Solar PV Monitoring/Automation Thread

con747 · 17-12-2023 6:49pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121506882#Comment_121506882

This any use? https://www.boards.ie/discussion/2058327100/saving-your-small-battery-for-peak-use#latest

SD_DRACULA · 17-12-2023 8:48pm

Not really but probably something like this will do it.

{% set discharge_needed_wh = (now_battery_usable_wh) %}
{% set load = (states('sensor.load_power') | int) %}
discharge_needed_wh: {{ ((now_battery_usable_wh)-load) / 2 }}

now_battery_usable_wh: 12240
discharge_needed_wh: 5559.0

the /2 can be updated to "hours left until 15kw o'clock"

micks_address · 17-12-2023 9:15pm

Hi folks,

Anyone have a recommendation for a heat meter that measures flow rate and flow/return temps with easy integration into home assistant?

10-10-20 · 17-12-2023 9:53pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121507672#Comment_121507672

Kamstrup Multical 403. Bit pricey for my blood.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0JyeLY9NURg&t=0s

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UaoSYYqGLNM

micks_address · 17-12-2023 10:07pm

Yeah I just watched those. I'm confused about getting it integrated with ha, is there any simpler way to integrate that using another pi? I wouldn't mind the investment with the goal of accurately measuring house heat loss before heading down a future heat pump road

graememk · 17-12-2023 10:11pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121507672#Comment_121507672

Depends on how DIY your looking to go.

You could get a flow meter and then some ds18b20, wire it all into a esp8266, some thermal pad, zip tie them to the flow and return, cover in insulation for good measure.

Possibly would use tasmota, or esphome.

Take the pulse count, convert that to L/s

kW = flow rate(L/s) x temperature difference (in C) x 4.18.

Home assistant can then convert kW to kWh.

Hardest bit is getting the flow meter in place.

HotSwap · 18-12-2023 1:09am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121506882#Comment_121506882

alias: Feed Battery to Grid at 00:30
description: Feed Battery to Grid at 00:30
trigger:
  - platform: time
    at: "00:30:00"
    enabled: true
condition:
  - type: is_value
    condition: device
    device_id: c4b480de0d2709c5f57651377ebc5be6
    entity_id: sensor.battery_state_of_capacity
    domain: sensor
    above: 20
action:
  - device_id: c4b480de0d2709c5f57651377ebc5be6
    domain: select
    entity_id: select.battery_working_mode
    type: select_option
    option: Fully Fed To Grid
  - wait_for_trigger:
      - type: value
        platform: device
        device_id: c4b480de0d2709c5f57651377ebc5be6
        entity_id: sensor.battery_state_of_capacity
        domain: sensor
        below: 20
  - device_id: c4b480de0d2709c5f57651377ebc5be6
    domain: select
    entity_id: select.battery_working_mode
    type: select_option
    option: Time Of Use
variables:
  entity_solar_forecast: sensor.solcast_forecast_today
  entity_inverter_target_soc: number.battery_grid_charge_cutoff_soc
mode: single

HotSwap · 18-12-2023 1:16am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121506882#Comment_121506882

I had this running for a while in the summer; but disabled it eventually. My fear was a was losing more on wear and tear on the battery; plus with conversion losses it was not adding up to huge money.

But as I’ve nearly the system a full year now; and I’m hitting full 100%-0% cycles nearly every day now; I’m less concerned with the wear and tear. Some might look into it again when summer comes around.

SD_DRACULA · 18-12-2023 11:32am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121508551#Comment_121508551

Yeah the only thing is to not drain it past the lower limit and then pull from grid before 2am, which is totally dependant on the house load at the time (and if anyone is awake and wasting power beyond the baseline)

HotSwap · 18-12-2023 12:59pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121509241#Comment_121509241

thats why I defined it to stop discharging at 20% which is prob too high; I’d prob go for 5% this summer.

kaisersose77 · 20-12-2023 6:05pm

Does anyone using a Huawei inverter with home assistant have an issue with the entities going unavailable every so often and if so did you find a solution? A reboot will resolve it but a bit of annoyance if you lose generation data due to the entities been unavailable.

JayBee66 · 20-12-2023 6:43pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121519074#Comment_121519074

Are you using Solarman integration for HA version 1.5.1?

If so then roll back to 1.4.3

There are issues with 1.5.1 not being stable with a random sample of inverters. No particular inverter (though I haven't seen anyone with a Solis having the problem) and not all owners of a particular inverter that suffer from the problem.

kaisersose77 · 20-12-2023 6:54pm

Sorry I should have mentioned integration, no in my case it's the wlcrs Huawei Solar Integration.

JayBee66 · 20-12-2023 7:06pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121519257#Comment_121519257

Okay. I have the same resulting problem in that entities go unavailable and can only be brought back with a reboot.

You could try a roll back to a previous version of your integration and see if it makes a difference.

