I just got the following email from Octopus about a deal they have with BYD to make car charging ‘free’.
Does anyone know anything about this topic?
I used to have solar panels in my last house, but the orientation of my new house isn’t great for that, and there are quite a lot of big trees around us and a hill which would limit the potential for PV.
“London, 23rd June 2025 - Octopus Energy, the UK’s largest energy supplier, has joined forces with BYD, the world’s top electric car maker, to announce the launch of the Power Pack Bundle – the UK’s first vehicle-to-grid (V2G) bundle – revolutionising the EV experience for drivers.
Unveiled today at Octopus Energy’s Energy Tech Summit, the Power Pack Bundle - priced at under £300 a month* - will include a leased V2G-ready BYD Dolphin, a bi-directional Zaptec Pro charger and access to a smart tariff that offers completely FREE home charging.
With free charging, typical EV drivers can slash their annual bills by £620 compared to charging on a standard tariff – and save nearly £1000 compared to fuelling a petrol car.”
We don’t drive much, but we have a 20 year-old BMW 325i estate petrol car, so it would be great to get an EV.
The deal there seems to be £3600 a year to lease the car, but you get free car battery charging at home - I’m not sure about when you’re out and about charging as well?
I’ve only just seen this offer, but it seemed like an interesting way to get an EV.
I have almost zero interest in cars though, which is why I probably won’t end up getting it because it’s unlikely to rise to the top of my list of things to do each day.
You might be surprised how good modern PV systems can be these days with all roof orientations and shading. Our current panels produce a little more than twice the output of those we had on our previous house (late 2011 install vs late 2024). Optimisers or micro-inverters can also deal with even strong shading, and don’t discount the advantage of a home battery to charge overnight during off-peak on an EV tariff and then power the house for the rest of the day.
As for BYD, I’d suggest having a drive of one first. Your BMW will likely be nicer to drive by some margin if that matters to you. Our X3 M40d is more fun and handles better than our Kia Niro EV, but then it’s my car and the Kia is my wife’s.
Edit: The Octopus website says you can join a waitlist only.
Vehicle to Grid typically means running your house during the day from your car battery which is charged overnight using a cheaper rate. I suspect this is more around Octopus directly managing when that battery export happens, for example it will ensure the car battery is full before peak national usage, then runs your house off the battery plus exports to the grid during that peak period.
As I understand from @Simon-in-Suffolk the battery chemistry is not designed for this sort of usage - although if you are just leasing does it really matter.
If it ultimately saves you money and it’s a leased vehicle then presumably the leasing company have factored this in or may be able to offset battery degradation into their figures in a way the public can’t?
Clever accounting perhaps?
Just strikes me that apart from so many of us not being able to utilise EVs for practical reasons (no off-road parking currently for me) we simply lack the grid infrastructure to store energy when it’s being generated cheaply or in excess of demand. I’m sure we’ll get there in the end it’s just that the infrastructure can’t appear overnight. Will things eventually be cheaper? Hmm, not so sure.
For those of us who’d find an EV impractical and don’t have solar, I wonder are there tariffs out there which would allow you to buy say a Tesla Powerwall or two and achieve effectively the same thing?
There are plenty of tariffs for exactly that purpose, so it is possible to buy off peak power to charge a home battery and use it to power your home during peak periods, and also to export any excess to back to the grid when demand is high. Officially, providers want you to use batteries in conjunction with solar panels, so that these charge them too, but batteries without solar are certainly an option that some have used.
