In this video I will cover our April 2022 performance figures for our solar pv,
Tesla Powerwall 2 here in the UK. I'll share the month's Ripple Energy wind turbine performance,
our electricity and gas bills, and our Tesla Model 3 and Renault Zoe usage and costs. So stay tuned!
Hi John here and welcome. April was an interesting month actually because we moved from snow at
the end of March to sunnier weather in April. Unfortunately sunnier weather often meant less
wind which impacted our wind turbine generation on some days during the month. Yes that's right
we own part of a wind turbine in case you missed that. I'll leave a link up here to a video in
the top corner as well as on the end screen in the video about Ripple Energy and wind farm ownership.
The graphic on screen is our setup at home which you can pause and review if you want to.
The observant amongst you will notice I've added the Graig Fatha wind turbine. All our components
and specifications are in the description below this video. Let's kick off with the newest member
of the household energy generation shall we? A 2.5MW wind turbine 180 miles away in Wales.
Here is the daily generation chart showing monetary value on the left hand axis the
right axis shows the kWh generated. This is a user specific chart based on how much energy you
invested in. We have 1,158 watts which equates to 25% of our annual usage. As you can see a
few high peaks towards the end of April but also some very still days with little wind generation.
This is normal and less wind in the summer, more wind in the winter. Here you can see the
averages for Cardiff 2021. The wind turbine is actually located nearby however it's probably
windier at the wind turbine location due to its high elevation and open aspect. Actually the
wind turbine is working 13% more effectively than predicted in terms of the numbers. Here is the raw
data that feeds that chart that I've just shown you. The first payment was made around the 20th of
last month so I'm actually unable to give you an exact credit that I'll get for April's generation.
In March for 17 days generation it was £15. For April I expect it to be around £30.
That amount, as you'll see later, covers our electricity bill for the month. Let's have a look
at what the sunshine has created a bit more closer to home. Well actually on the roof of our home!
For April 2022 our south south west facing 6.34kW produced a total of 775 units.
Not close to April 2020 which was a wall-to-wall sunshine, closer to April 2021.
Looking back at the last 2 years we had peak production in April. However, in 2019 it was
in May. Is this going to be the constant change with the seasons getting earlier and earlier
or is it just you know a one-off blip as well or a two-off blip. We'll have more data at the end
of May and be able to review and see where we are. Our average daily solar generation was 26
units for the month. Our total generation figure for the period divided by the size of our array
is 775 units divided by 6.4 worth of panels works out at 121p/kWh. That's pretty good pleased with
that. How did you all get on? As ever if you would drop your totals in the comments down below
that would be great to spark a conversation about that. Thank you very much for doing that. Looking
at each array our 4kW array produced 506 units and the newer 2.34kW array produced 269 units.
Not much more to say about that, it's in keeping with what I would expect. Let's have a look at how
we fared with our self-powered during the month. We've been jumping between Cost Saving mode and
self-powered mode with the Powerwall depending on how much sunshine was forecast.
With our solar pv and Powerwall contributions we were 85% self-powered for the month which is up
on March's figure of 63%. Very pleased to see that self-power figure rising.
Well let's just hope it's not peaked for the year and we drop down again in May.
The split between self-powered across peak and off-peak can be seen in this chart.
During peak rate times we were 97% self-powered drawing just 3% from the grid. During the
off-peak period which is 00:30am to 05:30am in the morning we were self-powered for 3% of the time.
April over the years, you can dramatically see the fall in production over the past 3 years when you
isolate the months in this chart. As most of you know the last 3 years shows both arrays, before
that which is the 4kW array hence the massive jump up for those last 3 years. Our round trip
efficiency for the power war was 88% this month 360 units into the battery versus 316 pulled out.
This chart gives you a little bit more detail on what happened day by day during the month. House
uses shown in blue. Blue peaks there are when we charge one of the two EVs and most probably the
Powerwall is charged during the off-peak time and we probably run a kiln as well overnight.
Solar generation shown in yellow comes in strong in the middle of the month onwards.
