Практика Shadowing: The Hidden Problem With Home Batteries - Изучайте разговорный английский по видео
Создание урока...
1
This is my electric bill from January.
2
I have solar on the roof and 20 kWh of battery bolted to my garage wall.
3
Even with all of that, the Eversource bill came out to $336.
4
And Banked Sunshine from last summer paid $166 of it.
5
Then the credit bank hit zero and my next bill came entirely out of my pocket.
6
So here's the part that took me two years and a spreadsheet to work out.
7
Every dollar of that rescue came from the panels on my roof, and the battery didn't help.
8
12 months of my own utility bills
9
and ran them against 12 months of data from the panel that meters every single circuit in my house.
10
Then I ran those same 12 months again with the battery deleted.
11
My battery costs me about $270 a year in electricity and has never saved me a dollar.
12
Not once.
13
And I'd buy it all again tomorrow.
14
I know exactly how that sounds, but stick with me here, because by the end of this you'll know why
15
and then you'll be able to decide whether my reasons align with your reasons.
16
There's also something I realized I got wrong about my electric bill that I stated in a previous video two years ago.
17
So what did I learn about home batteries after living with them across two homes over six years?
18
And are they worth it?
19
I'm Matt Farrell.
20
Welcome to Undecided.
21
This video is brought to you by Surfshark.
22
A quick bit of history because it matters more than it looks like it does.
23
In my old house, I had one Tesla Powerwall.
24
Tesla's referral program gave me the hardware for free, but I paid for the installation costs.
25
previous video.
26
That meant I had to estimate the total overall costs whenever
27
I talked about the calculation of payback numbers for my previous house.
28
It was also a ballpark estimate because of the referral program.
29
But this time I paid for the whole thing.
30
Four Enphase IQ5P batteries, which means 20 kWh of storage and 15.4 kW of output. $33,407 all in before any rebates.
31
The federal tax credit took 30% off and Massachusetts kicked in $1,000, so the net cost was $22,385.
32
That's $1,119 for every single kilowatt hour hanging on that wall.
33
I financed it with a MassSave 0% heat loan.
34
It's a great program that Massachusetts runs to offer low
35
or no interest loans for home energy upgrades on things like HVAC heat pumps to home batteries.
36
Again, nobody sent me these batteries, so there's no sponsor.
37
That's my money on the wall.
38
And here's what I thought I was buying.
39
Keeping those electrons generated on my roof, in my house, to help keep my electric bill low.
40
Also the ability to shrug at a power outage.
41
There's more to that, but only one of those turned out to be real.
42
Before we get into the money, return on investment, and all the other reasons you might want to get a home battery, here's what this thing does on an ordinary Tuesday.
43
Taking the last 18 months of data off my Span Smart Electric panel gives some really interesting insights.
44
On a median day, the battery discharges 11.3 kWh.
45
Over the last complete year, it moved 3,673 kWh into the house.
46
And here's the key thing to keep in mind.
47
The season decides everything.
48
In January, my solar panels generate about 20 kWh a day, while my house eats 52.
49
And yes, that's a lot, but remember that my house is all electric with an EV, heat pumps for heating and hot water.
50
Like everything.
51
There's no excess electricity generation to store, so the battery only moves about 6 kilowatt hours or so a day.
52
However, in July I make 61 kilowatt hours a day and use 58, which results in the battery moving about 14 kilowatt hours.
53
One quick clarification on my setup is that I keep my battery system set to 20% battery reserve, which means my total usable capacity isn't 20 kilowatt hours, it's more like 16.
54
Now let's do some division, because who doesn't like some math?
55
3,673 kilowatt hours a year over 16 usable kilowatt hours is 230 full battery cycles a year.
56
My warranty covers 6,000 cycles or 15 years, but at my rate, I won't hit 6,000 cycles until year 26.
57
It's kind of like a car warranty.
58
Your car may come with a 150,000 mile warranty, but if you only drive 4,000 miles a year, the warranty will expire by its time limit first.
59
I'm like that little old lady who only drives to church and back once a week.
60
So this battery is going to age out long before it wears out.
61
I wish I could say the same thing about my knees.
