[RichE]

I have a 2017 Bolt, just purchased used. No manual but did download it from Chevy. LONG document and not all that enlightening for much of it, but I haven't waded through the whole thing yet...

Pardon my ignorance, hoping these aren't silly questions I should have answered myself, so please bear with me.

With charger that comes with the vehicle, I have only found settings in the car for Off-Peak Only, Cost Optimized Off- and Mid-Peak, and Cost Optimized All Rates (other than off). Or is there a way to tell the charger to only allow charging on certain days or times?

My super off peak here in San Diego, CA, with SDG&E, San Diego Gas and Electric, is from midnight to 6am.

How does the car know when it's super off peak, or even off peak for me? I'm assuming peak/off peak, super off peak are different in different parts of the country but don't know for sure.

I don't even see an option for only charging during super-off peak times.

Or how can I even find out when my car things these times are?

Oh, I'm using the standard charger on 220v, so can pull 12 amps (from electric dryer circuit since I don't have an electric dryer). Would the solution be an actual timer (like for lights in house, etc.) that would run on 220v and only be on at the hours I select?

Thanks in advance.

Rich

 

[ARob]

Your choices are Peak, Mid-Peak, Off-Peak. They can't possibly cover all the variations, so you have to make it work with what they give you.

The assumption is 3 pricing tiers from H to L: Peak, Mid-Peak, Off-Peak. You will have to translate accordingly.

BTW, the OEM cord plugged into 120V is not going to give you a whole lot of range if you charge Off-Peak (Super Off-Peak) only. In fact, depending on your daily use, scheduled charging is probably worthless on 120V, you may need a whole 10-12 hours (or more) to restore range. Scheduled charging is most helpful with Level 2 (240V) charging.

Oh wait, I see you are using OEM on 240, but still you probably need more time than Super off-peak.

 

[RichE]

Your choices are Peak, Mid-Peak, Off-Peak. They can't possibly cover all the variations, so you have to make it work with what they give you.

The assumption is 3 pricing tiers from H to L: Peak, Mid-Peak, Off-Peak. You will have to translate accordingly.

BTW, the OEM cord plugged into 120V is not going to give you a whole lot of range if you charge Off-Peak (Super Off-Peak) only. In fact, depending on your daily use, scheduled charging is probably worthless on 120V, you may need a whole 10-12 hours (or more) to restore range. Scheduled charging is most helpful with Level 2 (240V) charging.

Oh wait, I see you are using OEM on 240, but still you probably need more time than Super off-peak.

Thanks for the reply.

Yes, with the 220 charging, I can do 12amps and don't need more than 6 hours a night to recharge. Especially these days as I drive a lot less than pre-Covid.

I guess I was thinking they'd give me a method to actually pick the days and times to allow charging. I can do it with a simple $30 "smart" home thermostat, why not in a computer controlled electric car?

And there's no listing for super-off peak, besides my not knowing when it thinks those times are? For all I know, it thinks off peak is from 6pm to 6am, and I don't want it charging then just from midnight to 6am.

So, without a listing of what the car things are those settings how to I translate their peak, mid peak (no idea what that is), and off peak, my levels here in SD are peak, off peak and super off peak. Answer... I can't. I think that's ridiculous.

 

[p7wang]

You have to program the car... this is a good starting point...

WIND-WORKS: Setting a Charging Schedule for the Chevy Bolt EV

 

[RichE]

You have to program the car... this is a good starting point...

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

Previous owner had lots of solar so had the optimization turned OFF, which grayed out (and therefore I didn't even notice) the EDIT option for the times! I turned the optimization to Off-Peak only, then could use the EDIT times to set to my setup, yay!

Now to figure just what plan (of 6 time of use) will work best for me. Have very cheap, 9 cents/KW super-off peak, but have to pay $16/month to get that. And, unfortunately, they require a year's commitment to go to it. And no good way to actually figure which would be cheapest. UGH.

Wish me luck and thanks again!

 

[RichE]

How do I mark this as solved or close the thread or ??? Thanks.

 

[p7wang]

If I were in California, I would get 7.68KW of solar and include solar noon +/- 1 hour as super off peak. No way I want to sell the energy cheap to the power company.

The threads stay open and people will just chime in later with more comments. LOL

 

[ga2500ev]

How do I mark this as solved or close the thread or ??? Thanks.