I guess the key takeaway is the consistency of solar. Lowest generation day was the high 10 units
on the 4th of April and the highest generation was 40 units on the 24th. An average of 25 units per
day over the course of the month. Import for April was down, that's shown in red.
A few good consecutive days there between the 21st and the 27th where
we had next to no import each day. A total of 4 units over those 7 days was imported.
We would have been on self-powered mode with the Powerwall during those days to minimise grid pull.
Export shown in orange indicates a few high export days. 11 units on the 20th and 15
units on the 21st both those days we were out so unable to take advantage of soaking up the solar
in one of the cars. This chart shows the 4 data sources we've just looked at in the day by day
house usage. Shown in blue is perhaps the key one to focus on here at 954 versus our solar total of
774. Surplus was 259 from the grid with 89 units exported. Let's have a look at those last two in a
bit more detail. This is our average daily house usage and our average daily grid usage over the
preceding months. A huge drop against March's figure average daily house usage shown in blue
was 32 units down from 40 units per day in March. Average daily pull from the grid shown in red was
9 units over 50% down on March's figure of 21 units per day. From the grid 89 units
escaped back to the grid in April. Regulars know I like to maximise my locally grown electricity.
It's fresher and has more zing! But seriously though... using as much as you can locally is
the best approach when you don't have an export tariff in place. We pulled 260 units from the
grid in April that's a 40 reduction over our 651 units imported in March which is good to see.
On the myenergi eddi, this heats our hot water from surplus solar. The eddi diverted 69 units
of excess solar generation to heat our hot water during the month. Considerably more than
the previous months. Nothing else has changed apart from there was more solar to play with.
The running totals for the eddi are 117 units for the year, 938 units since installation and
the running savings as you can see there based on our cheap rate of 5.5 pence per unit is £66.84p.
Onto the cars. The Tesla Model 3 covered 1,219 miles during the month
bringing its total mileage to 19,639 miles. No issues or problems to report.
We did 6 public charging sessions where we added a total of 275 units.
All charging was free at Tesla Superchargers. We actually have 8,000 miles of free supercharging
left and that expires in April 2023. After that we will be paying for supercharging.
We did 2 trips to North Yorkshire which was the reason for the 6 charging sessions.
As you can see historically looking at that column we don't do too much public charging.
Home charging on the Tesla added 89.75 units with 72% of our home charging
from the grid coming from sunshine. So 136 units coming from solar and 53 units from the grid. This
grid energy would all have been off peak Octopus Energy Go Faster tariff at 5.5 pence per unit.
The 22kW Zoe covered 404 miles during the month and now has a total mileage of 26,646 miles.
No issues or problems to report with a car and with the warmer weather it's getting more and
more economical. 6 miles of distance for 1 unit of electricity is quite common. As you can see from
the cost per mile for both cars it's been another cheap month you know, cheapest chips for motoring.
Finally let's have a look at our gas and electric bills for the month of April. Gas,
so it's 30 days this covers this billing period so the 5th of April to the 4th of May inclusive.
46 cubic meters of gas which is equivalent to 518 units of electricity once they've done the maths.
Our unit rate went up in April and is now 0.0693 pence per unit so the bill less the
standing charge was £35.90. Standing Charge £7.78. VAT at £2.18 giving a total of £45.86.
And as you can see here from this chart there's quite a few days when we had the gas boiler turned
off. I'm hoping that's going to continue. It's off at the moment as I record this in early May.
Electricity, 30 days again same period 5th of April to the 4th of May inclusive.
260 units in total use split between 26 units at peak and 235 units at off peak. The bill
less the standing charge was £16.09. Standing Charge of £7.14.
VAT £1.16, giving a bill total of £24.39p for the month. And that works out at an average cost of
6p per unit over the course of the month for the electricity we've used which is really good.
That's it! Any questions then just dive down into the comments below and I shall pick those
up. As always please comment, like, share any or all of those actions really help to get this video
shown to more people on YouTube which in turn helps my little channel grow. Thank you for that.
Thanks for watching I'll see you on the next video. Take care bye.