Power-use profile analysis of non-domestic consumers for electricity tariff switching

Abstract

For both domestic and non-domestic consumers, dynamic electricity tariffs have been proposed as a way to reduce their energy costs and to facilitate demand-side response. It is difficult for businesses which are tenants to adopt energy efficiency measures; thus, tariff switching is the easier option. Therefore, understanding the limits of the cost saving offered by tariff switching is an important step. This raises two questions: by how much could bills be reduced, and would all consumers benefit equally? Using a dataset of half-hourly electricity readings from more than 7500 British businesses, we performed an empirical analysis to discover which types of businesses might have lower or higher costs when changing between static and real-time tariffs. We identified differences in demand profiles that demonstrate that the decision whether to switch tariff types is a subtle one which may have a significant cost impact. The dataset was aggregated into five categories: Entertainment, Industry, Retail, Social, and Other. Our analytical methods can be used to distinguish the differences between typical electricity demand profiles for small- to medium-sized businesses and sectors in different market options. Our analyses of switching to a real-time tariff suggest that most of those small- to medium-sized businesses that would reduce their annual electricity bill would gain by no more than 10 %. Most of these businesses would gain by less than 5 %. This, we suggest, sets a realistic upper limit of the likely cash savings before energy efficiency, or other measures must be taken to further reduce bills.