How do dynamic hourly rates work for me?

Your energy supplier pays a rate so they buy enough electricity for your household. This purchase rate changes every hour and sometimes it's low or high. Do you have a fixed contract? Your energy supplier always charges you an extra safety margin. They do this to afford possible price increases. With a dynamic contract, you don't pay this safety margin, but the rate changes with the purchase prices. Because you don't pay for a margin, you save about 10% on your energy bill long term.

While dynamic hourly rates fluctuate, there's a pattern. The price at the middle of the day is often low, because many households generate cheap solar power. You can use this to your advantage: turn on your washing machine at the middle of the day instead of at nights. This way, you pay about 40% less for power consumption.

You can easily plan a dishwasher, washing machine, and dryer for in the afternoon. If you want to shift your use to these more affordable moments, you save about 5% on average on your electricity bill with these appliances. We assume that you can't do this every day, but you can do it half the time. If you're often home, you can probably do this more often and you save even more than 5%.

An average household uses 2800kWh of electricity annually. We compare the dynamic hourly rates with a fixed rate of € 0.40 per kilowatt hour. With a dynamic contract, a household with a low energy consumption saves € 110 annually. If you play your usage in a smart way, you can even save up to € 170 annually. How much you save depends on your annual usage, the fixed rate, and how often you save extra with smart usage.