Hi everyone.
I just got my install completed a few days ago, the battery is in single digits as i'm not on an import or export tariff yet and it's been very overcast. Is it normal that there is still export to the grid before the battery is charged to reasonable level or home consumption first?
Thanks.
Pakey07 It can be.
If your system is in ECO mode and the PV generation is only slightly above house load then the excess might be exported if it isn't sufficient to start charging the battery.
It also takes a while for the inverter to respond to changes in demand. Usually only takes a fraction of a second but sometimes the snapshots shown in the portal or app can make it seem quite significant. In ECO mode your system will be constantly swapping between import and export unless you have a lot of PV generation.
If you are exporting significant amounts (more than say 300W) and the battery is still not being charged then there could be a problem with your settings or configuration. Consistently exporting more than a few hundred watts with charging the battery would be unusual on most systems, if you have an AIO I think I read that it needed more than 200W to start charging.
You can check your settings in the portal, having ECO enabled and Timed Charge/Discharge/Export disabled should get things working as you want. It may be necessary to Reset to Defaults first.
If that doesn't sort you out then it might be best to discuss with your installer.
How low is the battery?
And if you look at the battery level graphs (state of charge) in the app or the portal, the battery should have been calibrated when it was installed - this fully discharges and then fully charges the battery. Can you see that happened?
If there’s not a lot of solar then the battery will then discharge down to empty based on house demand
geoffreycoan yes i got the notifications that it was going through it's calibration and it emptied. I'm hoping it's all going to change when i move onto an import/export tariff when i get my MPAN number?
Pakey07 How do i put it on ECO mode?
Are you using the web portal, android app, or iOS app ? It seems to be different across them all.
Pakey07 It's not been much above that
How much is "not much"? If it charges at all, then eco is probably working. When it discharges, 3-6% is probably about the lower limit you'd expect it to go down to before stopping. (The default config is 4%, I think. Mine tends to stop at 6%, then thinks for a bit and drifts upwards.)
Pakey07 I'm hoping it's all going to change when i move onto an import/export tariff when i get my MPAN number?
You should already have an import tariff. Assuming you have a smartmeter, it should be capable of handling the export too. But the way things are implemented, you get separate MPANs for import and export mapped onto your single physical smartmeter.
It may take some time (weeks ?) to get an export MPAN. But you can still choose your preferred import tariff - perhaps one that gives cheap overnight power when you can charge up your battery.
Pakey07 You will have an MPAN (meter Primary? access number??) already for your physical electricity meter. Do you have a smart meter or an older one that is manually read?
Almost all the ‘smarter’ tariffs require you to have an electronic smart meter so that you can be charged different rates for different times of day. The exception is Economy 7 where you could have either meter type.
If you have a smart meter then there is nothing to stop you changing onto a ‘time of day’ smart import tariff straight away and charge your battery up overnight on cheaper electricity. Or if you don’t have one, then apply for one and the electricity company will come and change your meter for you.
Separately you apply for an export tariff for which your electricity company will need to apply for an export MPAN for your smart meter from the DNO. This can take can take several weeks to come through.
It may be that your DNO issues the export MPAN once they process the paperwork for your solar install. Some DNO’s seem to do that, others seem to do it on request from the electricity company.
Pakey07 Have a look at
https://community.givenergy.cloud/d/3650-understanding-the-settings-on-your-app-and-portal
The first image shows the page on the portal you want. The top item is 'ECO', and you want the slider to be enabled.
It is possible for the portal to get out of sync with your inverter. It might be helpful to set it off, then on again. This should ensure that it's now on, even if it had somehow become unset previously.
DD Bear in mind that your installer should know your particular circumstances better than random strangers here on the internet.
Also bear in mind that installers have a fixed script that they know and follow and don’t know everything.
My installer missed the earth lead from the inverter to the battery and left the wifi wide open on my original install.
They then told me that I should have the second battery connected to the first battery rather than have one battery on each of my two inverters which resulted in months of all the PV that was generated on the second inverter being exported rather than stored and numerous over-voltage errors on the first inverter.
Then when they were back reconfiguring and connecting up the dedicated protected circuit fuseboard to the EPS terminals, lets just say I knew more about how GivEnergy EPS’s work than the two installer staff did.
Just saying, installers are far from fallible. Maybe you have a brilliant one. Maybe not. I’ve learnt a lot in this journey.
There is no reason at all to not swap to a different import tariff. I can’t see why you have to wait for an MPAN.
Talk to your current electricity supplier to see what they can offer, or look at alternatives if you want. Lots of us are with Octopus but plenty of other suppliers out there.
DD what’s AIO, AC, Hybrid?
Software is up to date.
Any ideas who to work the Octopus Watch app? I bought it a few weeks ago, way before I got the install but just looking at it now. Am i right in saying you can see when the cheap rates are tomorrow and can program when to download?
Is you battery 13.5kWh , 9.5kWh, 8.2 or something else?
Was it installed with solar or are the battery and solar unrelated?
This will help tell us information which can help determine your battery type.
Personally I’d be contacting your installer to get them to put this right and possibly GivEnergy support to see if they can help.
kram the battery is a 9.5kw and was installed last week as part of the solar system (7.23kw).
I'm not sure if there is a problem, if there is a problem how do i know there is one other than a low battery reading on the app? It's a bit brighter today so the battery is currently up to 60%.
I also had an ASHP installed a few weeks ago so that will have an impact on consumption and this is all before i'm on an import/export tariff.
