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

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:

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.