Battery sparks smart energy use

It wasn’t long after Rushin Patel installed solar panels on his 4-bedroom home in Williams Landing that he decided he needed a way to store all the energy he and his family were generating but not using.

We are providing much more electricity than we’re using back to the grid, which means that we probably should be investing in some kind of battery that stores the electricity we’re sending back and then use it for later purposes.

The financial analyst did the maths and decided on a 13.3kwh Tesla battery. The battery was installed in December 2019 and currently Rushin’s electricity bills are credits.

"Happy days! It’s going good so far, it’s been a few months and if I look at my usage I’ve hardly used any grid electricity at this stage since the installation. So we harness whatever energy is stored in the Tesla overnight. And then it actually gets charged up during the day. And yes it’s been 100 percent green energy so far. When I look at the app, we are about $30 in credit at this stage."

The Patel’s are also smarter about the way they use their energy.

“I’ve definitely started using the appliances in such a way that it doesn’t consume a lot of energy at the same time. I started seeing if you’re getting 2kw solar energy during a particular hour, we might not turn on the oven, because 2kw is not enough for the oven. You use it in the morning when you have the sun out.”

He believes it will take about 8 and a half years to cover the costs of the battery.

For now he’s looking forward to cheaper winter warmth to realise the real benefits of his solar system.

“The good testing period for the battery would be during the winter season. I would envisage that it will cover those months because we are not heavy users of electricity.”