Comment by beAbU

I'm on a time-of-use tariff, with a special "EV" slot between 02h and 05h. My car is programmed to only charge during this time unless I tell it otherwise.

The price difference is significant: About €0.08/kwh compared to the €0.2 - €0.4 I'd be paying during normal day/peak times.

This has made my day-to-day driving basically free, less than a euro per 100km (€0.08/kwh * 7kwh/100km)

I tried doing the same thing for other large(ish) loads in the house, dishwasher, washer & dryer, but the cost benefit was really really small when compared to the big savings from my EV charging.

I heat my water using an oil burning boiler, but if I had an electric water heater, it would make total sense to run that during the "EV" hours as well. If I could, I would then also invest in more capacity, and set the thermostat higher to have essentially a hot water battery that could last me the whole day.

At my old house I had an overspecced solar system, and I set it up to dump the remaining available solar energy after the batteries are done charging into my hot water heater. The thermostat was set to 75C or something, super hot. I'd then have piping hot water for most of the day, and maybe needed a small electric boost in the mornings, especially in the winter. Another 200L or so would have resulted in me not needing any grid power to heat up enough hot water for the household.