Comment by Jedd
6 months ago
In Australia it's common to have Time of Usage (ToU) billing.
Figures depend on provider and plan, but sometimes cheap (as per parent's 6c / kWh), but during the midday to 6pm range it may be up to 60c.
So, grid rates aren't subsidised, but having a storage medium means you can arbitrage power quite easily.
The AEMO (Australian Energy Market Operator) website has some good data can see price of electricity in realish time. This is for the NEM (which is east coast states + South Australia), the west coast is on a separately managed grid with no interconnection.
https://www.aemo.com.au/energy-systems/electricity/national-...
You can also view the breakdown of where the grid is sourcing energy from (i.e. what portion of the grid is supplied from solar pv etc at any given time).
I know that some big industrial users (large factories etc) can optimize/spin up production lines etc based on the spot price. Although I'm not sure if they use the same public AEMO data there might be a dedicated api or similar involved.