Off-peak power to the people

Householders in England could benefit from lower electricity bills thanks to a new energy tariff.

Green Energy has launched its Tide tariff with a range of electricity prices, and favours those using high electricity consuming equipment that can be arranged to come on at non peak times.

This has the potential for lower bills if customers make use of the lowest cost periods for running appliances, particularly those who have an electric vehicle with home charging for example.

The tariff is also being seen as building on the structure of the long available ‘economy seven’ tariff. It is considered as a forerunner of a developing domestic electricity market, as smart technology and meters become more available.

Tide will charge users per kWh, depending on the time of day with the lowest price available overnight.

• 4.99p from 11 p.m. – 6 a.m.
• 11.99p from 6 a.m. – 4 p.m.
• 24.99p from 4 p.m. – 7 p.m.
• 11.99p from 7 p.m. – 11 p.m.

What you can save

Before you set your alarm to start the ironing at 5am, you might want to consider the relative costs.

An hour’s ironing typically uses 1 kWh of electricity, which will cost around 5p on Green Energy’s night-time price, 11p during the day or 25p during the 4pm-6pm peak.

Those opting to run a standard older model washing machine on this tariff will bring the cost down from 22p during the day, to 10p a cycle if they run it after 11pm.

A dishwasher cycle at 65C will cost around 7.5p at night, 16.5p at midday or 37p if run at the peak time.

Running an older dishwasher every night for 50 weeks would save £31.50 a year compared to running it during the day on this tariff.

An older washing machine run three times a week at night would save £15 a year.

However, if you have one of the latest A+++ rated washing or dishwashing machines that use much less power, you reduce those savings by half.

The biggest savings come when charging an electric car. A 30kW recharge will cost £1.50 at night or £3.30 during the day – a £40 annual saving.

To find out how our energy law specialists can help your business, please contact Andrew Davison on 0191 211 7950 or to read more click here.