What smart meter options do OVO offer for polyphase CT metered supplies rated at 200A per phase?

Hiya!

I think this is a bit of a tricky one @ruralCTsupply , I have to agree that you’ve got an unusual setup.

What I can confirm is that 3-Phase Smart Meters are capable of dealing with 2-Phase Supplies. That’s a piece of cake, as is all sorts of unusual and exotic setups. The only snag is that 100A capacity limit per-phase. Most Domestic suppliers don’t support AMR Meters either I’m afraid.

However… There may be options yet! I’m going to take this one backstage and ask for thoughts. We’ve got the ability to get expert opinions for something like this and I think I know one or two people who’d be absolutely perfect.

Bear with me though, as I need permission to get those people involved in this thread. I’m on it now and we’ll keep you posted!

Thanks for that - very much appreciated.  

In terms of a little more context I did recently hear back from the Business side of one of the Domestic suppliers who suggested they could supply a “RCAMY” meter for my supply which from my in expert digging around seems to be a bit like a slightly more sophisticated version of a standard AMR meter.  

But it is not yet clear to me whether a RCAMY meter would (a) allow me access to wider range of modern tariffs or (b) be something that the Domestic side of the supplier in question could pick up and offer to me a a domestic customer or whether i would have to convert (with all the downsides) to a Business one.  I have asked these questions to the Business supplier in question (waiting for a response), but from previous experience on this subject with this supplier I have low expectations about what I might get as a response..

So is the A1140 you have rated 200a.

I thought it was 100a when I read the documentation.

I suspect i have misunderstood the documentation... 

https://www.camax.co.uk/product/elster-a1140-mid-polyphase-phase-electricity-meter

I am not an expert but when Direct Connected the tech docs seem to suggest it is up to 100A per phase, but when CT connected (which i believe it is in this case) i think it might be more.  

Attached picture is the meter in question, and also a picture of the incoming supply (labeled by a DNO engineer who measured the currents).

seems only 1 picture uploaded.  here is the meter

looks like you can set the “CT ratio” so the meter can handle bigger currents.  

https://www.metermarket.co.uk/product/elster-a1140

the “Ct Ratio” drop down has an option for a “200/5A” option, which is what my meter is set at.

@ruralCTsupply perhaps a silly question, I assume you are sure you need 200a per phase. 

Are there 200a fuses on each of the phases. 

not a silly question, have investigated downgrading the supply to 100A per phase but is a large property with a number different demands and the electricians who have looked at the load balancing have advised against it.  similarly switching to a 3 phase 100A per phase supply is also not really an option either as, while this could possible provide enough current, due to our location the DNO indication for how much this might cost was a serious 6 figure number with the caveat that being able to deliver it was highly uncertain due to various local environmental challenges of installing the necessary 3rd wire.

@ruralCTsupply

Best wait for @Blastoise186 then to see if he discovers any options.

The reality is Octopus Energy have the vast majority of time of use type tariff at the moment so you may be best directing the question at them in case what works for OVO won't work for Octopus, or if they have any solutions. 

Other suggestions are messy. I am not sure they are realistic, and you may already have considered them. For example 

A left field idea is to investigate the use of battery storage so you shift your energy use and dramatically reduce your peak load down to 100a per circuit. Also this could store some but perhaps not all the excess PV. 

Another is possibly have two separate meters if one could be 100a and one 200a and have a ToU tariff on the 100a meter. Again messy and you have the issue of standing charges and it is still not giving you ToU over all your energy. Am not sure this idea is realistic and may not work with your usage anyway 

I am sure you have considered lots of things reading your posts.

The ultimate challenge is that suppliers won't be looking to offer solutions for what will be a very small number of domestic customers i suspect. I fear no supplier will offer a domestic solution so you won't ever be able to access any domestic time of use tariffs without 

1. Getting the peak load down

2. Going to the expense of getting that 3rd phase installed. 

Have you had your actual peak load measured in real-time? I just wonder how high it is as that would help inform possible solutions perhaps? Comparing it to the theoretical maximum that has been calculated might be interesting?

I’m still looking into this myself. If I can get permission to call on some expert advice, that will likely make things easier.

But it’s a really weird edge case in that I’ve never heard of a Domestic supply having 200A per Phase before!

Oh, and I recommend against Dual-Meter or Twin-Element setups. They caused nightmares back in the day and just aren’t worth it anymore. I can definitely tell you that the Sekrit Smart Meter Friend doesn’t want to support that type of setup in the future.