If you are up to 60% and also using power as your home demands it, I'd say it's set up correctly.
With dull conditions it's entirely possible that you don't see much input to the battery. All the generation will go to the house. As the weather improves you'll get more and more into the battery.
As an aside, try to only use one system for changing settings (app vs online portal) as they can sometimes confuse each other. The labels are different too so that adds to the confusion. Many people find the portal to be more reliable.
If you have one inverter for the solar and the battery, you will have a hybrid inverter.
If you have two inverters you will have an AC coupled battery.
If the battery was installed with or after the ASHP, I’d be a bit disappointed you didn’t get suggested the 13.5kWh All In One (AIO) as it has more capacity and a higher discharge rate (5-6kW vs 3.6 for the hybrid vs 3 for an AC).
Also as the AIO is ac coupled also, you max power would have been 5-6kW from battery and 5kW solar (assuming you have a 5kW solar inverter). The hybrid will give a total of 5kW at any time and a max of 3.6kW can come from the battery, but solar+battery will never be >5kW.
Do you have a cheap rate tariff like cosy octopus (referral code available if you don’t have a local friend), which gives you a number of hours at a cheap rate? This would allow you to charge the battery and do most of the ASHP work during the cheap slots, then keep things ticking over between and on solar.
kram I’m still waiting on my MPAN number from SPEN so can’t do much about export yet. I have moved to Octopus on a flexible tariff but they are going to put in a new smart meter, said that will be better than the one I have. Will that waffle to me getting the code from SPEN or is that unrelated?
Pakey07 If your inverter was installed under the fast-track system (less than 3.6kW) then part of the delay from your DNO is (I think) them processing the paperwork for the install. Whereas if it's a bigger inverter and you had to get permission in advance (G99) then getting the MPAN should be quicker.
Having to get a new smartmeter might complicate things. But I guess the point of having separate logical MPAN numbers distinct from the physical smartmeter might mean that they can be mapped together easily. Not sure...
But if you have a heat pump, I wouldn't have thought you'd have much spare power to export at the moment anyway ?
I have a heat pump and today and one day last week are the first (that I can remember) that I’m in profit on the day.
Nice to see that the warmer weather and better solar is starting to make a financial difference.
-20p consumption charge today. A total of 39kWh consumed, 14kWh on the heat pump and 15kWh exported.
Worth saying though that this is on Octopus Agile with active battery management to charge and discharge at profitable rates.
When I first got my battery system in January 23 it wasn’t until something like May before I saw the battery level rise up to any decent level with solar charging. The ASHP ate up everything I generated and then some so @Pakey07 your low battery level is to be expected
geoffreycoan I waited till now to get the ASHP and Solar just now for that exact reason. The plan is to build up a head of steam over the summer so that the costs or at least most of them will be covered for next winter, you think that’s achievable? Octopus are putting in a new smart meter so need to wait a couple o weeks before they put me onto Flux so I’m currently on a flexible tariff. Should I charge the battery at certain periods just now or wait till I’m on flux where I know the best times to charge are?
DD yes, the long nights, cloud cover are not helping with generation, I’m hoping I can take advantage over the brighter months without the heating to help cover me next winter if that makes sense?
I could only apply to SPEN from yesterday as I’d to wait on the MCS certification, hopefully they’ll be quite efficient and get it processed quickly. Hopefully the new smart meter doesn’t complicate things.
Pakey07 Partly it will depend on what the new Flux rates are, but in the past the overnight cheap import rate has been about the same as the daytime export rate so once you figure inverter and battery losses in, it would actually lose you money to charge overnight and start grid exporting (from your solar) earlier in the day.
I think the best Flux strategy is to:
Sign up to solcast to be able to see what your daily solar prediction is. Only if the next day prediction is for poor solar and you won’t have enough captured in the battery to see you through the peak rate is it worth charging overnight. If you do charge overnight consider holding that charge (either by pausing the discharge or manually setting the discharge rate to zero) until the peak period.
That way you’ll avoid paying peak rate charges as much as possible
geoffreycoan that’s excellent. Think I’m going to have to really think hard and break it all down.
Thought it was going to be fairly straightforward, download during the cheap and export in the peak period etc. more complex than I anticipated but I’m grateful for the advice 👍
geoffreycoan SPEN are saying that it could take up to 12 weeks to give me my MPAN number, I’ve told them that’s unacceptable as I’d be missing out on the best export time of the year. They say it due to demand, is anyone else experiencing this?
The installer says it’s up to me to chase it with SPEN, SPEN says it’s the installers job. Whose responsibility is it?
Octopus tell me that until I get this they won’t be able to put me onto an import/export
Tariff.
What’s the best thing for me to do?
Pakey07 I’m not surprised. I think the DNO’s are allowed to take up to 3 months to issue the MPAN. As I said mine took 6 weeks and I missed out on export through June, July and half of August.
The installer will send the paperwork to the DNO and then I guess they don’t care about it after that.
Personally what I did was to make contact with the DNO myself. I must have gone through the general enquiries email address and they were actually very good, within a couple of days my query had gone to the right department and I was able to resolve the query that they had raised with Octopus that Octopus hadn’t sent on to me.
Since you are the one that wants the MPAN I’d get on the case myself.
Good luck. It is frustrating. And Octopus won’t back-date the export payments either. They will however ask for an opening export meter reading number and a photo of it ……
I don't see how they're going to issue an export MPAN when you don't have a meter capable of registering export.
You'll have to wait until the smart meter is installed.