My Electric and My Solar apps not showing kwh

glyn.hudson · 2016-05-11T23:03:58.983Z

To work with the My Electric App the feed type needs to be PHPFINA. Could you post a screen grab showing your input processors. The power input should be logged to a kWh feed using power to kWh process . See Home Energy - Guide | OpenEnergyMonitor

Emoncms input view.png2356×508 65.8 KB

PaulB · 2016-05-12T07:29:06.159Z

Hi @glyn.hudson

I followed the guide you referenced (but could always have made a stupid mistake!), my inputs are:

image.png2956×892 83 KB

… and my process list is:

image.png2802×1288 258 KB

Paul

glyn.hudson · 2016-05-12T08:30:57.415Z

Nice, that looks all good

What happened when you view the Kwh feed directly?

Do you have 24hrs or more worth of data? Is the time correct on the emonpi LCD?

If all these things are correct then in out of ideas. It will be over to @TrystanLea (who wrote the app) to help…

Sorry for the hassle.

pb66 · 2016-05-12T09:44:35.835Z

The processing and feeds do not look correctly configured to me. Where do you have CT1 installed?

“use” and “use_kwh” can only ever be positive unless your appliances can generate power.

It looks like at least the solar CT, but probably both CT’s are inverted

Are you confusing “grid” and “use”? The “use” should be the sum of “grid” (pos when importing) and “solar” (pos when generating). You could try something like

input1 (grid CT)

log to feed “grid”
allow positive
log to feed “import”
power to kWh “import_kwh”

input2 (solar CT)

log to feed “solar”
power to kwh “solar_kwh”

input “grid”
log to feed “use”
power to kwh “use_kwh”

However on a emonPi you can use the 3rd input to process “use”, which I believe is provided to give “grid” plus"solar" combined to circumvent the potential hazard of the mqtt values arriving in a different order and out of date “last” values being assumed current. In your current setup when input1 does it’s processing it uses input2 which has not yet been updated, my example puts the use of input1 in the processing of input2 which should be ok but not 100% reliable.

so you could remove the +input and the 2 “use” feed processes from the other input and have just

log to feed “use”
power to kwh “use_kwh”

in input 3, this would be simpler and more reliable/accurate,

Bill.Thomson · 2016-05-12T11:04:14.267Z

pb66:

However on a emonPi you can use the 3rd input

Doesn’t the EmonPi have only two inputs?
https://guide.openenergymonitor.org/setup/

pb66 · 2016-05-12T11:33:16.028Z

I could have been cleared, I should have said the 3rd input FROM the emonPi, referring to the 3rd input of the emonpi node at the emoncms inputs page.

The emonPi has a variety of physical “inputs” of which there are just 2 current “input” or CT channels, yes you are right. But despite there only being 2 CT’s there are 3 “powers” in the payload creating 3 inputs (in emoncms) from those 2 CT’s.

michal · 2016-05-12T18:45:33.737Z

glyn.hudson:

To work with the My Electric App the feed type needs to be PHPFINA.

Why ? I am running MYSQL feeds and have no idea why support for MYSQL does not exist in latest My Electric version.
Can someone here explain end of MYSQL support within emoncms code ?
Thank you in advance.

PaulB · 2016-05-12T20:08:32.490Z

Thanks @pb66 you have solved another issue I was having in terms of the Solar app and defining grid, solar and use. I have updated my inputs according to your detailed instructions which make sense. The third input on the emonPI is referenced by default as power1pluspower2 for anyone trying to follow the thread, it now looks likes this for Inputs

image.png2998×1256 171 KB

My feeds are also updated accordingly, hopefully you can see values for kWh being recorded:

image.png3000×874 103 KB

I think I now need to wait to see what tomorrow brings in terms of solar kWh and use kwh

Paul

PaulB · 2016-05-15T11:51:01.201Z

@pb66 thank you for your help. The instructions you provided sorted out my setup for me. I can now report that both Emoncms apps for reporting Electric and Solar are both now working as they should. I think I got confused with the polarity in combination with trying to work out if my setup was type 1 or type 2 (it is type 2).

Many thanks

Paul

recepta · 2017-03-29T19:55:46.618Z

pb66:

Are you confusing “grid” and “use”? The “use” should be the sum of “grid” (pos when importing) and “solar” (pos when generating). You could try something like

Hi Paul,

Can you please elaborate a bit more regarding “grid” and “use”. If for example, I have 2 phases A and B coming out of the meter, so the power consumed by the house is A+B=grid or use?