62
That sounds like good news, right?
63
It's actually the whole monetary problem because every dollar I spent has to spread across a very small pile of kilowatt hours.
64
And that pile is smaller than I told you it was.
65
Two years ago I sat here and explained how my electric bill works and I got part of it wrong.
66
I didn't find out until I pulled the last 12 months of statements for researching this video.
67
But hang tight because I'll show you the exact line item that proves it.
68
But the reason I got it wrong was that something changed quietly and nobody told me.
69
Your personal information works the same way.
70
And that's where today's sponsor, Surfshark, comes in.
71
I spend a lot of time thinking about protecting my home from the stuff I can't control.
72
Power outages, price spikes, the grid having a bad day, and I got reminded the digital side needs the same attention recently.
73
There was a massive BrightSpeed data breach that leaked personal info on more than 1 million customers.
74
Things like names, emails, phone numbers and more.
75
But with Surfshark you can protect yourself while online.
76
When signing up for a new website account, you can use Surfshark's alternative ID to mask your name and contact info, so you stop seeding the next breach with your real info.
77
They also have an email scam checker that uses AI to spot phishing attacks in your Gmail.
78
It works through their Chrome extension and catches suspicious content and malicious links before you click on anything dangerous.
79
It's It's really cool.
80
Start your 7-day free trial and unlocks 4 extra months of Surfshark VPN.
81
Go to surfshark.com slash undecided or use code undecided at checkout.
82
Surfshark offers a 30-day money back guarantee, so there's no risk to try it out for yourself.
83
I've been using Surfshark for years and I love it.
84
Don't miss out on this great deal.
85
The link's in the description below and thanks to Surfshark and to all of you for supporting the channel.
86
OK, let's pull up my bill.
87
Let's go slowly here.
88
More for me than for you.
89
My meter keeps a tab.
90
One counter for kWh coming in from the grid and one for kWh going out.
91
Eversource subtracts one from the other once a month and everything on my bill is computed on the difference.
92
The bill makes it pretty clear.
93
Consumption of 1,181 kWh, minus 143 for generation, nets 1,038.
94
Then watch what happens to that 1,038 kWh.
95
Both the supply and delivery chargers are computed on 1,038.
96
The kWh I exported canceled the kWh I imported, delivery charge included.
97
In Massachusetts that means about $0.32 of value for each one.
98
That's a real one for one trade.
99
And it's always worked that way here.
100
So what does the battery have to do with any of that?
101
Take July of last year, a month where I sent out far more than I took in.
102
With the battery I imported 853 kWh and exported 1,420.
103
Without it, I'd have imported 1,361kWh and exported 1,999kWh.
104
The battery cut both sides by roughly the same amount.
105
So my net barely budged and I came out $18 worse off.
106
Now let's look at the month where I owed money.
107
December of 2024.
108
With the battery I paid $231.07, which is exactly what Eversource billed me.
109
Without it, it would have cost $192.62, which means the battery cost me $38.
110
This type of thing is happening every single month.
111
Across the last 12 months, the battery cost me $207.
112
The reason is almost embarrassingly simple.
113
With every kWh I run through the battery, I lose about 16% as heat.
114
714 kWh a year, gone.
115
The cars in my garage might be slightly cozier because of that, but my wallet is not.
116
Under a flat electricity rate like mine, along with basically 1 to 1 net metering, the grid is a better battery than my battery.
117
It's virtually 100% efficient.
118
But two years ago, I told you Massachusetts credits your exports at the generation rate only.
119
So you eat the delivery charge on everything you send back.
120
And I said the battery helps you dodge that.
121
Many states in the country operate that way, so in those locations, that's 100% true.
122
But my specific case, only half of what I said was true.
123
In early 2024, my credit really was about 54% of retail, which certainly looks generation only.
124
In February of 2025 it jumped to 85% and today it matches supply plus distribution plus transmission almost to the penny.
125
My export terms improved by more than half and nobody told me.
126
Not sure why.
127
I only found it because I keep a spreadsheet.
128
In case you couldn't tell, kind of a nerd.
129
But the conclusion I drew was wrong back then.
130
There is a haircut happening on the net metering credit for me.
