SolarEdge battery profile switching by owner (privileges)

[warx]

I am pretty pissed off with LG ESS to be honest. We have two non-prime RESU 10 - our installer installed two primaries by mistake and we have been waiting for over a year for a "secondary" to replace the 2nd. Now they are discontinued! - so we now have a 260lb, $12,000 (w/ installation) paper-weight hanging on our wall. What a terrible terrible engineering FU by LG to embed the primary/secondary thing in hardware and not a simple DIP switch or firmware setting and then to not support these batteries that are not even 3 years old! Hate LG now. Basically if there's any problem with them they are disposable despite the "warranty"

[chronos432]

I am pretty pissed off with LG ESS to be honest. We have two non-prime RESU 10 - our installer installed two primaries by mistake and we have been waiting for over a year for a "secondary" to replace the 2nd. Now they are discontinued! - so we now have a 260lb, $12,000 (w/ installation) paper-weight hanging on our wall. What a terrible terrible engineering FU by LG to embed the primary/secondary thing in hardware and not a simple DIP switch or firmware setting and then to not support these batteries that are not even 3 years old! Hate LG now. Basically if there's any problem with them they are disposable despite the "warranty"

I confirmed with my installer (who has recently installed a couple of the LG PRIME batteries) that now there is a DIP switch right on the battery to switch between master and slave (or "Primary Batt/Secondary Batt" they call it now).

That really stinks that you are stuck with an outdated version that cannot be supported. I would definitely be pissed off too. What has the installer done to rectify?

[chronos432]

Mine is set to maximize self consumption. It runs off Solar until about 4:30 pm, and then transitions to battery. I have a 16kwh LG, with reserve set to 20% (so it’ll use around 12.8 kWh, if fully charged) and at this time of year, with the load that I have, it’ll run off battery until around anywhere from midnight (if using my home theater ) to early in the morning.

For example, Monday was a good day and this is the production (green), consumption (red), and self-consumption (purple):

688791FF-64C6-43FA-B9EA-1CACA3857EBC.png
Almost a full 24 hours coverage.

I don’t have installer access, so I can’t create any profiles or complex setups (I saw some video where a guy in Europe has profiles for different seasons and events - not sure if that is available here in the US).

Also, there is Weather Guard, which, when enabled and there is an upcoming storm forecasted, it will not use the battery, when solar production stops. Essentially disabling the self consumption.

darkskies Thanks so much for the info! that's great to see. Question - is this profile basically set permanently?

For you and others including soby is it possible to MANUALLY switch to "Maximize Self Consumption" mode at random times under my control, NOT on a fixed schedule? Is this possible through the app or would I have to manually do this through the installer admin portal?

Second question - if battery level falls to reserve, is it possible to have it automatically switch back to "Charge with solar power"? Obviously it is going to go back to drawing from the grid until it charges up again, but the behavior I would want in my situation is for it to switch back to "Charge with solar power" until I want to have it in "Maximize Self-Consumption" again. Not a big deal if this is not possible, just wondering.

[darkskies]

darkskies Thanks so much for the info! that's great to see. Question - is this profile basically set permanently?

For you and others including soby is it possible to MANUALLY switch to "Maximize Self Consumption" mode at random times under my control, NOT on a fixed schedule? Is this possible through the app or would I have to manually do this through the installer admin portal?

There's no user accessible control for me, other than setting the reserve level 10-100%, and turning on/off weather guard. The behavior is predefined. If solar, use that for load, battery charge, and sending to grid. If battery above reserve, use that. Otherwise use grid. In the morning, with battery at reserve (20%), it will run on grid, until solar available of which it would provide load to house and start charging battery with excess. Some days you can see this, with production > 7.6 kw and it is charging the battery.

For example:

IMG_B8D1467B658F-1.jpeg

Second question - if battery level falls to reserve, is it possible to have it automatically switch back to "Charge with solar power"? Obviously it is going to go back to drawing from the grid until it charges up again, but the behavior I would want in my situation is for it to switch back to "Charge with solar power" until I want to have it in "Maximize Self-Consumption" again. Not a big deal if this is not possible, just wondering.