“solar” - when PV is producing energy, the feed should be logged as positive values?

the reason that I am asking is, I am trying to fix My Electric all that never worked right on my shared hosted linux server.

Robert.Wall · 2017-03-29T21:19:17.031Z

Our usual definition is:
“Use” is the power/energy consumed by the house. It is positive by definition.
“Generation ( / Solar)” (usually PV but it could be wind or hydro) is the power/energy from the PV etc infeed. Usually positive during daylight, it can be negative at night because the inverter does consume a small amount of ‘keep-alive’ power.
“Grid” is the power/energy that flows in the connection from the supply authority. We define it as positive when power/energy is imported (Use > PV) and negative when power/energy is exported (PV > Use).

In your case, we would regard “Grid” as the nett sum over both legs of the supply - but bearing in mind what Bill Thomson wrote elsewhere, your meter might charge you for importing on one leg and charge you for exporting on the other leg.

recepta · 2017-03-29T23:16:00.568Z

Thanks Robert. Use and Generation does make sense.
So is grid a sort of virtual feed, calculated grid = use - generation?
In my case I would calculate grid = (Phase B - Generaton) + Phase A

Robert.Wall · 2017-03-30T08:32:46.826Z

recepta:

In my case I would calculate grid = (Phase B - Generaton) + Phase A

You can calculate it that way (and so would I), and so would a meter that works according to the official guidelines (in the UK at least). But as Bill warned, your meter might not. So it you get a different answer to what your bill says, the reason probably lies in that area.

recepta · 2017-03-30T22:06:37.817Z

My meter most likely calculates it the same way as well. I know it is old style meter with the rotating disk. However, now when I am thinking, in my case I am not sure why I would need grid feed, since I never will be exporting power to the grid.
My Phase A will always be drawing some power. Phase B during sunny periods hopefully be around 0. So my “use” feed is essentially the same as would be a “grid” feed. am I right or I missed something here? Also looking at My Electric, My Solar amd Solar with Divert apps, I do not see them using “grid feed”.

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Robert.Wall · 2017-03-30T23:00:02.177Z

recepta:

I never will be exporting power to the grid.

You might well be correct there, but only because you have a very low power dump load. Had your PV capacity been much greater and you were heating water, it might have been possible that your water had reached maximum temperature before the sun went down, in which case you would need to switch to a different load or export.

“Use” and “Grid” are the same overnight, they are not the same when you are generating (unless you are not counting the diverted power as ‘Use’.)

recepta · 2017-06-02T21:52:06.775Z

Robert.Wall:

Our usual definition is:
“Use” is the power/energy consumed by the house. It is positive by definition.
“Generation ( / Solar)” (usually PV but it could be wind or hydro) is the power/energy from the PV etc infeed. Usually positive during daylight, it can be negative at night because the inverter does consume a small amount of ‘keep-alive’ power.
“Grid” is the power/energy that flows in the connection from the supply authority. We define it as positive when power/energy is imported (Use > PV) and negative when power/energy is exported (PV > Use).

In your case, we would regard “Grid” as the nett sum over both legs of the supply - but bearing in mind what Bill Thomson wrote elsewhere, your meter might charge you for importing on one leg and charge you for exporting on the other leg.

In my feeds, once SOLAR starts to produce energy, my USE feed goes down in value, and get negative at times. Is that a normal behavior? Or should I be calculating USE some how differently? At the moment my USE feed is just addition of Phase A + Phase B.

Robert.Wall · 2017-06-02T22:10:14.022Z

From that, I think what you call “Use” is what we would normally call “Grid” - it is the power into or out of your premises.

If your Phase A & Phase B c.t’s are on the supply side of the point where the PV infeed joins, that is definitely the case and [Phase A + Phase B] = Grid (in our terminology).

So yes, that is normal behaviour for the “grid” connection. In your case, Use will be PV generation (“Solar”) + the quantity you are presently calling Use.

Bill.Thomson · 2017-06-02T22:12:13.432Z

recepta:

At the moment my USE feed is just addition of Phase A + Phase B.

And what you’re calling Phase A and Phase B are referred to by the
US electrical trade as Leg 1 and Leg 2 of a Split-phase system.
i.e there’s only one phase, not two.

recepta · 2017-06-03T00:11:34.835Z

That makes sense, thanks.
Let me see if I can figure out how to add two inputs or feeds to get the real use which is “use+PV”

recepta · 2017-06-06T23:09:41.743Z

I did changed up my feeds, hopefully I did it correctly (feed 1 and 2 will be renamed to grid once I know that I did it correctly):

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