Can I connect my In Home Display (IHD) to my Solar Inverter to show my exported energy?

Hi @12like ,

This is a good one actually. The exact answer depends on your setup. As far as I’m aware, it’s impossible for an IHD to show data from anything that’s not on the Home Area Network like a generation meter. If you had Smart Export Guarantee with your smart meter handling export metering, the IHD may be able to show this data depending on the IHD you’ve got, however this functionality is not supported for the Feed-in Tariff if memory serves.

I’m afraid in your case, there’s nothing out there that I can recommend because FiT cannot integrate with any smart meter that I’m aware of. I think @kevinmcintyre09 might have some advice though.

@Blastoise186 Is correct there is no easy integration of solar generation with smart meters.

We have had a number of solar monitoring products, but recently discontinued the devices as they were so old. This includes a pre-smart meter that measured import, export and generation, and we calculated consumption.

Justifying integration of this capability into our smart meter IHDs, we have struggled to do.

Within smart metering there is a twin element meter, which can be wired I believe to support generation. However, they are not very common, and I seem to recall some challenges with data going into the DCC.

The best you will do is buying a solar monitor, and manually working it out.

Our IHDs with the newer firmware support showing import/export live on a dial, and give you the import and export meter reads, but that is about it today.

Sorry I cannot be of more help Kevin @geo

Thanks @Blastoise186 and @kevinmcintyre09 

Can you supply a link to the new IHD which can show import export live on a dial so I can see what this looks like and what it takes to capture solar data.  I’m not so much interested in billing level accuracy rather to decide at a moment in time if there is enough solar to switch on both the washing machine and dishwasher without importing too much from grid.

Photos of that kind of IHD are extremely hard to come by I’m afraid. I can definitely show you photos of what the displays on a regular Geo IHD look like with the dial though. Their website at https://geotogether.com/ has a few photos of them if that helps.

The other snag is that Geo doesn’t currently sell any IHD products directly to consumers that I know of and if their solar monitors are gone, that doesn’t leave many options. Kevin happens to be very clued up as well with these things, so he’d know if there was anything else that he could recommend.

Depending on your solar setup, there might be other options though. Could you tell us what system you’ve got as I might be able to call in some help from a few other members.

If that is your goal, why don’t you just look at the export? My IHD shows export just as it would show import (and in fact the two are virtually indistinguishable, only separated by a few tiny pixel).
One potential problem is that both the washing machine and the dishwasher will have vastly different power requirements as they go through their cycle. Heating does use a lot of power for both, but it is only active intermittently. 

Was your IHD supplied by OVO, @MrPuds?

Be really interested to hear how the export reading can be viewed if so. We were under the impression that our IHDs weren’t able to show this info so happy to update this topic if we’re incorrect.

As for other ways to view export data, @12like, I know we’ve got plenty of solar-panel users here who might be able to direct you to some great third-party apps they use - @Jequinlan, @ArundaleP, @f0rtune?

@12like apologies missed this one :)

Normal dial when installed with a system with no export

For a system with export we change the dial by adding an export segment (ignore the prepay tab, only shown if you meter is in prepay mode)

When exporting it looks like this.

We don’t use negative numbers on the UI for energy, so the text helps reinforce what it is showing you.

Why grey out the dial? We did this to make it easier to see from across the room if you were importing or exporting.

Example of the meter reading screen with export readings

As noted by @ArundaleP some meters give us the full import/export value, some zero out export. In that the latter case, we will stay with the normal dial as there is no export as far as we are concerned.

@Blastoise186 is right, we do not sell SMETS IHD directly today.

Thanks Paul.  My export meter isn’t Smart and I don’t think I can have it changed as I’m on a FiT contract.  Can it still be connected to Glow Stick using a cable clamp?

Thanks Kevin,  does the export part need a SMETs meter which mine isn’t.  Or can a cable clamp be used to monitor export current?   

