Fronius push exported power with one disconnected inverter

Questions
#1

Hi, have just had a new system installed with 3 strings on 2 Fronius primo inverters - one 12x315W north facing panels and one with 7 west and 8 east. Also have a fronius smart meter to limit export to the 5 kW limit.
Currently the problem is that the EW inverter is in the shed and does not have network access so there is no way to get generation data from it. Solarweb is a bit confused by not knowing the generation of the second inverter, but is showing total grid export and consumption, so I have a good idea of total output. It does usually, but not all the time, show zero power use during power generation - not sure how this works - either it doesn’t know how much self consumption there is and should show no power use at all if there is export, or it does know and should show a small amount of power use all the time…

Anyway, on to PVoutput, I have set up the push (single inverter, meter with &delay=3&auto=1 and logdata) and am getting data ok, but I just see power consumption (which is usually zero during generation) and generation for the single inverter that is connected.
Questions:

  1. until I get the network cable installed to connect the 2nd inverter, is there any way to see the total exported instead of just the single inverter?
  2. Why am I seeing 0 power usage most, but not all of the time while generating? Based on nighttime usage I’d expect about 100-300 W usage during the day.
  3. I’m not 100% sure on the parameters that I should be setting in my push file names. I’ve set auto=1, but it is not clear to me if the meter is sending net or gross data - obviously my actual export to the grid is net (ie I use power from my array and excess is exported to the grid.)

cheers
Badger

#2

Ok, I grabbed some ethernet over power adaptors and have connected the 2nd inverter to the network. Now I’m trying to set up the push for this inverter, but I’m getting an error: “The server is sending no response or is not accessible”
Any ideas on this one?
cheers

Edit: Super, the inverter was set to connect via wifi even though I was actually connecting to it via ethernet. Now seems to be fixed.

#3

If there are two inverter pushing to the same PVOutput System Id then one will overwrite the other.

The consumption calculations won’t be correct if generation data is missing for one of the inverters.

  • Consumption = Generation + Net
  • When generation is lower than net, consumption will be negative, this is shown as 0W on PVOutput.

If there are 0W readings for consumption then it is sending net. The auto=1 setting should be used with 5-minute meter net push, but may not be required if using the more reliable hourly Log Data push. This contains both inverter data + net data since the start of the day.

#4

So how do I push data from both inverters? They are connected to the same smart meter

Yes, I figured this. Now I have the 2nd inverter connected to the network, solarweb has updated to show the actual self consumption during the day. I’d like to do the same with PVoutput, but I’m not really sure how to do this if the inverters will overwrite each other.

Ok, just found https://pvoutput.org/help.html#general-aggregation, will have a try

#5

Ok, have aggregation working.

I set all the pushes up with no flags, since I’m using log data push it should be fine. However as soon as the panels kicked in today, consumption went up - looks like actual usage + export (I’m sure we are not using 3.5kW!). So I set the flag on the meter push to n=1 (since auto won’t work during the day) and now consumption has dropped to 0W which is also not correct - solarweb says we are using about 200W.
Not sure if I’m setting it up wrong or “consumption” actually means “import”

#6

After playing around a bit with the interface, I’ve found the little buttons that change the graph view so I can see “net generation” and see that I do actually have net power usage being reported/calculated. Thanks Bankstownbloke for the tips.

The “consumption” graph is therefore just imported power, and so any self use does not appear on the graph or the columns of data/download for live data. However in the aggregate data (eg Daily) “consumption” includes self usage, and import is a separate column.

Checking these, I’m coming up with large differences between pvoutput and solarweb daily totals:
For example: yesterday both report total generation of 10.8 kWh, but SW shows export of 7.32kWh, PVoutput shows 10.1 kWh. imports 6.63 and 6.33 kWh, and total usage (import + self consumption) of 10.1 and 7.02 kWh.
Something is still configured wrong, so I’m going to have to have a look at my meter at midnight or early in the morning to figure out which (if any) is reporting export/import correctly.

#7

After checking the export/import on my electricity meter a few times, I’m sure that I have something set up wrong, as PVoutput values don’t match the meter or Solarweb outputs:
Yesterday I exported 9.3 kWh to the grid according to my meter. SW shows 9.33 kWh. PVoutput shows 11.31kWh.

Any ideas?

#8

Hard to tell without further information on your setup, how many pushes (meter/inverter/log) have been setup and to which systems and which settings have been applied?

