cinmar said:
Elsewhere, I read that PG&E in Calif. offers reduced rates for EV charging, however it requires a second meter. Apparently, many cities don't allow a second meter at single family homes due to the fear that everyone will start converting their garages to illegal rental units. I've also inquired with my Bldg. Dept. whether they have restrictions on second meters for this purpose. If they do have a restriction, I think it would make sense to offer an exception for EV owners, and condition the exception on the installation of the EVSE.
No, PG&E doesn't
require a second meter to get the reduced rates. They do
offer a second meter option if it makes sense for you (and your locality allows it). And it does make sense sometimes, because we're not really talking about reduced rates, but time-adjusted rates. The night-time rate goes down, but the day-time rate goes up ... way up, in some cases. If you switch the whole house to the new rate, and use a lot of AC in the summer, you could go over $500/month just for electricity. If you get a second meter, and just run the Leaf from that, and just charge at night, then you do save money, or at least you can, depending on the extra charges for the second meter.
So, why bother, right? Just stick with what you have. There are two problems with that:
1) In PG&E land we have a tiered structure, like the income tax. The more we use, the more it costs per watt. If we are already using a lot of electricity, the extra 10-24kWh the Leaf pulls per night could easily cost an additional $3-$8 per day.
2) It's not legal. While we are not required to have a second meter, we
are required to use the special time-adjusted rate schedule for charging any EV we have. I'm not sure how they are going to enforce that, but I suspect if they see a sudden 500kWh/month jump in your usage, year round, they will get suspicious. And of course if they "give" you a smart meter they will be seeing time-of-day usage patterns whether or not you are paying time-adjusted rates.