Charging Costs

So one of the obvious draws to going EV & Tesla is saving on fuel costs. But you still need to pay for electricity, and hopefully you can charge at home rather than at public chargers.

There are a number of EV specific electricity tariffs in the UK, but I decided to have a go at Octopus Agile, which sets rates dynamically based on the energy market the day before. The cap seems very high at 100p/kWH but it seldom goes over 35p an only for very short blocks of time. Even if there were some energy event, I can move off the tariff the next day, but can't move back for 30 days.

It particularly suits us, as with commutes, dinner is often later and energy use during the highest priced 4-7pm block is lower than average. I don't need to charge the car every night and so can 'hold out' for a very cheap block of time, sometimes even free or being paid to charge!

Crunching the numbers, over the first 2 months of EV driving, the savings look to roughly be:

Saving £135 (46%) vs Octopus Intelligent Go EV tariff

Saving £209 (57%) vs Octopus Flexible (Ofgem capped) tariff 

Saving £281 (64%) vs Octopus Flexible (Ofgem capped) tariff & driving my old ICE (BMW 330d)

How to get Octopus Agile:

1) Switch supplier to Octopus (initially Flexible tariff). Use this referral link https://share.octopus.energy/noble-robin-945 for additional £50 credit!

2) If you have a smart meter you can then update the tariff after you've switched at https://octopus.energy/smart/agile/