HotSwap · 20-12-2023 8:39pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121519074#Comment_121519074

I use the same one: https://github.com/wlcrs/huawei_solar and maybe 1 or 2 times in the last year the stats weren’t available; but I put it down to home assistant rather than the inverter as when i restarted HA everything came back.

Tree · 20-12-2023 11:04pm

Same for me and the Huawei integration, it's usually more on the HA side and a reboot (or reload integration) usually does the trick. I think I've had it go off once during the year when my battery SOC automation was running and that was annoying but it hasn't happened since.

staples7 · 27-12-2023 11:26pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/120924582#Comment_120924582

In the same boat as you, wondering if you got set up? Huawei inverter only installed last week. Would love to set up some dedicated monitoring device in the kitchen. The app is good just hassle checking it

Tree · 28-12-2023 12:46pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121542169#Comment_121542169

You shouldn't require the installer password (but having it stored somewhere is a good idea in case the installer goes under).

I /think/ most people don't use the smart dongle, I had trouble setting it up without but a lot of other people have more luck. I'd say try out the integration (it's a really good integration) and see if you can get what you need from it.

staples7 · 28-12-2023 1:37pm

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121543289#Comment_121543289

It's still a bit past what Im looking for I think. Just something like an echo show perhaps that I can logon onto fusion solar webpage and keep that showing. Could go down the route of an old IOS device also. iPad mini, old iPhone and buy some sort of wall mount

Tree · 28-12-2023 2:21pm

You should be able to display home assistant down the road on whatever device you choose :) (join us on the dark side! so many automations! including charging/discharging your battery on demand or making other things behave when the sun comes out like your car charger)

Then you just want to show the fusionsolar webpage on kiosk mode on a broswer on a phone/tablet?

JayBee66 · 28-12-2023 3:58pm

Apparently, Solarman Smart users can have their accounts permissioned so that they can control their inverters remotely from within the Solarman App; battery charging on/off etc.

I was wondering what data you have to supply to your inverter manufacturer to get permissioned as their Chinglish instructions make no sense to me.

"Hello, you need to provide us with the account information interface of your smart version account so that we can authorize based on the information."

I gave them my Solarman Smart account ID but that doesn't seem to be enough.

JayBee66 · 02-01-2024 8:22am

Took a while but I have been authorised for Solarman Remote Control. Does all I need. I can fiddle with my inverter panel from anywhere. Even when on holiday. Turn off battery charging whilst away and turn it back on whilst travelling home. This negates any need for me to set up this functionality in Home Assistant.

Modbus registers can be both read and setup from a web browser. I can also see registers that are not seen from the inverter menu screen. Below, you can see that I am able to limit export whilst charging the battery at night. Something that I am not able to do on the inverter panel.

graememk · 02-01-2024 11:36pm

Just a reminder to setup automated backups of home assistant.. I didn't lose any data but made life a lot more difficult for myself

SD_DRACULA · 03-01-2024 12:05am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121563890#Comment_121563890

Oh yes daily backups and don't forget to backup to gdrive with the addon: https://github.com/sabeechen/hassio-google-drive-backup

mp3guy · 03-01-2024 12:22am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121563890#Comment_121563890

Sounds pretty grim. I run a nightly full machine Veeam backup myself, while also having yaml in a private git repo.

jasgrif11 · 03-01-2024 12:31am

I automate full backup nightly at 3am to dropbox. I keep 7 backups and purge the rest.

Added 1TB SSD to the HA PI recently too.

insular1 · 03-01-2024 12:38am

Relatively new to home assistant but was feeling a tad vulnerable after reading this with only a crappy 32gb SD card in the Pi and no auto back ups. Thanks for the tips, have it automatically backing up to Google drive daily now. Amazing how dependant I have become on this in only a few short weeks! Would be very painful if I had to start again from scratch.

graememk · 03-01-2024 12:42am

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121564094#Comment_121564094

Need to get a new SSD for nightly snap shots too of the VMs. But have it now being backed up to the cloud.

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/121564127#Comment_121564127

Yeah, power blinked and the HA VM never came back up. Only would boot into recovery. I suppose it possibly would have been fixable but was getting nowhere.

insular1 · 03-01-2024 1:31pm

Before using HA I had the bright idea of monitoring some of my heavy loads individually using additional CT's linked to the myenergi system but annoyingly myenergi doesn't have this feature. Recently discovered however that HA can pick up the individual CT's linked to myenergi even if they are not actually configured in the myenergi system. This has allowed me to monitor several loads individually (Heat pump, Zappi v1 without a hub and garage) just using the Harvi CT's. May have already been mentioned in the thread but just in case it wasn't, might be of use to someone.

micks_address · 03-01-2024 3:55pm

hi folks,

has anyone integrated the nest thermostat with home assistant? Ive added the official integration but it doesnt look like it gives access to boost hot water. Only gives option to turn on / off heat. I'd like to add an automation that would boost my hotwater if it dips below a certain temp (have a temp sensor in ha from the eddii) Ive seen some references to running a homekit docket container and being able to control it that way - anyone given it a go?

Cheers,

Mick

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