SolarEdge battery profile switching by owner (privileges)

Collapse
X
 
  • Time
  • Show
Clear All
new posts
  • warx
    Junior Member
    • Jan 2022
    • 25

    SolarEdge battery profile switching by owner (privileges)

    Hi,
    I have a SolarEdge 7600 energy-hub, backup interface and two RESU 9.8 (although only one works) and 7.3kW of panels. My battery profile is not visible or controllable by me. I have the minimal privileges in My Solar Edge/online. It's set to keep topping to 100% which must be stressing it somewhat and I would like to be able to switch between a longevity profile (~80%) and a backup mode (100%) manually.
    I feel like my installers are in the way of me asking SolarEdge if this feature is something that can be enabled without being granted full "installer" privileges. Would SolarEdge even take my request? Who governs what I can do in this situation?
    Cheers.
  • soby
    Solar Fanatic
    • Mar 2019
    • 121

    #2
    I have the StorEdge inverter so there may be some differences but it should be fundamentally similar. You should be able to see all of the tabs below when you have full access. You can use the admin tab to get to "Energy Manager" and choose from MSC, Backup, Disable, SolarEdge Profiles or Account Profiles.

    Admin.png

    To really control what the battery is doing, you'll need to be able to create account profiles and that's where SolarEdge makes it really difficult. To make custom profiles, you need to have an installer account which isn't difficult to do. You can't convert your existing account so you need to reregister with another email address and register as an installer.

    From here you have two choices:
    1) Sign a form with SolarEdge taking over complete ownership of your system away from your installer.
    2) Have your installer add you as an authorized account on your system. This essentially adds you to their account like you are an employee but you only access to your own system.

    I have the second choice above because my installer added my installer account to their system and gave me access. Any time you make chances to the battery manager, there is a warning message telling you that you are responsible for screwing up your battery if your changes cause any issues.

    Tread lightly.

    Comment

    • warx
      Junior Member
      • Jan 2022
      • 25

      #3
      Thank you. I see the bare minimum tabs - not even the Layout and have asked my installers for that to no avail. It's a shame they dont do individual privileges or at least one consumer level up from basic "Look! Here's a pretty picture and a number). I wish I'd stuck with the waiting list for the AC coupled Powerwall despite being inferior just so I could have some control.

      Comment

      • soby
        Solar Fanatic
        • Mar 2019
        • 121

        #4
        I went through a similar buyer’s remorse phase when I discovered how unfriendly the SolarEdge battery control interface is to homeowners. SolarEdge flat out does not want to deal with homeowners. Unless you identify as an installer, support wont even talk to you.

        I can understand why to some degree. Most homeowners don’t know what they are doing and, if they aren’t careful, can screw everything up. With that said, it is possible to take full control. It’s just prohibitively hard.

        What is your installer labor warranty? Are they ignoring your requests for more access because they just don’t know how to give it? I had to send a link to the exact procedure that my installer had to follow to give me full access. I also don’t have a warranty of any kind through my installer (long story) so they didn’t have any concerns that I would screw something up and expect them to fix it.

        It is worth the battle though. I have a custom TOU profile that is intended to minimize the degradation on my battery while still maximizing solar energy produced and backup capabilities. Since my system was installed, the SolarEdge app now lets you easily change the backup reserve setting in case there is a storm threatening.

        Comment

        • warx
          Junior Member
          • Jan 2022
          • 25

          #5
          I usually request from my installers and never hear back. I do have a good warranty (labor included) so ultimately don't want to risk that. Just seems like there should be something inbetween full assumption of ownership/abandoning of 20yr warranty and a fixed choice of profiles.

          I wont expect a response from my Solaredge email request then. I do have a degree in electrical and electronic engineering if that would sway them! Perhaps I'll really lean on my installers as I did give then $55k after all. If I could keep the warranty with a waiver of if I do something detrimental.

          Comment

          • soby
            Solar Fanatic
            • Mar 2019
            • 121

            #6
            This was the email I sent to get my installer going.
            Good Morning,
            I would like to implement more granular control of when the battery is charged/discharged by setting up Time-of-Use (TOU) profiles and the only way to accomplish this is with Admin access through the monitoring portal as shown here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mkFmLqIKwec.

            The following document details how to add an "Account Manager" with Admin access to only a specific site: https://www.solaredge.com/sites/defa...an_account.pdf. The relevant section is shown below. Make sure to NOT check "Allowed for all sites" because I don't want access to all the sites you administer... only my own.

            Account Manager.png


            Thanks,
            Soby

            Again, you need to create a new installer account on the SolarEdge site using a new email address (the old one can't be converted). Provide that email address to your installer when you make this request.

