing this for high usage locations?

Link to article: Tesla introduces time-of-day Supercharger rates at select locations - Drive Tesla Canada

P.S. I don’t know if this thread is specific to just the California forum or the CA Supercharger Locations forum. Sorry if I’m overstepping. @bmah

 

[1100MCM]

I don't think it's high usage but rather local utility time of use rates. 4-9P weekday is typically the highest cost for electricity so most commercial time of use rates reflect this. Tesla looks to be adjusting to reflect this.

 

[smartypnz]

sounds fair.... love it

 

[ecarfan]

I don't think it's high usage but rather local utility time of use rates. 4-9P weekday is typically the highest cost for electricity so most commercial time of use rates reflect this. Tesla looks to be adjusting to reflect this.

I agree. This change by Tesla seems reasonable. I expect to see it at more locations in the future.

 

[goldengate]

The problem is that locals who might have charged after dinner / late afternoon may shift to the middle of the day which at certain superchargers (like SLO) could be a disaster given the middle of the day is their current peak traffic. Seems like incentives should be given at those stations to get locals to charge during periods when they are less busy.... which is basically any time but mid day.

 

[PedramGh]

I doubt if charge rate is same in all stations. It makes sense if each station has different charge rate based on the consumer traffic at that certain place.

 

[Feathermerchan]

You Ca guys are nuts. I'm paying 9¢ / kWh all day long. If you doubled that for SC it would still be less than the lowest rate above.

 

[1100MCM]

You Ca guys are nuts. I'm paying 9¢ / kWh all day long. If you doubled that for SC it would still be less than the lowest rate above.

That is the rate at the supercharger? If that’s the case, wow that is cheap!

 

[PedramGh]

This is CA! You make money so you’ve got to spend those bucks!

 

[miimura]

You Ca guys are nuts. I'm paying 9¢ / kWh all day long. If you doubled that for SC it would still be less than the lowest rate above.

Here is a sample of the kind of Tariff rates that Tesla would have to pay in California. This is the PG&E B-20 Rate for commercial service with demand over 1000kW.

Let's say it's a site that has 16 V2 stalls. That's 8 cabinets that can pull up to 160kW each. Maximum demand is 1280kW. If the site gets full at least once each Summer month between 4-9pm and also between 2-4pm or 9-11pm, they have to pay all of these charges, before you even start counting the usage charges per kWh.

Meter charge: $45.09 * 30 days = $1,352.70
Peak demand charge: $25.74 * 1,280 = $32,947.20
Part-Peak demand charge: $5.31 * 1,280 = $6,796.80
Maximum demand charge: $21.41 * 1,280 = $27,404.80

That's $68,501.50 per Summer month before you even start counting up all the kWh and paying 11 to 16 cents for each of those kWh.

 

[Feathermerchan]

Many utilities have a ratchet clause that has you pay maybe 80% of your maximum demand charge each month as a minimum.
That's a minimum charge of $54,801 every month. The ratchet is set annually. Once set it stays for the next 11 months. This allows the utility to even out the customer's bill.

 

[Mixdup]

I'm guessing in California time of use is mandatory in some if not all areas. In many other areas of the country (GA for example) time of use is optional, but not required. I'm guessing this is probably only going to be implemented in places that have mandatory TOU (which may be beyond California)

Another way, and maybe Tesla will move in this direction eventually, would be to install powerpacks and charge them during the cheap period and then charge out of them during the peak periods--even in locations that don't have solar panels

I do worry that this will shift charge patterns and you'll end up with SCs with no one at them during peak time and overcrowded during off-peak times but without energy storage on site to shave the demand, no scheme to even out pricing would actually help with peak demand which is an issue and results in high CO2 generation

 

[Feathermerchan]

Or Batteries will be installed by the utility so that they can use all the wind and solar possible and then use the batteries on the grid and lower rates during time of high use.

 

[miimura]

I'm guessing in California time of use is mandatory in some if not all areas. In many other areas of the country (GA for example) time of use is optional, but not required. I'm guessing this is probably only going to be implemented in places that have mandatory TOU (which may be beyond California)

Yes, time of use rates will soon be mandatory on some utilities in California. They have also shifted the Peak hours later in the afternoon to match the evolving "duck curve" caused by solar power integration on the grid. This has also had the effect of devaluing solar generation owned by residential customers. This greatly extends the solar system payback for people who have solar but no batteries. The State guaranteed the net metering rules, but they didn't lock in the rate schedules. I was kicked off my rate plan that was "too good to be true".