Hildebrand has been pretty friendly with me recently, and they’ve been teaching me about their offerings in order to help me to help other forum members out.

I’m afraid from their information, the Hildebrand Glow Stick cannot be connected to cable clamps and incompatible with non-smart meters of any kind.

It’s a bit of a nightmare to “smartify” non-smart stuff of this kind I’m afraid, and I can’t think of any way to make such devices be able to join the HAN for a SMETS1 or SMETS2 site - not least because you’d have to get through ZigBee Certification for starters. And that’s a long process before you even go through literally any other certifications.

Thanks it’s a shame that the display devices don’t support real world use cases.  The solar FiT meter isn’t smart as the government required quarterly readings only deem that I export 50% of what I generate. I’m on a 20 year contract for solar and don’t expect a meter change unless OVO who  administer the FiT scheme tell me differently .   So I need to monitor generation and try to maximise my usage of solar.   I have two old monitors side by side for that purpose.  Getting an OVO smart display will add yet another display but not help

with optimising solar usage.  

Yes all of the Trio devices work with SMETS meters.

Unfortunately, there is no easy way to do this. We used to sell twin-element meters with a display and hub (prior to the bottom falling out of FiTs), this would measure import, export, generation and calculate consumption. 

Today in a SMETS world you would need a SMETS IHD monitoring import/export and have the ability to support a meter transmitter either LED or CT for generation. It is technologically possible, however justifying the business case is much harder.

Hi - hoping someone can advise

Recently had solar panels fitted with battery storage. I will inform OVO of this in due course. In the meantime I have noticed that my IHD3 is not showing the same amount of imported energy from the grid as the Solax Cloud App. For example yesterday the solar panels shows a consumption of 21.57kWh with 8.4kWh of this imported from the grid and 13.17 from solar, but the IHD3 shows 19.15 kWh used (which I will be billed for). Could this be because OVO are not yet aware of the new solar panel installation

Hey ​@jtleavesley 

Welcome to the OVO Online Community. I have added green tech badges to your account so other community members with the same green tech can identify you 🙂

Just wanted to loop in ​@BPLightlog  ​@juliamc ​@mavison & ​@hydrosam as they might have some helpful advice for you. 

These topics might be helpful for you:

• The Smart Export Guarantee (SEG) - Getting paid for the energy you export to the grid - FAQs Tutorial

• Power your solar battery with low cost, greener energy News

• Solar Photovoltaic (pv) panels: Installation, apps, export payments and ROI - User guide Tutorial

Hi ​@jtleavesley , the monitor for virtually every solar PV system uses a CT to measure home load (and usage) . Unfortunately, this is often not that accurate and therefore as long as your IHD and meter are connected and sending readings, that will be the accurate measurement.

There is a scenario that you may want to check, which is, if the CT and connections are made incorrectly, it can make things count solar as grid consumption. That shouldn’t happen but I have seen it on occasions.

Hi ​@jtleavesley Could it be that your Solax app is correctly showing what your inverter/battery circuit is importing from the grid to a) help re-charge your house batteries when the panels aren’t producing enough to do that on their own (maybe at night?), which might be the 8.4 kWh, and b) contribute any excess PV production to your household demand and/or export back to the grid during the day, which might be the 13.17 kWh figure?

The IHD3 consumption figure of 19.15 kWh will be what your house as a whole consumes, not just what your inverter/battery circuit may consume (i.e. buy) from time to time, but including that 8.4 kWh amount of course.

I’m not entirely sure of my ground here, but as ​@BPLightlog says, I would trust the IHD and the household smart meter to show correctly your purchase from the grid.  And of course your PV panels won’t consume anything as such: you mention a 21.57 kWh consumption by the panels, which I take to be their production for the day?? Which I have to say sounds a very respectable figure for this time of year, I think mine might have produced about 7 kWh that day, so I may have totally the wrong end of the stick?