No need. Don't worry as some new user will stumble upon this thread three years from now and ask another question.

BTW on your original question is just different nomenclature for the same time zones.

Bolt off-peak is your super off-peak (lowest rate).
Bolt med-peak is your off-peak (middle rate).
Bolt Peak is your Peak (highest rate)

Set up the schedule, then set the Bolt to Off-Peak only (which again is your Super-off-peak).

Enjoy your Bolt!

ga2500ev

 

[RichE]

If I were in California, I would get 7.68KW of solar and include solar noon +/- 1 hour as super off peak. No way I want to sell the energy cheap to the power company.

The threads stay open and people will just chime in later with more comments. LOL

My roof is 25 years old and in good shape, not worth taking it down to put solar up, plus cost, etc. I don't have A/C (don't need where I'm a fairly near the coast), use about 200KWh/month before EV, so cheap, super/off peak charging will be a lot cheaper for me

Super off peak is at least 6 hours a night, plenty for the driving I do in the Bolt, especially now with Covid, I drive a lot less.

 

[boltage]

Or how can I even find out when my car things these times are?

Somewhere in the settings is a way for you to tell the car what peak, mid-peak, and off-peak electricity pricing hours are.

 

[ARob]

My roof is 25 years old and in good shape, not worth taking it down to put solar up, plus cost, etc. I don't have A/C (don't need where I'm a fairly near the coast), use about 200KWh/month before EV, so cheap, super/off peak charging will be a lot cheaper for me

Super off peak is at least 6 hours a night, plenty for the driving I do in the Bolt, especially now with Covid, I drive a lot less.

My parents live in SD (PL) and recently put in Solar so I took a look at their SDGE rate plans. My recollection is they average ~700kWh used per month but their solar generates about 50kWh per day so they end up with surplus every year. The utility offers 2 EV TOU plans in addition to whole house TOU.

If can be tricky to determine if, or which TOU plan is best. You need a good understanding of what time of day your power use is. 200kWh/mo whole house use is quite low, but likely most use is in peak rate periods. That works out to 6-7 kWh daily, or in Bolt terms, 20-30 miles of charging daily to double your use. Unless you really understand your daily use patterns, it an be tricky to figure which TOU plan will work best. I honestly can't recall if their utility bill breaks out use by time of day, so the analysis is trickier. You could drive your electric costs up if a good share of home use is in peak, even though theoretically your charging would be super cheap.

I looked into TOU here in CO, it would have significantly driven my cost up, even with charging off-peak. Our rates are a flat $.106, so pretty close to the $.09 Super off-peak rate!

SDGE has one EV TOU plan that meters EV charging separate but the rates are still reasonably high. The single-meter EV-TOU5 plan is what you are referring to with $16 monthly fee, but it puts all of your home use on TOU. Just make sure you don't drive your cost up for regular home use in order to save on charging your car.

 

[MichBolt]

My parents live in SD (PL) and recently put in Solar so I took a look at their SDGE rate plans. My recollection is they average ~700kWh used per month but their solar generates about 50kWh per day so they end up with surplus every year. The utility offers 2 EV TOU plans in addition to whole house TOU.

If can be tricky to determine if, or which TOU plan is best. You need a good understanding of what time of day your power use is. 200kWh/mo whole house use is quite low, but likely most use is in peak rate periods. That works out to 6-7 kWh daily, or in Bolt terms, 20-30 miles of charging daily to double your use. Unless you really understand your daily use patterns, it an be tricky to figure which TOU plan will work best. I honestly can't recall if their utility bill breaks out use by time of day, so the analysis is trickier. You could drive your electric costs up if a good share of home use is in peak, even though theoretically your charging would be super cheap.

I looked into TOU here in CO, it would have significantly driven my cost up, even with charging off-peak. Our rates are a flat $.106, so pretty close to the $.09 Super off-peak rate!

SDGE has one EV TOU plan that meters EV charging separate but the rates are still reasonably high. The single-meter EV-TOU5 plan is what you are referring to with $16 monthly fee, but it puts all of your home use on TOU. Just make sure you don't drive your cost up for regular home use in order to save on charging your car.

