Why electric car owners could pay more in summer

Higher at purchase than the price of gasoline cars, electric cars have the advantage of providing owners with big savings. Moreover, many electric car drivers charge their vehicles at night in order to benefit from a more advantageous price on electricity. ENEDIS customers benefit, for example, from 8 Off-Peak Hours and 16 Peak Hours per day, with more attractive rates during off-peak hours. But this could soon change if the recommendations of the Energy Regulatory Commission (CRE) are followed up.

The CRE has in fact noted that due to the growing number of photovoltaic panel parks, electricity production during the day is increasingly in surplus. This is obviously even more true in summer. The Energy Regulatory Commission therefore proposed changing the off-peak hours schedules, in order to move them to daytime and not nighttime, when solar panels produce no energy. But above all it is a question of adapting off-peak hours to the seasons.

The movement of off-peak hours during the day would therefore only take place during the summer period, when there is a lot of sunshine and consumption is low. In winter, on the other hand, the distribution of off-peak and peak hours would remain unchanged, with off-peak hours at night. But if drivers continue to charge their electric cars at night in summer, they will logically pay more. Unless they radically change their habits… The question also arises for public charging, because, apart from Tesla, electricity suppliers do not adapt their prices with a more advantageous rate at night.

The Energy Regulatory Commission has already made a request to Enedis, but implementation will be very gradual. The authority has established a timetable over several years and is considering an initial change within at least 3 or 4 years before generalization within 10 years. So don’t panic, this change to off-peak hours should not happen for several years.