Hopefully, my diagram above answers your question (if not, please rephrase). With mine, with max self-consumption, it prioritizes using the battery, and re-charging the battery, over sending to grid.

HTHs

[warx]

I confirmed with my installer (who has recently installed a couple of the LG PRIME batteries) that now there is a DIP switch right on the battery to switch between master and slave (or "Primary Batt/Secondary Batt" they call it now).

That really stinks that you are stuck with an outdated version that cannot be supported. I would definitely be pissed off too. What has the installer done to rectify?

Well, trying to resolve - it's been so long and now totally dependent on their goodwill. Maybe get them to install a single PRIME 16 in place of two "old" 10s or maybe get money back for one 10 and make do with 10kWh.

[darkskies]

Wishing you the best on resolution. I've hit a similar situation with the generator integration, relying on my installer to install a ATS as a stop gap for integration, so at least we have whole house backup. It's a tough situation to be in. I feel your pain. Let us know how you make out.

[soby]

One thing that I'd like feedback on from one of you who has batteries, is whether or not I could easily switch to only battery consumption at certain times of the night. I have a high end stereo system that will probably benefit from running off batteries instead of the noisy grid, and part of the promise of the system is to be able to switch manually to battery consumption.

You're thinking of a UPS and these inverter/battery combinations are not that. If you have high end electronics that you want to protect from power surges from the grid, you put a quality UPS between your equipment and the wall outlet. I have several small UPSs around the house for critical electronics like desktop computers, TVs and home network equipment to keep them protected regardless of what is going on with the grid.

For you and others including soby is it possible to MANUALLY switch to "Maximize Self Consumption" mode at random times under my control, NOT on a fixed schedule? Is this possible through the app or would I have to manually do this through the installer admin portal?

SolarEdge certainly advertise this capability in the app here: https://www.solaredge.com/en/product...ls/mysolaredge but I have seen that. Similar to darkskies, The only thing that app allows me to change is Backup Reserve value via a slider and Weather Guard. That may be because I'm on the older StorEdge platform but there's no way to know for sure. The only way for me to switch between storage profiles and MSC is via the admin tab of the web interface.

Second question - if battery level falls to reserve, is it possible to have it automatically switch back to "Charge with solar power"? Obviously it is going to go back to drawing from the grid until it charges up again, but the behavior I would want in my situation is for it to switch back to "Charge with solar power" until I want to have it in "Maximize Self-Consumption" again. Not a big deal if this is not possible, just wondering.

Maximize Self-Consumption (MSC) is exactly that: battery will get first priority to charge from solar power until 100% full and then prevent grid import of power until battery drops to reserve setting. It is very rare (and may be illegal if battery cost was included in 30% federal tax credit) for battery to ever charge from the grid. There is a "Backup only" setting in the web interface that will charge the battery from the grid and only discharge when the grid goes down. You can also create a custom storage profile that allows the battery to charge from the grid and switch to that manually.

[chronos432]

You're thinking of a UPS and these inverter/battery combinations are not that. If you have high end electronics that you want to protect from power surges from the grid, you put a quality UPS between your equipment and the wall outlet. I have several small UPSs around the house for critical electronics like desktop computers, TVs and home network equipment to keep them protected regardless of what is going on with the grid.



SolarEdge certainly advertise this capability in the app here: https://www.solaredge.com/en/product...ls/mysolaredge but I have seen that. Similar to darkskies, The only thing that app allows me to change is Backup Reserve value via a slider and Weather Guard. That may be because I'm on the older StorEdge platform but there's no way to know for sure. The only way for me to switch between storage profiles and MSC is via the admin tab of the web interface.



Maximize Self-Consumption (MSC) is exactly that: battery will get first priority to charge from solar power until 100% full and then prevent grid import of power until battery drops to reserve setting. It is very rare (and may be illegal if battery cost was included in 30% federal tax credit) for battery to ever charge from the grid. There is a "Backup only" setting in the web interface that will charge the battery from the grid and only discharge when the grid goes down. You can also create a custom storage profile that allows the battery to charge from the grid and switch to that manually.