Some utilities allow you to download your usage history down to the hour. You could dump that data into a spreadsheet to calculate the impact of each TOU option on your overall cost. It gets tricky when the TOU plans have different rates by season (summer / winter), or even by day of the week (Saturdays and Sundays are sometimes considered off peak.

If you're in a neighborhood with similar houses, you could ask your neighbors if they're on a TOU plan and what impact it's had. Presumably, similar houses will have similar efficiencies and similar weather, etc.

 

[GregBrew]

My parents live in SD (PL) and recently put in Solar so I took a look at their SDGE rate plans. My recollection is they average ~700kWh used per month but their solar generates about 50kWh per day so they end up with surplus every year. The utility offers 2 EV TOU plans in addition to whole house TOU.

If can be tricky to determine if, or which TOU plan is best. You need a good understanding of what time of day your power use is. 200kWh/mo whole house use is quite low, but likely most use is in peak rate periods. That works out to 6-7 kWh daily, or in Bolt terms, 20-30 miles of charging daily to double your use. Unless you really understand your daily use patterns, it an be tricky to figure which TOU plan will work best. I honestly can't recall if their utility bill breaks out use by time of day, so the analysis is trickier. You could drive your electric costs up if a good share of home use is in peak, even though theoretically your charging would be super cheap.

I looked into TOU here in CO, it would have significantly driven my cost up, even with charging off-peak. Our rates are a flat $.106, so pretty close to the $.09 Super off-peak rate!

SDGE has one EV TOU plan that meters EV charging separate but the rates are still reasonably high. The single-meter EV-TOU5 plan is what you are referring to with $16 monthly fee, but it puts all of your home use on TOU. Just make sure you don't drive your cost up for regular home use in order to save on charging your car.

When looking at rates, pay close attention to "daily fees". Many utilities will offset the rate reductions with jacked-up "daily fees" to make up the difference. Often these fees aren't shown anywhere as a part of the rate, so rate-payers don't notice them.

Make sure any mathematical model comparing rates includes all taxes and fees.

 

[AEALESSANDRA]

THANK YOU, THANK YOU, THANK YOU!

Previous owner had lots of solar so had the optimization turned OFF, which grayed out (and therefore I didn't even notice) the EDIT option for the times! I turned the optimization to Off-Peak only, then could use the EDIT times to set to my setup, yay!

Now to figure just what plan (of 6 time of use) will work best for me. Have very cheap, 9 cents/KW super-off peak, but have to pay $16/month to get that. And, unfortunately, they require a year's commitment to go to it. And no good way to actually figure which would be cheapest. UGH.

Wish me luck and thanks again!

It's the same plan I have--and I have solar. You'll now be charging your Bolt in the middle of the night. It's the best rates. For what I used to drive (GMC Yukon Denali where I would spend $2400/year in gas), the Bolt is a nice savings. And with Costco gas north of $3.90/gallon the other day when I gassed up my wife's ICE, you'll be happy. If you track expenses in Quicken like fuel purchases, look at what you spent a year on gasoline for the miles you traveled. Then figure out how many miles you think you'll drive this year, figure out the number of kW's of power needed to go those miles this year, and then multiple by .09/kW. If you really want to be technical about it, you could add the $16/mo x 12 that SDG&E will charge you for the power delivery but your house still needs power for all the other stuff than the car. Trust me, you'll be dollars ahead. Good luck

 

[ArizonaJon]

I am in Arizona but have a similar rate structure. I use the time of departure option and set my departure time to the end of the Super Off Peak time. The car calculates when to start charging to finish by then. Works great.

 

[Marspilgrim]

Now to figure just what plan (of 6 time of use) will work best for me. Have very cheap, 9 cents/KW super-off peak, but have to pay $16/month to get that. And, unfortunately, they require a year's commitment to go to it. And no good way to actually figure which would be cheapest. UGH.

That's very strange, but California rules don't benefit consumers. Here in Chicago land I have us changed to hourly/TOU (also a 1 year commitment) but still the same 6 cents from ComEd with no upcharge. You will need to know the time range of your local utility, whether off peak ends at 6am or 8am for example and schedule accordingly. So far we have apparently saved about 11% over using the day average pricing.

 

[p7wang]

I save 25% with TOU. When I call solar installers for a quote and prove I can save money with solar (vs other opportunity cost), their jaws drop. LOL