131
It's about 4.8 cents and it only touches the surplus
132
that spills into the credit amount that builds up over the summer months.
133
My battery couldn't capture it either way.
134
And here's the number that nobody who's selling you a battery will put on a slide.
135
So let's put a price tag on a stored kWh.
136
Start with the net cost of $22,385.
137
Spread it out over everything the battery will deliver in 20 years at my usage level, which is about 64,000 kWh.
138
That number assumes the battery loses about 1.5% of capacity every single year, which is what the published data on this battery chemistry actually shows.
139
That's $0.35 a kWh just for the hardware.
140
This is not accounting for my solar panel setup, just the battery by itself.
141
But when we do account for the solar I'm generating, we have to account for the cost of charging the battery.
142
Every excess kWh I put into the battery is one I could have sold back to the grid for $0.28.
143
Because I lose 16% in round trip efficiency, that works out to another $0.33 for every kilowatt hour I get back out. $0.68.
144
That's what one kilowatt hour of my battery costs me.
145
The one it replaces is worth $0.28 and I can buy one off the grid for $0.32.
146
I'm paying more than double the grid price to store electricity I already own, and longer battery life doesn't rescue it.
147
Stretch it to 25 years and it only falls to $0.62, because the cost of filling it never changes.
148
And before you jump into the comments and try to dunk on home batteries in general, or especially on my setup, there is money in this system and it comes from exactly one place.
149
My utility rents my battery.
150
It's called Connected Solutions.
151
Every summer between June and September, there's 40 or so afternoons that Eversource sends a signal to my battery to dump its power back into the grid.
152
The sessions last for about 2-3 hours right around the 5pm crunch.
153
Enphase pays $275 per average kilowatt delivered and passes 100% of that money from my utility to me.
154
Some companies don't because they take a cut.
155
But how's it work out?
156
In 2024 I earned $1,881.38.
157
In 2025 I earned $1,634.35.
158
So why was one year 13% less?
159
Both years my battery dumped essentially the same energy per event, about 14.5 kWh.
160
What changed is how long the utility stretched it out.
161
The program pays on average kW, not kWh.
162
Basically, you get paid for how fast you can empty your bucket instead of how much water is in it.
163
Same energy over 2 hours scores 7.3 kW.
164
Over 3 hours, 4.8 kW.
165
In 2024, 82% of my events were 2 hours.
166
In 2025, only 55%.
167
Same battery, same job, but a third less money.
168
And I have zero say in it.
169
Which brings us to the real question, does a home battery make financial sense?
170
If you take the $207 a year my battery costs to run out of the Connected Solutions income, I'm netting about $1,550 a year if I average the first two two years.
171
My enrollment runs for five years, but my understanding is that I might be able to re-enroll.
172
If participation does end after five years, this battery will only recover about 20% of its cost over 25 years, and then it bleeds $200 a year forever.
173
If it renews beyond the five-year period, it might pay for itself in year 15.
174
The whole answer is kind of fuzzy on what's going to happen down the road.
175
So when looking at the finances and ROI of a home battery, the math is saying no, it's not worth it.
176
So here's the question I've been dodging for the past 10 minutes.
177
Why don't I regret this?
178
Why on earth would I do it all over again?
179
That's because this isn't an investment decision.
180
I'm not deciding what stocks to buy or where to invest my money for a financial return.
181
Ask yourself, what does a battery do?
182
What's its function and purpose for what you want it for?
183
Do you buy a lawnmower because it's an investment or because it serves a task?
184
For instance, look at my emergency backup history.
185
For the past 26 months, I've had 10 outages for a total of 51 minutes.
186
Out of those, the longest one lasted 11 minutes.
187
On his face, it sounds like I'm spending over $22,000 for 51 minutes of backup is an insane decision.
188
But here's what actually happened during those 10 outages.
189
Nothing.
190
We didn't notice.
191
There were times we were running on backup and had no clue.
192
No flicker, no beeping, no clocks blinking at us the next morning.
193
I found out afterward from a log or phone notification that I missed.
194
And that's the thing the spreadsheet can't see.
195
Every number in this video is a money calculation, and money is not why most people buy a battery.
