As you say its not a quick survey, I looked at it and its mostly a lot of detail about the options for standing charges (as you would expect) which you can only really comment on by first reading a document with several 10s of pages.  As I don't have a particular opinion about this I personally didn't respond. 

However there is also a question about policy costs and their allocation, and I did answer this with a comment that policy costs related to climate change should fall on gas not electricity.  Currently they are loaded largely on electricity which is incoherent in terms of the policy objective (as it dis-incentivises the switch to renewables).

If there are others on this forum who, like me, aren't particularly opinionated about standing charges, but do have views on the current incoherent allocation of policy costs, then answering that section alone is an option. 

Done @editor saying the electricity to gas price ratio needs to be much less than 4 to encourage the move to electric heating. So all policy costs should move to gas or they must be shared with gas to give the ratio of less than 3.

Plus various other bits of personal prejudice(!)

We should shift the extra charges onto gas even if it has to be phased in but ultimately standing charges should be abolished.

[I lobbied Clive Lewis on shifting charges onto gas today as he has gained parliamentary time to put down a private member's ballot so he asked for suggestions.] 

I lived in Spain for years where energy tariffs are tiered into bands by demand. There's no standing charge it is all unit-based. Energy is cheaper than the UK anyway.

It means low users pay a lower rated band and high users pay one of the higher rate bands. Exceeding your prescribed demand level gets you capped after several infringements and then you are moved up a tier.

There's recognition that certain people have mitigation for health reasons or whatever.  It works very well and there's an inbuilt incentive to be a bit more frugal. 

@lucia excellent info about Spain. There’s nothing in the 60+ pages about how other countries do it so your reply above would be a useful input to them. They are just SO blinkered!

Certainly what you describe seems an excellent system.

For reference, I've just upgraded my chart which shows the electricity standing charge rises since spring 2019.

This uses data extracted from the latest copy of Annex-9 here, which is updated each time Ofgem raises the energy cap.

I've only tracked four of the 14 DNO regions.

SW England and Northern are vying to be "top of the table".
Each DNO needs to fund major infrastructure upgrades to accommodate commercial generation sites, connecting at 132kV and below.
In each case the power is required in London, as can be seen on maps published here by National Grid ESO:

That map is compiled from four parts issued by ESO.
Apologies for the reduced resolution where I had trouble with the overlap around Sheffield.

Ofgem's own tables showing the present Standing Charge under the energy-cap can be viewed here.

@transparent As a south west resident it irritates the hell out of me to be paying so much more than London. All summer my standing charges have been higher than my energy bills. 🙁

I've said it before, we need tiered energy pricing with integrated standing charges and exceptions for health reasons, and we need to start to transfer charges away from electric onto gas.

The porcine fleet is preparing for take off as we speak... 😏🐖

And roughly whereabouts are you in SW England @lucia ?

How much are you in touch with your MP and Councillors?

My MP asked me to explain to him the energy resources in Cornwall & Devon, and the correlation between that wealth and the cost of electricity. He then likened the situation to the way in which Ofwat has permitted ever higher charges for water and sewerage, whilst the residents must pay for the infrastructure to support the peak tourist inflow in summer.

Posted by: @lucia

↑

we need tiered energy pricing with integrated standing charges and exceptions for health reasons

We can do even better than that:

1: permit locational/nodal pricing to allow residents to use/store the electricity which is otherwise being discarded during times of excess generation

2: implement the Block Tariff feature which is already present in every smart meter. That increases the cost of electricity for households which are profligate, and thus allows lower charges for others. Since it doesn't negatively impact the revenue of Energy Suppliers, I'm trying hard to wonder why that option wasn't considered during the 2022 energy crisis.

3: subsidise the installation of storage batteries for (a) social housing, (b) those on pre-payment meters, and (c) households on the Priority Services Register.
For dwellings with pre-payment meters, they will require access to a ToU Tariff too of course.

