User profile: Graeme Cooper

We’ve asked some of our customers to tell us a little about their EV home charging setups and their experience using ev.energy

We thought we’d start with Graeme Cooper who has been with ev.energy since our inception. Below he explains his current setup and how he gets the most out of the ev.energy app.

My Setup

• 600 year old grade 2* listed farmhouse – bought derelict about 9 years ago and selfbuild renovated it.
• Octopus Energy Economy 10 tariff.  (green energy)
• 3 phase supply to home.
• 100% Electric House (off grid gas, off mains drains, private water supply – we only get phone and electricity utilities)
• 2 x 14kw (28kw) Ground Source Heat Pumps
• 2 x 300 litres of hot water storage (300 litres domestic hot water/300 litres underfloor heating)
• 1 x BEV Tesla Model S 75
• 1 x PHEV Volvo XC90 T8
• 2 x Tesla 7kw Wall chargers (1 x tesla dedicated, 1 x type 2)
• We treat all our waste water so the house expels clean water

Having gone BEV in 2017, I was frustrated that I could only set the car to start charging overnight when I had an E10 off peak period, but then had to set the state of charge to avoid it continuing to charge when the rate changed back to peak in the morning.  It was dumb charging.

Having worked in the wind industry I was very aware that renewables caused price and carbon intensity fluctuations in the market.

When I heard about ev.energy I was keen to try it. It links to my car, knows my tariff and preferences and it simply ensures my car is charged cleanly and cheaply. I was so impressed that I wanted to work more closely with ev.energy to see if we could use the same logic and app to improve my heating system.

My Ground Source heat pumps want to run gently most of the time as this is the most energy efficient way of working.   However, it isn’t the most cost or carbon efficient. So using an internet enabled switch linked to the ev.energy platform to ‘pause’ my heat pumps, my heating has become cleaner and cheaper too.

With both my heating and car charging now smartly managed, I have been able to ensure more than 70% of my electricity consumption is off peak (and off peak is often cleaner too).