Yes, I am using HA also. The Myenergi, SolarEdge and ASHP have integrations which give access to lots of data. As do the Govee products, in my case a wireless temperature and humidity monitor. Later the Weather Station and maybe the Emporia Energy Monitor and the technical data from the heat pump.
HA for me was a steep learning curve. I never liked Unix much 40 years ago. Getting HACS (Community Software) was time consuming just finding instructions. I decided to build an ESPHome gadget (Wemos Mini D1 is a wireless board with GPIO connections - a bit like Arduino with lots of open source software). I wanted to attach 5 DS18B20 temperature sensors to the pipes across the plate exchanger between the ASHP and the radiators. I used the spare on the hot water outlet. It’s was challenging just getting things working the first time. The kit is ridiculously cheap.
The Solar is nearly complete. I need to separate the battery import data from the output to use the HA Solar dashboard.
The critical test for the phantom import is to make sure that the smart meter is showing near zero import when off grid. Smart meters have to be accurate (within 1%). However, energy clamps are not required to be. SolarEdge can calibrate their equipment, but the installer must use suitable screened cat5/6 cable between the incoming mains and the inverter. 2% error is the norm I would think.
HA is great fun, I’ve lost many hours with it already! I think it could be easy to make things over complex so I am trying to make HA supplement the house rather than take over and be dependent on it.
Here are my early dashboards, still work in progress. I’m currently dividing the tabs up by purpose rather than areas or rooms.
Yesterday for example, my solar app shows 14.8 kWh imported, whereas the smart meter app (from the energy supplier) shows 20.7, so quite a difference. Oddly, the export is 3.6 and 3.8 respectively. I recall the solar guys saying that the readings can be unreliable when the system is fluctuating between importing and off grid or exporting.
Hi interesting reading about your systems. I am about to have my system connected by 18th of this month…
2 x Sunsynk 5kw inverters
10kw solar array ground mounted
15.5 kw battery
I am allowed a 5kw export.
I use around 12000 kw a year…I am hoping to make a serious dent in this… I was thinking of going with Octopus flux the generation export rates seem pretty good … maybe use this tarrfif for the 6 months of summer and then try and switch to Octopus Cosy in the winter…if they let me switch…
I use a ground source heatpump…which in the winter chews through around 25-28kw per day… + we now have an electric car.
I don’t know what the hybred inverters will do to the sound quality of my hifi…hmmm what have others found…
This HA stuff looks really interesting. I can see how you might install HA on your NAS or RPie, but struggling to see physically how a temp. sensor communicates with it. I like the idea of having three sensors in my airing cupboard. Presumably I don’t need to connect them to another RPie, but guessing you fit them to a board. Is this board then communicating on your house Wi-Fi? Presumable you need some power here which I might struggle with in the airing cupboard.
Also are there any current clamp measuring sensors that I could use near the inverter and CU?
If you have a dedicated consumer unit and keep stuff apart as much as possible there is less likelihood. I posted a YouTube video on conducted emissions. There are some photos of the noise on the mains. My batterie are on a north wall quite a way from the CUs.
That’s a big system. Ours is 6.3kWp DC. When I can’t empty my battery enough (DC linked so will take everything from the panels until full) and can’t up my usage and there is more than the export limit (3.68kW for me) the Solar gets lost! My system even today will generate 37kWh. With clear skies it could be over 60kWh. I need to start exporting when the sun rises at 3.68kW not to loose any and then drop the battery (20kWh) down to about 5kWh for the sunset to sunrise period! Until SolarEdge give me control of the system I have to go through my installer. Not smart. I’d also like to be able to set a battery threshold to start export as waiting till its full makes it difficult to spread the surplus.
I had a socket to plug a old phone charger into and connect it to the micro USB on the Wemos D1 mini Board that has the WiFi. You can buy battery cradles as the board and temperature sensors will work on 3.3V.
Two are connected to the Eddi which is my solar PV immersion divertor. You fit a relay board to the Eddi and that has two inputs for temperature probes.
The third sensor is connected to my Owl Intuition heating controller. Owl is almost unique in having a hot water controller with a temperature probe as most rely on the simple thermostat used with most hot water cylinders. As this was pre-existing it met the needs perfectly.
The temperature sensors work with their respective systems. To bring them together in Home Assistant requires you to integrate the respective platforms into Home Assistant.
This is generally very straightforward, you just click on Add Integration, find the relevant one and then configure it. Often this is just a matter of entering your account details in and then they appear.
Once added you end up with services, devices and entities. Services could be a weather forecast for example, devices are physical devices whereas entities represents a sensor, actor, or function in Home Assistant. i.e. Entities are generally the data associated with the device or service. Entities are used to monitor physical properties or to control other entities, i.e. these are what you work with mainly.
When you setup a dashboard you add cards. There are loads to choose from and there are more available that can be added in.
You can then use this information for automations. For example I have one that on certain days it boosts the hot water using gas if the tank temperature hasn’t reached certain threshold. This ensures that on low solar days we don’t have cold showers!
Had my modest 3.2 KWH GivEnergy system installed today - geeking out on the tech and app. At the risk of going over old ground on this thread; a very quick steer on best Octupus Energy or similar tariffs would be appreciated.
When mine was first installed I had significant errors in the import reading. My system would also constantly draw from the grid by about 200w when it thought it was reading zero. Turned out to be a dodgy connection on my clamp meter. I shortened it and remade it. Might be worth a check
Very much depends on how you use it. Have you got an ev?
We’ve opted to stick to a standard tariff and take the higher export rate. 15p/kwh anytime. We’ve young kids so dinner time is always in the high tariff but your circumstances may benefit the variable export rates. Bear in mind if you choose an ev tariff you can only get the flat export rate of 4p/kwh. I can charge my car cheapish at work, then if it’s at home on a sunny day I just bleed into the car rather than export
Thank you - don’t have an EV yet. Maybe next year - replace the NDX first!
As a family we are not huge electric consumers so at the moment just hoping to keep within generation means; and possibly by-in cheap units over winter to charge the batteries.
The idea of the car also storing/discharging on demand interests me.
Very limited possibilities at the moment - Indra (car charger manufacturer) are currently running or have recently run a pilot project with chademo equipped cars (Nissan Leaf or Nissan 200 van) and two way chargers.
As far as I know there is no ccs / type 2 equipped two way charger, and precious few cars with any kind of ability to export any energy
But it is coming
I have solar and battery coming, already have a share in a wind turbine and two EVs. My car is currently charging at the slowest possible rate to pick up what it can from the wind turbine. Once we have the solar etc fitted we should be able to monitor it all better
I am hoping that in summer I will be able to export 5kw for a large portion of the day and still have good usable power for the house and electric car … even then I will waste some. My main concern is towards winter and early spring I hope the panels will keep giving … at least powering house and battery…time will tell…I have plans for another 15kw battery if all is well… I have a heatpump which is quite consumptive of power…around 30kw a day in the cold winter…
So in my experience there’s a reasonable amount of generation available in the winter.
Some cold but sunny days were frustrating in that power was exported rather than charging the battery since cold batteries charge at a much slower rate (mine are in the attic and I need to improve the insulation to keep them above 15 degrees C since that seems to be the cut off for mine with slow charging)