Thanks soby ! I meant above that the HOUSE will be drawing from the grid, not battery from grid. Not really interested in that.

Yeah, my stereo system eats too much power to be on a UPS. The idea here for sound quality is to be mostly or entirely locally powered from the inverter/battery combo (this is controversial whether or not it should make a difference, for me the proof is whether the audio sounds better and has lower perceived background noise levels). I have a whole house surge protector installed, this is NOT due to concern for power surges, solely audio quality due to increased "power quality".

Thank you for confirming that the only way to do this, until SE gets this up, is from the admin tab of the web interface!

[darkskies]

I use a WattBox with UPS, surge, and line conditioning for all my sensitive electronics (not the amps, though, which just have surge protection).

[Srrndhound]

Yeah, my stereo system eats too much power to be on a UPS.

Usually power amps are not essential to be on UPS unless the goal is to have uninterrupted playback during a power disruption. Most important for UPS are things with computer chips, spinning drives (optical or HDD), and lamp-based video projectors. Get enough UPS to allow controlled shut down / cooling and the gear is protected.

I have a whole house surge protector installed, this is NOT due to concern for power surges, solely audio quality due to increased "power quality".

A surge protector's only quality improvement is in the form of limiting extreme grid voltages that exceed the device's clamping limit. That might save a component's life, but it will otherwise do nothing for sound quality.

[toofargone]

Hopefully, my diagram above answers your question (if not, please rephrase). With mine, with max self-consumption, it prioritizes using the battery, and re-charging the battery, over sending to grid.

HTHs

Thanks for posting the screenshot, darkskies. This is the first time I have definitive evidence that my battery is NOT discharging properly under the "Maximize Self-Consumption" profile setting. For me, the battery just dumps the power at inverter max all at once until it hits reserve. It doesn't power the house through the evening >.<

IMG_0268.jpg

[chronos432]

Thanks for posting the screenshot, darkskies. This is the first time I have definitive evidence that my battery is NOT discharging properly under the "Maximize Self-Consumption" profile setting. For me, the battery just dumps the power at inverter max all at once until it hits reserve. It doesn't power the house through the evening >.<

IMG_0268.jpg

Is it going back into the grid? Power has to be going somewhere and not just being dissipated as heat…
or your house is more power hungry than you realize? Assume not the latter.

[soby]

Thanks for posting the screenshot, darkskies. This is the first time I have definitive evidence that my battery is NOT discharging properly under the "Maximize Self-Consumption" profile setting. For me, the battery just dumps the power at inverter max all at once until it hits reserve. It doesn't power the house through the evening &gt;.&lt;

Depending on your afternoon consumption, that may not be incorrect. Can you post consumption chart too? This is what my chart looks like on a day with utility demand response when the battery dumps power to the grid starting at 4pm until I hit the battery minimum (~15%).

78998CE7-F3FF-41E4-A3DB-DD5B81A4FAF5.png

[chronos432]

Depending on your afternoon consumption, that may not be incorrect. Can you post consumption chart too? This is what my chart looks like on a day with utility demand response when the battery dumps power to the grid starting at 4pm until I hit the battery minimum (~15%).

78998CE7-F3FF-41E4-A3DB-DD5B81A4FAF5.png

soby Yours isn't set to MSC right (maximize self consumption)? If I understand MSC correctly it should NOT be exporting to the grid from the battery. We have no TOU rates in Maine and it's net metering so I would never want to export to grid from the battery...

Thanks!

[darkskies]

It would be good to see your consumption toofargone . For me, my consumption in the evening is around 0.75-1.25kWh typically (except when running my home theater, then it is up to 2.5kwH for a few hours ). With my 16 kwh LG, I have about 12.8kwh, so I see it lasting anywhere from 10pm to 4-6am the next morning. Now granted, we're having lots of sun right now, so great generation, and low load (as heat is off). Battery gives great output:

IMG_2052.PNG

However, back in January, I only had the battery set to deplete down to 80% capacity, and would see it drop right down, due to the load. So, it would be good to see how much you are consuming to see if actually consuming or if it is being fed to grid.