Within a couple of years that strategy would be self-funding because

• the prepayment feature of their Smart Meters can be revoked as they'll no longer be in debt
• the 11kV rural distribution network will no longer be subject to demand surges, and hence won't require infrastructure upgrades
• the most vulnerable in society will enjoy off-grid electricity, resilient against outages

Please ask if you'd like me to post diagrams/charts which describe the features I've referred to.

@transparent That's all really interesting - I like your thinking on this. Miliband's/ government's forward planning seems very woolly and far too 'private enterprise' for my liking. 

I'm located between the moors and the sea in the south. 😁

"He then likened the situation to the way in which Ofwat has permitted ever higher charges for water and sewerage, whilst the residents must pay for the infrastructure to support the peak tourist inflow in summer." 

Down here we get hit like this in multiple ways but it never gets discussed the way things in the north of England do. It drives me nuts. Our infrastructure all round is dire. 

"1: permit locational/nodal pricing to allow residents to use/store the electricity which is otherwise being discarded during times of excess generation"

This is what Greg Jackson is constantly lobbying for but I don't understand enough about it yet to have an informed opinion. I did earn 85p of 'free' electricity recently because of Octopus giving it away for an hour on windy days. 

"2: implement the Block Tariff feature which is already present in every smart meter. That increases the cost of electricity for households which are profligate, and thus allows lower charges for others"

Yes, definitely. This is a variation of what I said - it's common in Europe. In Spain electricity is billed in usage bands you sign up for, or are allocated. If you exceed it more than a couple of times you are pushed up to the next, higher unit rates band. No service charges and much more fair imo.  

"3: subsidise the installation of storage batteries for (a) social housing, (b) those on pre-payment meters, and (c) households on the Priority Services Register."

Absolutely! It would help relieve strain on the grid too. However, be careful of narrow definitions of 'need'. Just like the horrendous, knee jerk Winter Fuel Allowance hit, there's a danger of missing lots of very low income people who should receive exactly this kind of support.

I'm really interested in all this and definitely would like to talk to you more about it. It's an area I'm beginning to work in bit-by-bit. 

Seeing the comments above on "need", you might like to respond to the ofgem consultation on vulnerability @transparent @lucia 

https://consult.ofgem.gov.uk/energy-supply/consumer-vulnerability-strategy/

Posted by: @transparent

↑

For reference, I've just upgraded my chart which shows the electricity standing charge rises since spring 2019.

This uses data extracted from the latest copy of Annex-9 here, which is updated each time Ofgem raises the energy cap.

-- Attachment is not available --

I've only tracked four of the 14 DNO regions.

SW England and Northern are vying to be "top of the table".
Each DNO needs to fund major infrastructure upgrades to accommodate commercial generation sites, connecting at 132kV and below.
In each case the power is required in London, as can be seen on maps published here by National Grid ESO:

-- Attachment is not available --

That map is compiled from four parts issued by ESO.
Apologies for the reduced resolution where I had trouble with the overlap around Sheffield.

Ofgem's own tables showing the present Standing Charge under the energy-cap can be viewed here.

The initial big jump was went OFGEM moved some existing not new infrastructure costs from the unit rate to the standing charge. That was the majority of that initial jump.

Ironically this was done as it was thought to be fairer to make sure every contributed to infrastructure. At the time the unit rate was expected to fall, however the energy crisis meant it went up at the same time.... so both the unit rate and standing charges went up quickly.

Posted by: @transparent

↑

increases the cost of electricity for households which are profligate, and thus allows lower charges for others.

Not sure who defines 'profligate', or how they do so, but won't this penalise people with ASHPs? In effect, a disincentive to install a heat pump, or even remove one. The most effective way for me to de-profligate my electricity use is to get rid of my heat pump, and re-install a fossil fuel boiler. 

Or am I missing something?

I do however agree standing charges, especially when relatively high, are a bad idea, acting as they do like a poll tax. Furthermore, implementing exceptions for those in need (who defines need?) will always be complex and expensive, and likely to fail for many. Look at what is happening with the winter fuel allowance. Perhaps simpler and better to pay some wealthy folk a few hundred quid they don't need than freeze those less well off to death. Cold weather and old age don't always go well together.