[Richard Neilson]

My electrical provider is Southern California Edison (SCE). It appears that SCE will only provide the special EV rate, .0965 kW, if you have a second meter, dedicated to EV charging. The consumer is responsible for the purchase and installation of the second meter. SCE website estimates total cost of second meter between $1,500 to $3,0000. Currently I am in still in the tier system, with tier 1 at .16, and tier 2 at .25, and have not gone over tier 2 due to solar. My question is whether or not anyone has installed a second meter to take advantage of special EV charging rate.

 

[DucRider]

At the savings from the tier 2 rate, your break even would be at 10,000 to 20,000 kWh or 40K to 80K miles.

If some of the charging is at the tier 1 rate, the ROI is even less attractive.

 

[redpoint5]

Interesting. Why is the utility encouraging people to buy a dedicated meter? Does the second meter have it's own wires out to the transformer, or does it utilize the same wires as the primary meter?

I'd probably be more inclined to invest that $2,000 into expanding the solar array.

 

[wcfieldz]

Interesting. Why is the utility encouraging people to buy a dedicated meter? Does the second meter have it's own wires out to the transformer, or does it utilize the same wires as the primary meter?

I'd probably be more inclined to invest that $2,000 into expanding the solar array.

In LA at least, the second meter is a Time of Use (TOU) meter and is specifically for an EVSE only (They put a little placard on the box saying so). The point is to get the 2¢ discount per kwh for overnight charging. LA is unique in the rebates we get to encourage us to go EV as quickly as possible.

At one point in LA back in 2010-2012 they offered $2000 to install, but now it's dropped to only $300 for a TOU and up to $500 for EVSE. Power Company form: https://www.nissanusa.com/ev/media/pdf/incentives/nissan-leaf-incentive-204.pdf

Now, to get a TOU meter you need to install a new weatherhead, new 50amp breaker and as such as probably cheapest for a licensed electrician is $1500+. The savings probably takes years and many miles and would really only benefit a few use cases: High mileage daily Tesla drivers (Eg, driving back and forth everyday between LA and SF or San Diego). The $300 rebate probably only really covers material cost, if that.

For me, I have one Bolt EV on a 36,000 mile lease with no EVSE yet and only a fully loaded 100amp panel with no solar/PV array.

So my money is probably best spent simply upgrading my panel to 200+ amp and/or adding a solar/PV array (which I'm currently bidding out).

 

[redpoint5]

In LA at least, the second meter is a Time of Use (TOU) meter and is specifically for an EVSE only (They put a little placard on the box saying so). The point is to get the 2¢ discount per kwh for overnight charging. LA is unique in the rebates we get to encourage us to go EV as quickly as possible.

It seems very inefficient to require a 2nd meter just to take advantage of a 2 cent price break on charging an EV. That would save about $50 per year in electricity cost for those driving 10,000 miles. If CA (or LA county) wants to reduce petroleum consumption, they should raise the tax on it. That's way more administratively efficient than creating needless work for electricians.

I spent somewhere around $75 for the 4 AWG wire, 50A breaker, and NEMA 14-50r (outlet). Then I spent $200 on a Leaf EVSE and $20 to retrofit it to 240v. My total for L2 charging (albeit slow) is about $300.

100 A service is not much, so I imagine upgrading that is your top priority.

 

[wcfieldz]

It seems very inefficient to require a 2nd meter just to take advantage of a 2 cent price break on charging an EV.

Yeah, but how else can they differentiate that you're ONLY using this particular electricity for EV. It made sense in 2011 when they offered a $2000 rebate for installation when you buy/lease an EV. Now it's such an edge case that the recoup on investment takes so long that it's not worth it.

My plan is to upgrade my main panel to 200+amp in conjunction with the PV/solar array installation. I "bank" my PV power back into the grid during the day, and at night "buy" it back.

LADWP Info on TOU meter and EV discounted rate: https://www.ladwp.com/ladwp/faces/wcnav_externalId/r-gg-EVincentives?_afrWindowId=null&_afrLoop=1296878888313421&_afrWindowMode=0&_adf.ctrl-state=kfolzdw9d_25#@?_afrWindowId=null&_afrLoop=1296878888313421&_afrWindowMode=0&_adf.ctrl-state=8ggmgl3vi_4

 

[redpoint5]

Yeah, but how else can they differentiate that you're ONLY using this particular electricity for EV. It made sense in 2011 when they offered a $2000 rebate for installation when you buy/lease an EV. Now it's such an edge case that the recoup on investment takes so long that it's not worth it.

It made sense from a consumer standpoint to install it back when there was a huge rebate, but it doesn't make sense from a taxpayer or environmental standpoint. There is no way that a 2nd meter and encouraging EV use with marginally discounted rates will produce $2,000 of environmental good. Not only is the environmental benefit negligible, but it's a form of regressive taxation where the common person subsidizes the install for the wealthy. I can see why the rebate was dropped (and surprised it was ever adopted).

What would really be slick is to develop a way for the EV to report back to the utility how many kWhs were used, and when. This way we don't need to hire more electricians to wire in a 2nd costly meter to the house. Some sort of "opt in" method to share that specific data to the utility for the purpose of getting a price break.

My plan is to upgrade my main panel to 200+amp in conjunction with the PV/solar array installation. I "bank" my PV power back into the grid during the day, and at night "buy" it back.

I'd probably do the same thing. I haven't looked at your rate structure yet, but it's my understanding that SoCal electricity rates are pretty high. It makes sense then to offset the cost with PV. At $0.08/kWh and overcast skies half the year, it doesn't make sense here in the PNW. Besides that, the large majority of my power comes from hydro.

 

[wcfieldz]

It made sense from a consumer standpoint to install it back when there was a huge rebate, but it doesn't make sense from a taxpayer or environmental standpoint. There is no way that a 2nd meter and encouraging EV use with marginally discounted rates will produce $2,000 of environmental good. Not only is the environmental benefit negligible, but it's a form of regressive taxation where the common person subsidizes the install for the wealthy. I can see why the rebate was dropped (and surprised it was ever adopted).



I'd probably do the same thing. I haven't looked at your rate structure yet, but it's my understanding that SoCal electricity rates are pretty high. It makes sense then to offset the cost with PV. At $0.08/kWh and overcast skies half the year, it doesn't make sense here in the PNW. Besides that, the large majority of my power comes from hydro.

I think the TOU pilot program was more or less to just see if it'll even work. At the time the only people that would get it / do it are the first wave of Leaf and Volt

I'm $0.15093/kWh for the first 350kWh per month at Tier1 rate for this current high-peak season. I hardly cross into the other Tiers so I'm not sure what it is.

Edit: Found an old bill from low-peak seasons:
$0.148/kWh for first 350
$0.18326/kWh for next 700