Adding more solar panels to an existing SolarEdge system

[scrambler]

I have been using the Emporia for a year now, and Its Grid Import / export CTs are tracking PG&E report by a couple of percent. They also track the grid Import export CTs of the Solar system (both sets are on the same wires side by side).

It is important to initialize the system properly, so it automatically detects which CTs are on L1 and which are on L2, and not to change them afterwards.

If you need more CTs, you can get more units and set them up as parent child, just don't use the 200A CTs on the child unit.

One thing I keep waiting for, is for them to enable Bidirectional reporting from the small CTs that are on Solar breakers, so I can record my Hybrid inverter properly when it charges the battery.

[warx]

Oh good to know the 50A CTs don't track both directions... Gotta get that K<->L the right way for mine. Oh but wait - that also means my whole setup of the 50A on the StorEdge is not working then. That has both grid->battery, grid-> sub-panels but also PV->grid. I guess the ultimate/only truth is visiting my utility portal (opower from PGE) for a day old report.

[Ampster]

Oh good to know the 50A CTs don't track both directions... Gotta get that K<->L the right way for mine. Oh but wait - that also means my whole setup of the 50A on the StorEdge is not working then. That has both grid->battery, grid-> sub-panels but also PV->grid. I guess the ultimate/only truth is visiting my utility portal (opower from PGE) for a day old report.

That is why I did not put the CTs on the subpanel in which my solar goes through. As I mentioned, I bought the self powered CTs for the main panel so I could fit them around the two wires each for L1 and L2. Then I put the smaller CTs on individual loads in both subpanels, doubling up some where the loads were not significant. Later I moved some around and that it probably why I occasionally see unaccounted for loads. The daily Net consumption off the two main CTs corresponds with my PGE daily reports from their website.

[scrambler]

Oh good to know the 50A CTs don't track both directions... Gotta get that K<->L the right way for mine. Oh but wait - that also means my whole setup of the 50A on the StorEdge is not working then. That has both grid->battery, grid-> sub-panels but also PV->grid. I guess the ultimate/only truth is visiting my utility portal (opower from PGE) for a day old report.

The frustrating part is that from what they said, the 50A CTs can track both directions, but that is not handled by the SW for now...

[Ampster]

I did go to the Emporia user forum and got the answer for my question about a three wire circuit (L1 & L2 with shared neutral). If I want to measure both legs I need to reverse one of the legs through the CT so the magnetic flux will not cancel. .

[warx]

Interesting that it looks like IotaWatt supports bi-directional 100A sub circuits - which would be much better for mixing solar/battery circuits in there. Gets spendy but may be able to use the Emporia CTs.

Now I finally have my My SolarEdge App configured to monitor it shows exporting when it is actually just passing grid power to the sub-panels. This throws off all the charting as I see this on the Production chart as Export but Solar Production is zero at least.
e.g. at night I saw 0.5kW exported to grid whereas the Emporia showed 0.5kW coming in from the grid, passing to the EnergyHub, and passing to the backed-up loads (the sub-panels). Oh well.

[Ampster]

Are you using external CTs for that monitoring? It sounds like some CTs need to be reconfigured or reversed. Start with your utility meter to get a fix on which way power is actually flowing.

[warx]

The utility meter 200A circuit measures fine bidirectionally (green for export, blue for consume etc.). The problem is that I have a 100A circuit off the main panel to the storedge solar system. So this is birectional too - most of the house consumes through the storedge so it's sourcing from grid, solar, and/or battery. However when solar is exporting it uses this same circuit to push back to the main panel. So two issues for Vue - first it's 100A (exceeding the 50A CTs which can handle 63A) second it can be either direction. Previous system was plain solar (no backup interface) so was unidirectional export only. I suspect if Emporia fixed the software my load would rarely get over 50A since all the big stuff in the house bypasses this altogether (and does not get backed up).

[scrambler]

The only way to deal with that properly right now would be to use a separate Vue for the 100A circuit, using its 200A CTs on the 100A lines, so you can record bidirectional data there.
But you would have to combine data from the two Vues manually in an Excel sheet.