I think most of the automation people use is related to spot pricing for grid prices and avoiding/delaying power heavy activities (e g. running the dishwasher or drier, charging the ev, etc) until there’s enough reserve in the battery or the panels are generating enough power (or projected to) to cover it.
You could optimize the charge rate under consideration on the sun forecast. Goal is then to get the target storage capacity (100% or maybe less) in the evening when the sun goes down. This could reduce the ageing of the battery because you don’t charge with high currents and you have the 100% state only for a short time. Also, if you know that you dont need the whole capacity in the following night you could stop charging at e.g. 80%. Also this could reduce the ageing of the battery when it’s possible to stay between 20% and 80% of the possible storage capacity.
first off - PV optimization:
I use the SolarForecast - Bindings | openHAB binding to get estimates on how much energy my PV is going to generate over the day.
I also do have devices, which can be directly controled: Wallbox, heat pump, whirlpool, dish washer, washer, …
So I constantly probe for my devices, which request energy:
did anyone start a washer (on a simple Wifi outlet)
Is a car connected to the wallbox and how much energy does it need for it to load to xx% SoC
do I need the heat pump for warm water or heating
do i need to heat the whirlpool
how much energy is needed to load the battery for the night
…
I then combine the demand of all those devices with the estimated yield of my PV and plan accordingly, meaning starting the devices if there’s enough power coming through.
second: dynamic pricing
So, and I also combine this with my dynamic pricing for grid energy, which adds another layer of complexity. So I price the PV yield with a virtual price and compare that with the grid prices to change energy source or let devices run.
more complexity
You could also add to the complexity little things like set (dis-)charging limits on the battery or even load the battery from grid, if dynamic prices are cheap enough, etc.
I do that with a bunch of rules and configuration items to achieve exactly the outcome I want for my home. There’s a bunch of “Energy Management Systems” available, both openSource and commercial. There’s even one based on openHAB from stormi.
I have. Dual inverter configuration with Grid backup/fail over
I second the use of SolarForecast (using Forecast Solar from that because it has morning and evening damping which is important because of my location relating to a mountain and to a late rising sun.)
I also make use of rules to turn off items like kettle, microwave if turned on during periods of high consumption by car chargers because otherwise i fail to grid and I don’t want that (i can wait for tea as alexa will tell me as openhab turns it off
Importantly with knowing the consumption individual items i can make decisions about what to run at the same time because limits of the system.
i also estimate the charge completion of my batteries based on current load so on those days or periods with less solar yield i can get my batteries (more) charged than without info.
Also with forecasting i can make the decision do i charge car today or tomorrow (or next two days) and how does it relate to other household items like dishwasher, washing machine and oven.
This is interesting. Do you do this automatically or is it manual action?
Up to now I had a ferraris meter that rotated back and it was read once a year, but few days ago the utility replaced it with smart meter so I am thinking of how to optimize my users (EV, heat pump, boiler…) based on the solar production but also important is without losing comfort.
That’s in my rules. Basically I know, what each device will request for a run (e.g. dish washer 1,2kWh over 3:15h) and I use SolareForecast, when the best time would be.
For EV I use evcc - Solar Charging ☀️🚘 - Connects Your EV Charger With Your PV System - give it a try. I do change the mode of evcc via openHAB from off to pv or so.
