Using the web portal:
What I WANT to do is set the Inverter to Timed Discharge over a time range. Nothing else.
However when I do this it switches Eco Mode on every time. SO I turn that off and it then turns Timed EXPORT (not Discharge) on.
So I turn that off and turn on Timed Discharge and it puts Eco mode back on.
What am I missing here please? I just want stored energy to be discharged at 4-8pm Nothing else. No other options.
Would logic not dictate that a Charge cycle is needed in the sequence? Otherwise when would the battery recharge for the next day's 4-8pm discharge?
Therefore I would expect either ECO mode or Timed Charge (or both?) to be needed as well as Timed Discharge.
Well if I put it on Eco then it just discharges 24/7 as needed so that will not work.
If I put it on timed charge (say, for 20 mins at some early hours time) then I still get the same behaviour - as soon as I select Timed Discharge then it turns on Eco (so starts to discharge immediately) and if I turn Eco off then it turns on Timed Export..
nythbran use Eco mode but reduce the max discharge power setting to 0 for when you don't want to discharge?
stevelewis That is a faff - manually doing that every time.
I see we have another outage on the portal at this moment (Error 500 again) so maybe there is an issue...
nythbran What I WANT to do is set the Inverter to Timed Discharge over a time range. Nothing else.
The battery will need to charge at some point, otherwise it will just discharge down to zero.
Maybe have a think about what you are trying to achieve here, balanced against what the technology is capable of. Why is discharging at those hours to the exclusion of everything else the goal?
nythbran If I put it on timed charge (say, for 20 mins at some early hours time) then I still get the same behaviour - as soon as I select Timed Discharge then it turns on Eco (so starts to discharge immediately) and if I turn Eco off then it turns on Timed Export..
The system has to do something, otherwise what is the point in buying the battery?
Eco mode, for most people, suits as it tries to minimise both export and import. It will try and meet house load with solar gen and stored battery power. Any generation overage will be used to charge the battery.
Yes but that doesn't make sense in terms of behaviour here...
I can set Eco
or I can set Timed Export (eco OFF)
I cannot set Timed Discharge (eco OFF)
It makes no difference if I have timed charge on or off.
There is battery capacity (27% currently from 2 x Giv9.5) - I just want to hold this until 4pm then discharge this at the rate of usage not export.
nythbran Could you explain why you only want to discharge at certain times, maybe that would help.
Because we then contribute to lowering peak demand....
nythbran then discharge this at the rate of usage not export.
That doesn't make any sense to me, can you please clarify?
The system can either export at the full whack that the battery can manage or at a lower rate that you can select. What exactly do you mean by "discharge at the rate of usage"?
You can select Timed Discharge - during that time the batteries are discharged at the rate required to cover the property demand only.
Even though we have Agile Export with Octopus the export rate is (currently) less than Variable rate so there is no sense in exporting any excess ....
On the bigger scale we are taking grid demand away at the peak usage time....
Again, I think that you may be overthinking this.
Timed Discharge will use any energy to support the house load (not much different to Eco mode)
Timed Export will discharge the batteries at full rate. As long as the house load is below this, then the excess will go to the grid.
But then you say that
nythbran Agile Export with Octopus the export rate is (currently) less than Variable rate so there is no sense in exporting any excess ....
So what exactly are you trying to achieve then?
Zakalwe Timed Discharge will use any energy to support the house load (not much different to Eco mode)
Precisely. At peak hours nationally we can remove our demand by discharging from storage. I dont want to export as we use far more then we generate but it just seemed 'Greener' to be able to select discharge to home at peak times.
I can just leave it on Eco but that means by the time 4pm comes the batteries are at 4% at this time of year so we are adding to grid demand at the peal time.
It just doesn't make sense to me that Timed Discharge is effectively not working (as it is overridden by Eco).
nythbran easy with an automation. I have Python code that can do this with a 10-minute edit. Could also be scheduled in Home Assistant.
stevelewis easy with an automation
Can you point me in the right direction to learn about this please?
nythbran www.github.com/salewis38/palm
I currently check CO2 intensity at 1pm and force a charge if it will be significantly higher that evening - might be good enough for you out of the box.
stevelewis Thank you - I will take a look - keep you posted.
At peak hours you will always use from Solar First, Storage Second, Grid Third, that is what ECO does... providing you are within the system limit and providing the battery has enough power left in it.
Your actual challenge is ensuring that the battery has enough charge to cover your house usage during that peak period to minimise grid use bear in mind that it can't draw more than the battery export rate so you are limited to solar power+2.6kWh (x inverters). It is still down to the user to avoid the use of high consumption appliances.
Therefore to do what you want: if you know that your max usage is 3kW over that period then you need to ensure that your battery has at least 3kW in it. As there isn't a dynamic charge option all you can do is set a Timed Charge period & Charge to % to ensure that a worst case 4% battery is charged to say 3.5kW by 15:59. That way ECO mode effectively works whilst the sun is shining, only drawing the balance to charge the battery from the grid when needed.
It would be good if "Timed Charge" had a Level Charge at Time option so that it could automatically manage the forced charge start time although thinking about it I do wonder whether the advantage would be that great.
Yes - understood. It just seems strange that you can command a Timed Export yet you cannot command a Timed Discharge for the same timeframe - you have to either be prepared to export excess or run on Eco mode and use the energy up as generated (unless you play with min discharge levels as you say).
I would have thought this was important.
We have run on Agile incoming before now and this becomes even more significant - Timed charge during early hours price plunge and discharge (not export) at peak times.
Maybe it will get looked at in future.
I've no experience of Agile I'm afraid however as I understand it you want to:
Timed Charge at Say 02:00 to 100% cheap rate for use in the16:00 Timed Export.
You want an effective ECO mode to run through the day until the Timed export. That means Solar to Home, Grid use or Solar to Grid (Export as the battery is full.)
Come 16:00 you want Battery to dump to grid along with any excess solar, so for a 5.2 battery that is about two hours until it is flat.
Then use from the grid until Timed Charge Starts at 02:00
So, what happens if you set: Timed Charge 02:00 to 15:59 - Timed Export 16:00 to 20:00 with ECO Enabled.
...it will just keep charging the battery to 100% (or whatever you set) from grid if necessary until 15:59