Anyway, best of luck, you’ll really start noticing the PV contribution from now on, as we progress into April…you won’t regret it, and getting battery storage at the same time is definitely the way to go.  Do let us know how you resolve the different data being presented to you by Solax and by your IHD, I’m always willing to learn from others here on the forum…kindest regards

Many thanks BPLightlog and waltyboy

I have emailed OVO direct regarding my query and will post their reply when received. Being a newbie, and taking longer than most to understand the complete picture it will be sometime before it all sinks in. But with help from forum members I’ll surely get here at some point.

Regarding the consumed 21.57kWh this is made up from importing 8.4kWh from the grid and 13.17kWh from solar as shown on screenshot below. The total yield for the day from Solar is 17.7kWh with 13.17kWh to the house and 4.53kWh to the grid. The IHD3 consumption figure of 19.15 kWh is what I will be billed for. So is the consumption to the house add up to 13.17kWH + 19.15kWh = 32.32kWh which seems rather a lot of energy usage for one day.

There are parts of your graph (green and blue, either side of zero) which look like they might be activity to/from the battery. 
So as ​@waltyboy mentioned, there could be parts of your grid input which are on top of true home consumption - but of course your meter (and IHD) will log these as usage.

If there’s another part of your data that shows the battery state of charge (Soc), that might help to make sense of it all. The info from your SolaX system is ‘part of’ the overall picture and so consumption won’t be the two parts added together.

Thankyou BPLightlog - I can see the battery state of charge and will keep reviewing daily data and hopefully the penny will drop one day!

Hi ​@jtleavesley (and ​@BPLightlog, who is much more au fait with this stuff than I am), one thing to be careful about when charging batteries using your panels, although a thoroughly excellent idea in itself, is to watch like a hawk any additional grid charging that automatically occurs when the panels can’t quite cope on their own: typically at night of course, but even at times during the day especially during the winter months when the batteries are getting hit hard anyway and the panels are dark for much of the day.  
 

Have no fear, using batteries to store excess panel production (supplemented by the grid as necessary) is definitely the way to go, although it’s only really started to get routinely adopted in the last few years or so. Plus, as we head out of March now into longer brighter days you’ll really start to see more and more of that lovely PV production. Assuming your panels are in the UK.

Keep us posted on developments as your system really starts to stretch its legs!  Just watch that grid top-up and make sure you control when it occurs….for example a lot of people time it to occur during cheap tariff rates at night, but it would be of little use re-charging your battery at night while the house was busy using your battery storage. What could work for you would be to use your PV panels first and foremost for the house as and when they can contribute, and then any surplus production to go automatically into the batteries to be discharged later for the hours when your panels are unproductive.  I guess that’s one way your system may be designed anyway? And as ​@BPLightlog and you have homed in on, keeping a sharp weather eye on your battery SoC will be paramount, particularly when the seasons, and our own usage habits, are changing in Spring and Autumn. 
 

Solar generation at 17.00 today 27.5kWh which I’m super happy with. The battery is 100% full and the solar is still generating. I would have earned £4 yesterday and £5 today if I could have exported to the grid but I haven’t yet managed to get DNO approval or selected an export tariff yet. Something I will be doing as soon as possible. I’ve tweaked the schedule time for heating my 210l hot water cylinder and that’s made a saving of around £1 yesterday compare to the day before but it was super sunny yesterday which will have helped as the hot water is heated during 11am to 5pm time slot with a couple of hours top up between 5am to 7am in the morning. My electric bill for yesterday was £3.30. I will look to lower this if I can through further tweaks and optimisations. Enjoying the challenge.

Looking into the data - I see that £4 & £5 earnings would have been achieved by utilising a TOU tariff not through exporting back to the grid. I’ll have to spend more time trying to get a better understanding once I’ve switched to an energy provider offering the best ASHP & SEG tariffs. I’m looking at Octopus. Any thoughts?