There are many 0W consumption being logged during solar production which suggests the import data reported in the push is not high enough vs export.

#9

I’ve set up aggregation, so I have the following child systems:

  • The North array with pushes: Inverter with no parameters, Meter with &delay=2&auto=1, Logdata with no parameters.
    Seems to show correct generation, but as you state, usage drops to 0W during generation except for some brief periods where usage exceeds generation.
    For 15 jul Gen = 5.826, use =6.759, export = 5.212, import =6.145
  • The EW array with pushes: Inverter with no parameters, Logdata with no parameters.
    EW array shows just generation and no usage (should I also be pushing meter data? It is the same fronius smart meter or should I push the meter data to the parent system?).
    For 15 jul Gen = 6.434, use =0, export = 6.434, import =0
  • These add to the parent system but the values reported are different to the sum of the child systems above:
    For 15 jul parent shows: Gen = 12.26, use =6.736 (6.759 +0), export = 11.311 (5.212+6.434 = 11.646) , import =5.810 (6.145 +0)
  • Solar web reports: Gen = 12.25 (OK), use =9.29 (!), export = 9.33(!), import =6.37(!).

Not sure what settings make a difference in the systems? I went through and set all the tariffs to net and the prices for all three systems.
In advanced settings, Net power calculations and net power tracking are enabled. Net method was set to average, have changed to instantaneous.
cheers

#10

Pushing net data to child systems then aggregating that to the parent won’t work as the net data is already calculated to gross before it is summed to the parent.

The LogData should be pushed to the parent, but unfortunately it also contains inverter data and will overwrite any aggregated inverter data.

Currently the LogData pushes records both meter and inverter data, this may work for your setup if the service is updated to process either inverter or meter

i.e.

  1. Child A - LogData inverter only
  2. Child B - LogData inverter only
  3. Parent - LogData meter only

This will then calculate total net using the sum of inverters.

#11

Yes, I take your point, that would explain the slight differences between the child with the meter data and the parent - the parent is not accounting for the times when there is both import and export in the same 5 minute interval.

This doesn’t explain why the child with the meter data shows 0W most of the time during generation though? The other child is not reporting any meter data.

I guess the net>gross summing problem can be sorted by pushing inverter data only to the child systems and pushing the meter data to the parent system id, and not pushing log data at all? I’ve changed to this setup and we will see how it works today…

Or can a flag can be set on the logdata push to just push inverter data to one id (child) and then have another service with another flag to push meter data to the other (parent) id? I can’t see anything in the help that might apply.

thanks for looking at this issue!

#12

Pushing LogData will always take both inverter and meter and overwrite any existing data.

A possible setup using the current functionality -

  1. Child A - LogData Push, Inverter Push
  2. Child B - LogData Push, Inverter Push
  3. Parent - Meter Push (auto=1)

On both children set Aggregate Mode to Solar, this means the parent will only add up generation data.

image

Pushing the net meter data to the parent will allow the net data to be calculated with the total generation.

#13

Ok have this set up, let’s see how it goes tomorrow.
thanks

Edit: 0730: Not looking good so far. Just started solar production, but the parent has no usage data at all, or sometimes when I refresh has a single point (energy used). Doesn’t show any of the power use this morning, although this does show up in the child system from the log data, I’m expecting this to read self consumption during production as before.

#14

Something not working, the meter data is not getting to the parent system at all. Well maybe a little - I did see some power usage data appear yesterday but then when I refreshed it disappeared. Nothing at all today, although the child system shows power usage from the log data.
Not sure why I’m not seeing it.
upload file name is /service/r2/froniuspost.jsp? sid=Parent_sid&key=APIkey&auto=1

any more ideas?

edit: After looking at the settings, I’ve set aggregation data for parent to solar only too, looks like that might have fixed it, as some usage data has appeared. Possibly the parent was reading power usage data as zero from the child systems and overwriting the meter data?

#15

Looks like we are getting usage data on the parent system. Doesn’t quite match with solarweb - looks like there are a few data points at 0 W usage, possibly due to missing data, although I would have expected no data rather than 0 W if that were the case.

#16

The pushes are being received each 5-minutes so there isn’t any missing data, the 0W is due to the import/export data received not aligning with the aggregated generation reported.

We will add some additional debugging over the next few days to see where the problem is. Please leave push configuration as-is for now.