Here we go!

Re: Here we go!

Jburgess wrote: »

That's cool. Is that with the damaged panels or are fixed already? Will you use the banked power this year or will you sell it at the end of the year?

Cloud cover had my production off by 20% yesterday.

Well had panels inspected yesterday by a claims adjuster and they claim no damage. However the roof does show some issues, so the GC I used on the new building is also the subcontractor for the solar, getting him out to look it over before I sign off on the insurance.

Banked kWh are going to happen as a check from APS at year end. I am still a bit unclear as to how they will calculate it, but next years bank should cover 100% of the bill fees once paid back for the year, making my total electric a zero sum game. It is sort of strange on how the figure the "Service Delivery Charge" which is an add on by total kWh for the year. It is calculated from Jan1 to current billing point and if you draw more than you produce you get one. I don't know how that is possible with 2000 kWh in the on peak bank but I think it is the total kWh delivered (on peak + off peak). Mine was $36 for Aug raising my bill to just under $100. The bill doesn't reflect how this is calculated and I have a beef in with APS. But the panel adds this year should eliminate that next year. I am leaning more and more to the noon to 7PM time of use plan. If we can just not use anything but AC in that time period and we replace the last old AC unit this winter we should for sure cover 100%. Was hoping for some Obama money to help on defraying some of those costs like I did on the first one. So far that has not happened, but might during Lame duck as stimulus $$$. Can you say QE2?

I added the new building load onto the TED (orange line MTU #3) but have very little history on how much it might draw during cooling season. The mini split looks way minimal however and I think I could recommend the Freidrich as a great solution for heat pump heating and cooling. In any case I am impressed so far.

Re: Here we go!

techntrek wrote: »

I'm "this close" to pulling the trigger on a Fujitsu mini-split (9RLS). I just need to measure the length of my copper run to figure out if I'm going to buy one of the premade sets or make my own.

What model Freidrich do you have?

M36TYF2, the boxes say made in Texas but who knows where the components come from. 3 room split each 12000 BTU system with one outdoor 36,000 BTU base. Code guy and my AC guy liked it a lot.

http://www.friedrich.com/products/ModelOverview.php?model=M36TYF2

Re: Here we go!

Jburgess wrote: »

Hi Solar_Dave,

Trying to understand your billing.

When you sell at the end of the year, do get the rates listed in EPR-6 $.0659 for peak and $.05963 for off peak?

Are you on ET-1 rate “time advantage” schedule? With those hours for TOU almost all your production is on peak I assume. So you are paying for off peak use and then looking for the purchase of your excess on peak production at the end of the year to exceed what you paid for off peak?

But now your utility wants a delivery charge for banked power it returns to you?

It also kinda sucks that you pay sales tax on the off peak you buy, but don’t get sales tax back on what the utility purchases. That adds another 9% to your off peak costs.

Just trying to make sure I understand.

I’m looking at a non solar APS bill right now and including taxes there are 21 separate thing I am being billed for.

I completely understand your confusion. Mine has 19 billing items on it.

So still on the 9AM to 9PM TOU with EPR 6 and expect a check for any excess as calculated on Dec 31.

The service delivery charge was explained to me like this, you take the Total kWh used year to date vs the Total kWh return via grid tie year to date, if the amount returned to the grid is smaller than the the total consumed then you get a per kWh service delivery charge. On-peak or off-peak mean nothing to the calculation. Up until my September bill it was a very small number and I still had on peak of 2000+ kWh credited hence my major confusion.

Yes I have been purchasing off peak kWh at the rate of about $20 a month this summer, pretty minimal considering the AC loads, in fact I moved the pool to on peak in July on the timer because of all the credited hours, and lowering the off peak consumption.

I agree ET1 is nearly all on peak generation time, that is why I keep thinking that the noon to 7PM TOU (ET2) might be much better even though the actual tariff rates are much higher. Who cares, if you push enough to the grid during those hours to cover consumption and then reap the benefits of more off peak from the mornings. Down side is the EPR 6 payback is slightly less at year end because you moved those kWh to off peak, but in turn you don't pay for really any off peak consumption. I have almost convinced myself to switch. Utility says NO on returning to locked and grandfathered ET1 if I make the move.