196
So let's talk about my actual reasons for wanting a home battery.
197
Contradictions included because I think the contradictions are the interesting part.
198
I wanted energy independence.
199
Meanwhile my utility takes the wheel 40 or so afternoons during the summer, and that's the only part of this that pays.
200
My money and motivation are pointing in opposite directions.
201
I wanted to use my own clean solar power power being generated on my roof.
202
And To do it, I throw away 714 kWh a year as heat.
203
Storing my own sunshine is less efficient than shipping it to the grid and buying it back.
204
But I wanted resilience.
205
I didn't size it for the worst case scenario.
206
20 kWh runs my whole house about 8 hours in January, if I didn't do any kind of curtailment.
207
A genuine multi-day nor'easter needs 3 or 4 times that.
208
I made a rational call about how much backup I'd most likely need.
209
Going off-grid was never my motivation.
210
If I shut things down to just the critical loads like the fridge, the HVAC, a few lights, and with any January sun at all, I can run it indefinitely.
211
That's the span panel helping me to shape my energy usage during an outage.
212
Most people just install a hard-wired critical loads panel to do the same thing, but I'm able to adjust my critical loads in software.
213
I can be more flexible with it depending on what's actually happening.
214
The last rationale for getting a home battery tends to trip up everybody.
215
Independence and resilience are two different things.
216
Independence means leaving the grid.
217
Resilience means the grid can stay.
218
It just stops mattering when it fails.
219
And I want the second one.
220
Those two get mashed together constantly and they buy you completely different systems.
221
EnergySage asked homeowners and installers the same question in the same survey.
222
67% of installers said people buy batteries for resilience, only 11% for savings. To homeowners?
223
30% said rate savings.
224
A lot of people are being sold one story while telling themselves another and nobody's numbers get checked.
225
And there's one benefit that the whole spreadsheet misses.
226
When my battery discharges at 5pm on a 90 degree Fahrenheit day, it's shoving aside the dirtiest power on the grid.
227
Peaker plants are what's running at that hour.
228
Last year my battery pushed 611 kWh into the grid across 43 events.
229
Every one of them timed to the filthiest moment of the day.
230
My solar can't do that on its own.
231
So here's where I land.
232
I can't tell you this pays for itself, because in my situation, it doesn't.
233
What I can tell you is what $22,000 actually bought for a nerdy homeowner in Massachusetts.
234
It bought 10 power outages that I slept or worked through.
235
It bought about $1,550 a year for as long as Eversource keeps renting it.
236
It bought a house that holds its fridge
237
and HVAC through a storm as long as the sun shows up from now and then.
238
And it bought me the ability to stop thinking about winter nor'easters, which… knock on wood, hasn't impacted me in this house yet.
239
It definitely did in my previous house.
240
I've experienced much longer outages and it's not fun.
241
Which is why I'd much rather be prepared with my energy storage backup.
242
It costs me $207 a year in electricity and it will very likely never pay itself back.
243
But it depends on where you live and how your electricity rates are structured.
244
And this was my favorite part of digging into this topic.
245
While I was pulling bills for this video, I found this.
246
Eversource swapped my meter in February.
247
Western Massachusetts is first in line for their smart meter rollout.
248
A million and a half of them will be installed by the end of 2027.
249
And the entire point of that program is time of use rates.
250
Now, time of use would flip my energy math from negative $200 a year to somewhere between $170 and $800 positive,
251
depending on how Massachusetts structures the rates.
252
It definitely helps, but it still doesn't make it a crystal clear investment.
253
The program renting my battery still does that.
254
But here's the part I'm fixated on.
255
A better peak rate wouldn't help my battery.
256
But my utility paying me less for excess solar power I send back would.
257
Right now, the grid is a perfect virtual battery for anyone that lives in my area with solar.
258
It's free and never loses a thing.
259
That's exactly why my battery can't win.
260
The policy change I'd normally be complaining about is the one
261
that would actually vindicate the purchase and honestly be more fair to all the non-solar homeowners and renters in my area.
262
And yes, I'm advocating for not having a 1 to 1 net metering.
263
I think it's more fair to have generation only credits for solar homeowners.