 

[Feathermerchan]

PSC's/PUC's love 'Time of Use' rates because they 'send the right price signals' to customers.

But surveys always say that customers would have one rate.

Remember initial call phone plans that started as price per minute use then morphed into TOU rates with several periods during week days and different rates on weekends? The public rejected those. There's a company selling electricity here in Tx (Griddy) that sends you price alerts and I think they have hourly semi real time pricing.

Personally I prefer a flat rate.

 

[Mixdup]

PSC's/PUC's love 'Time of Use' rates because they 'send the right price signals' to customers.

But surveys always say that customers would have one rate.

Remember initial call phone plans that started as price per minute use then morphed into TOU rates with several periods during week days and different rates on weekends? The public rejected those. There's a company selling electricity here in Tx (Griddy) that sends you price alerts and I think they have hourly semi real time pricing.

Personally I prefer a flat rate.

Of course a flat rate is the most customer friendly for all customers as a whole. For some customers, TOU billing is actually advantageous, depending on the area and their work patterns. And in terms of fairness, TOU is the most fair as it allocates the true cost of the actual electricity consumed at the time it was consumed. Of course, that last bit depends on a tariff that is fair and not used to gouge, which can be rare

TOU also discourages the highest peaks, which is a good sustainability practice. The peaker power plants that must be started up to cover the highest peak times are very dirty and represent a very high marginal cost

The best solution both locally for Tesla's pricing, and for the grid as a whole is more energy storage that can be used to shave the peaks. If Tesla would/could install some powerpacks at locations even without solar, they could store energy off the grid during off peak times and use that during the highest peaks. And, the same goes for utilities as a whole. Hopefully they will use more storage solutions so that the peaks are not so hard to meet and TOU rates can stabilize or even be reduced

 

[Feathermerchan]

We had about 2M residential customers and around 10,000 selected TOU. Our load research discovered that those on TOU already had a TOU lifestyle and did not have to change their habits to save on the TOU rate. So in that case the utility loses that money. The only way to male it work is to have everyone on TOU. But the PUC did not have the courage to try that one.
Commercial customers were charged separately for demand (more expensive metering) so had a better price signal.
Our peaking units were Combustion Turbines (jet engine) which ran on natural gas in West Texas and we needed them anyway for black start. I think they ran about 7-800 hrs per year.

With deregu;ation in Tx, rates have come down some. I'm paying 9¢/kWh flat for this 2 year contract. It makes the Model 3 lots cheaper to drive than any ICE car with similar performance.

 

[reach]

This is the current Supercharger rate in Oxnard, California as of July 1, 2020. Is this the highest of anywhere at $0.39 per kWh?

;

 

[ElectricCyclist]

Of course a flat rate is the most customer friendly for all customers as a whole. For some customers, TOU billing is actually advantageous, depending on the area and their work patterns. And in terms of fairness, TOU is the most fair as it allocates the true cost of the actual electricity consumed at the time it was consumed. Of course, that last bit depends on a tariff that is fair and not used to gouge, which can be rare

TOU also discourages the highest peaks, which is a good sustainability practice. The peaker power plants that must be started up to cover the highest peak times are very dirty and represent a very high marginal cost

The best solution both locally for Tesla's pricing, and for the grid as a whole is more energy storage that can be used to shave the peaks. If Tesla would/could install some powerpacks at locations even without solar, they could store energy off the grid during off peak times and use that during the highest peaks. And, the same goes for utilities as a whole. Hopefully they will use more storage solutions so that the peaks are not so hard to meet and TOU rates can stabilize or even be reduced

I am personally familiar with Tesla having proposals to install their Megapacks in some upcoming Supercharger projects which could help mitigate some of the issues of charging on peak. I also wanted to provide the TOU-EV-9 Tariff for Southern California Edison territory my guess is that these Superchargers fall into this rate schedule. The summary is during the Summer "On Peak" Tesla is paying quite a bit for electricity at approximately 45 cents per kWH.

https://library.sce.com/content/dam...ustrial-rates/ELECTRIC_SCHEDULES_TOU-EV-9.pdf

 

[tivoboy]

I think this looks a bit like tesla trying to work WITH the power companies, to reduce actually demand usage, probably in high impact areas during what would be peak load for utilities.