I guess the question is will the EPR6 on-peak pay back be better than the ET1 off peak consumption. I think the service delivery charge won't hit me at all next year as I added the 2160 watts of panels in late spring.

Edit:
BTW my consumption overall will go down some more as I really have to trash that old 10 seer 2.5 ton Lenox after the first of the year and put another 17 seer Trane in, was hoping for some more Obama (really Bush) money as a tax break to help defray that cost. The Lenox is on its last leg, sounds like someone is hitting it with a sledge hammer on start up. My AC guy says get ready. The new 3 ton Trane uses about 55% of the watts that the old 2.5 ton Lenox uses.

Also the new building uses almost nothing to cool on the freidrich 3 way mini split, of course the building is really insulated extremely well, 2 inch of exterior foam and 2X6 wall construction with excellent windows and weather striping.

Re: Here we go!

Jburgess wrote: »

So if I am understanding correctly, then your bill is based on 4 things before taxes are applied.

1. Fixed charges

2. Peak production charges if net usage is positive

3. Off peak production charges if net usage is positive

4. Delivery charges if total net usage is positive

In addition any negative peak, off peak or total usage is carried forward to use in the next months billing.

Then once a year excess peak and off peak production is paid to you. In your case, Dec. 31.

Yes I think you have it. It is that delivery charge that seems to be quite steep. There is nothing on the bill on how the amount is calculated and I looked the tariff docs over and can't seem to find it in the on the Utility web site.

From the Utility Glossary:

Delivery service charge - A charge, based on your kWh usage and/or kW demand, to build and operate the equipment for delivering electricity to your home/business, including lines, poles, transformers and substations.

I still can find no other definition on how they calculate the amount like a per kWh fee rate, sliding scale, initial flat fee + kWh rate on the web site.

A quick call to them reveals the rate is $0.027960 per kWh.

Edit Further digging revels these other per kWh charges
System Benefits Charge: $ 0.00210 per kWh
Transmission Charge: $ 0.00520 per kWh
Delivery Charge: $ 0.02796 per kWh

SO it is ugly to calculate:
My Sept example:

Cost of net electricity

Basic service charge $7.85
Delivery service charge $30.17
Environmental benefits surcharge $5.24
Federal environmental improvement surcharge $0.17
Competition rules compliance charge $0.36
System benefits charge $2.27
Power supply adjustment* -$4.85
Metering* $6.14
Meter reading* $2.05
Billing* $2.31
Generation of electricity on-peak* $0.00
Generation of electricity off-peak* $20.21
Transmission and ancillary services* $5.61
Transmission cost adjustment* $2.31

Cost of electricity you used $79.84

Then add in the lawyer speak:

ADJUSTMENTS
1. The bill is subject to the Renewable Energy Standard as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule RES pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 70313.
2. The bill is subject to the Power Supply Adjustment factor as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule PSA-1 pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 67744, Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 69663, and Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 71448.
3. The bill is subject to the Transmission Cost Adjustment factor as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule TCA-1 pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 67744.
4. The bill is subject to the Environmental Improvement Surcharge as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule EIS pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 69663.
5. The bill is subject to the Competition Rules Compliance Charge as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule CRCC-1 pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 67744.
6. Direct Access customers returning to Standard Offer service may be subject to a Returning Customer Direct Access Charge as set forth in the Company’s Adjustment Schedule RCDAC-1 pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 67744.
7. The bill is subject to the Demand Side Management Adjustment charge as set forth in the Company's Adjustment Schedule DSMAC-1 pursuant to Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 67744 and Arizona Corporation Commission Decision No. 71448.
8. The bill is subject to the applicable proportionate part of any taxes or governmental impositions which are or may in the future be assessed on the basis of gross revenues of APS and/or the price or revenue from the electric energy or service sold and/or the volume of energy generated or purchased for sale and/or sold hereunder.

The references are all here in pdf
http://www.aps.com/aps_services/residential/rateplans/resrateplans_11.html