264
Come at me in the comments if you disagree.
265
And if you've got a battery of your own, I'd genuinely like to see your numbers and hear about your motivations on getting one.
266
And for those of you that don't have home batteries, do you want them?
267
Do they make sense in your area?
268
Jump in the comments and let me know.
269
You can also check Check out extended cuts of many of my videos over on Patreon.
270
If human-written and researched videos matter to you, Patreon support helps a ton.
271
The link's in the description if you'd like to join, but just watching, subscribing, and turning on notifications is awesome.
272
Check out my follow-up podcast, Still to be Determined, where we'll keep this conversation going.
273
Keep your mind open, stay curious, and I'll see you in the next one.
📺 Тот же канал
C11
How Solar Is Beating Nuclear's Best Idea
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
C18
How Quantum Batteries Break Every Rule of Charging
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B23
Is Solar About to Get WAY Better? (I Did the Math)
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B22
How the Worst Oil Crisis in History is Backfiring
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B28
Why Australia’s Solar Is So Cheap (And Ours Isn’t)
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B28
The Truth About Ocean Plastic
IELTS PrepTOEFL PrepUniversity Students
✨ Рекомендуемое видео
B21
282 предложений
Piracy is COMPLETELY justified: Louis tries NetFlix & remembers why
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B21
160 предложений
i tracked every dollar i spent as a resident... its alot
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B21
126 предложений
What Can a $50 Laptop Do?!? (2026)
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B21
449 предложений
This Time WAS Different
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B22
233 предложений
5 Non-Negotiable Systems That Protect My Energy From Chaos
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B25
285 предложений
I Built a Fake Home Theater…
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B22
177 предложений
Why Electric Motorcycles Are Failing and Nobody Will Admit It
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B21
191 предложений
I Rebuilt My Entire Website in Astro… Was It Worth It?
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
B22
178 предложений
Against All Odds: Never Give Up When Life Gets Hard | Elon Musk Motivation
Business EnglishDaily ConversationUniversity Students
B22
159 предложений
Electrical Engineering Simply Explained
Business EnglishUniversity StudentsWorking Adults
Лексика и советы по произношению к этому уроку
Этот урок разговорной практики уровня B2 построен на видео «The Hidden Problem With Home Batteries». Чаще всего повторяются слова: battery, kwh, hour, grid, cost. В этом видео 273 предложений и 3307 слов для шедоуинга. Речь длится 17:54. Говорящий говорит быстро, около 185 слов в минуту, поэтому звуки часто сливаются и сокращаются. Только 81% слов входят в 3000 самых частых слов английского языка, поэтому лексика сложная.
Ключевая лексика этого видео
Самые сложные слова из видео (15), с произношением и значением:
| Слово | Произношение | Значение |
|---|---|---|
| grid существительное | /ɡɹɪd/ | се́тка, решётка |
| kilowatt существительное | /ˈkɪ.ləˌwɒt/ | килова́тт |
| outage существительное | /ˈaʊ.tɪd͡ʒ/ | ава́рия |
| homeowner существительное | домовладе́лец, домовладе́лица | |
| spreadsheet существительное | /ˈspɹɛd.ʃit/ | электро́нная табли́ца |
| resilience существительное | /ɹɪˈzɪl.ɪ.əns/ | психологи́ческая усто́йчивость, усто́йчивость |
| meter существительное | /ˈmitəɹ/ | счётчик, измери́тель |
| undecided прилагательное | /ˌʌndɪˈsaɪ̯.dɪd/ | нерешённый |
| metre существительное | /ˈmiːtəɹ/ | метр |
| import существительное | /ˈɪm.pɔɹt/ | и́мпорт |
| mathematics существительное | /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/ | матема́тика |
| compute глагол | /kəmˈpjuːt/ | вычисля́ть, вы́числить |
| contradiction существительное | /ˌkɑːntɹəˈdɪkʃən/ | противоре́чие |
| usable прилагательное | /ˈjuː.zə.bəl/ | го́дный к употребле́нию, го́дный |
| referral существительное | /ɹɪˈfɜː.ɹəl/ | направле́ние |
Фразовые глаголы, которые вы услышите
| Слово | Произношение | Значение |
|---|---|---|
| check out глагол | проверя́ть, прове́рить | |
| find out глагол | узнава́ть, узна́ть | |
| work out глагол | /ˌwɝk ˈaʊt/ | рассчи́тывать, рассчита́ть |
| come out глагол | /ˌkʌm ˈaʊt/ | выходи́ть, вы́йти |
| go off глагол | взрыва́ться, взорва́ться | |
| go out глагол | выходи́ть, вы́йти | |
| send out глагол | высыла́ть, вы́слать | |
| take off глагол | снима́ть, снять |
Фразы, которые стоит повторять
Короткие законченные фразы из видео, которые пригодятся в повседневном разговоре:
- That's my money on the wall.
- In case you couldn't tell, kind of a nerd.
- Why don't I regret this?
- What's its function and purpose for what you want it for?
- Do they make sense in your area?
Грамматика в этом видео
Конструкции, которые говорящий использует чаще всего, с точными словами из видео:
| Конструкция | В видео |
|---|---|
| Present Perfect Continuous have/has been + -ing — действие началось раньше и продолжается | I've been using · I've been dodging |
| Пассивный залог be + причастие прошедшего времени — важно, что происходит, а не кто это делает | is brought · is computed · are computed |
| Present Perfect have/has + причастие прошедшего времени — прошлое действие, важное сейчас | has never saved · have imported · hasn't impacted |
| Придаточные определительные who / which + предложение — уточнение о человеке или предмете | batteries, which means · reserve, which means · level, which is |
Произношение, на которое стоит обратить внимание
Говорящий использует 52 сокращённых и редуцированных форм, например I'm, I'd, can't. Произносите их коротко, так, как слышите.
- Звуки «sh» и «zh»: spreadsheet /ˈspɹɛd.ʃit/, contradiction /ˌkɑːntɹəˈdɪkʃən/, calculation /ˌkælkjuˈleɪʃn̩/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/, sunshine /ˈsʌnʃaɪn/
- Длинные слова — следите за ударением: resilience /ɹɪˈzɪl.ɪ.əns/, undecided /ˌʌndɪˈsaɪ̯.dɪd/, mathematics /mæθ(.ə)ˈmæt.ɪks/, contradiction /ˌkɑːntɹəˈdɪkʃən/, notification /ˌnoʊtɪfɪˈkeɪʃn̩/
Звуки, трудные для русскоязычных:
- /w/ — губы округлены, это не /v/: kilowatt /ˈkɪ.ləˌwɒt/, warranty /ˈwɔɹ.ən.ti/, wallet /ˈwɑl.ət/, quietly /ˈkwaɪ.ɪt.li/
- Звонкие согласные в конце слова — не оглушайте их: grid /ɡɹɪd/, outage /ˈaʊ.tɪd͡ʒ/, undecided /ˌʌndɪˈsaɪ̯.dɪd/, discharge /dɪsˈtʃɑɹdʒ/, dodge /dɑd͡ʒ/
Как заниматься с этим видео
- Прослушайте всё видео один раз молча и выпишите незнакомые слова.
- Начните со скорости 0,75×, повторяйте предложение за предложением и вернитесь к обычной скорости, когда станет легко.
- Запишите себя и сравните с оригиналом, обращая внимание на такие слова, как grid, kilowatt, outage.
Что такое техника Shadowing?
Shadowing — это научно обоснованная техника изучения языка, изначально разработанная для подготовки профессиональных переводчиков и популяризированная полиглотом доктором Александром Аргуэльесом. Метод прост, но эффективен: вы слушаете аудио на английском от носителей языка и немедленно повторяете вслух — как тень, следующая за говорящим с задержкой в 1–2 секунды. В отличие от пассивного прослушивания или грамматических упражнений, Shadowing заставляет мозг и мышцы рта одновременно обрабатывать и воспроизводить реальные речевые паттерны. Исследования показывают, что это значительно улучшает точность произношения, интонацию, ритм, связную речь, понимание на слух и беглость речи — что делает его одним из самых эффективных методов для подготовки к IELTS Speaking и реального общения на английском.