            You could also ask for your installer to just make the battery profile changes instead. I'm not sure why your second battery isn't working or whether or not the batteries are completely owned by you (although for $55K, I hope they are!). Does your utility company require they be configured in a certain way? Do you have Time of Use pricing from your utility? What exactly do you want the batteries to be doing?

            Comment

            • jc95
              Junior Member
              • Sep 2015
              • 11

              #7
              Resurrecting this thread from earlier this year... I have a SE7600H inverter and am considering installing batteries (probably also SE) soon. I've been going back and forth with the installer trying to get administrator/root/installer/superuser/whatever it's called access. They've granted "Full Access" to my user account. That's not what I'm looking for. With just the inverter, there's not much that I really want to do, but if I add batteries, I want control over what battery profiles are in effect at any time without relying on the installer (who I suspect will become substantially less interested in making changes for me after the contract is closed out).

              I've sent them the instructions I've found online about how to add an Acct Manager user with access only to my site (uncheck the "allowed for all sites" box and add just my site). They tried this with a test account and report that the account gets access to their entire fleet. Any ideas what's going on and what they might be doing wrong?

              Another path might be that I have a SE self-installer account. I can see my site but can't do anything other than the "full access" user stuff to the site. I can, however, create acct manager users and also sub-installers. But I have no sites to give them access to, so I can't really test the behavior. I could probably have the install contract relinquish control to me, but I suspect they would then walk away from any warranty issues. Is there some way to leverage my install acct, maybe by linking to them as a sub-installer? I'm not sure what the difference is between a sub-installer and an account manager user.

              I cannot user setapp. If I try to add the QR code to my install acct, I get an error that it's already registered to the installer. As I would expect.

              I don't know if it matters that I'm in California PG&E on a NEM2 tariff and maybe there's some PG&E rule that prevents homeowners from configuring their batteries.

              Comment

              • soby
                Solar Fanatic
                • Mar 2019
                • 121

                #8
                Keep in mind that you will need the backup interface to use your inverter with batteries.

                Unfortunately, "Account Manager" access does indirectly give me access to every other site that my installer is responsible for even though it shouldn't. It's not in my "Site List" but I can access all the sites through "My Account" --> "Site List". Honestly, I didn't expect them to grant me this access back in 2020 and I was ready to assume all responsibility for the system if they refused to grant the access since I don't have a warranty though them. They have since gone out of business anyway and I still have access to all the orphaned sites.

                Comment

                • jc95
                  Junior Member
                  • Sep 2015
                  • 11

                  #9
                  A BIU is part of the plan.

                  If an AMgr with an unchecked "allow access for all" still allows access for all sites, that seems like a bug, no? Is there any situation (other roles, maybe) where unchecked actually works as might be expected?

                  Since they don't want their other customers exposed to me and I wouldn't want the liability in any case, is there a solution to this other than to yanking the system over to me? I really just want to configure my own storage profiles. I don't know what their default is, but I suspect it's probably MSC all day, every day.

                  Comment

                  • soby
                    Solar Fanatic
                    • Mar 2019
                    • 121

                    #10
                    ​​
                    Originally posted by jc95
                    A BIU is part of the plan.

                    If an AMgr with an unchecked "allow access for all" still allows access for all sites, that seems like a bug, no? Is there any situation (other roles, maybe) where unchecked actually works as might be expected?

                    Since they don't want their other customers exposed to me and I wouldn't want the liability in any case, is there a solution to this other than to yanking the system over to me? I really just want to configure my own storage profiles. I don't know what their default is, but I suspect it's probably MSC all day, every day.
                    I did some poking around since my installer is no more and I can't really get myself in trouble. As you can see below, I am setup as an "Account Admin" which seems like a huge mistake. Nevertheless, the "Allow for all sites" is unchecked and I only have full access to my own site. However, there is literally nothing stopping me from checking that box and getting full access to all 647 sites. Based on the Role descriptions, maybe my correct role would be Account Manager but that may strip me of the ability to create battery "Storage Profiles". I can play around with it some more later tonight but I have to be careful not to do something that kills my access.

                    Early on I would change storage profiles a lot more because you couldn't change the backup reserve from the app. With that ability more readily available, I have the same battery storage profile of "charge from clipped solar" during the day with MSC discharge overnight. The only time I would ever consider changing storage profiles is if I can foresee a power outage coming but there is no sun to charge up the battery. In that scenario, I have a storage profile that allows the battery to charge from the grid. I have only used this for 3 hours in 3 years.

                    Capture.JPG

                    Comment

                    • jc95
                      Junior Member
                      • Sep 2015
                      • 11

                      #11
                      If you have Acct Admin, can you create another user with another role (like Acct Mgr) and see what they can & can't see & do?

                      I confirmed with my installer that they set everyone to MSC 24x7x365 and just leave it. I think the other users probably don't know or care that there are other profiles available. The installer said they would make an individual profile change for $300 each.

                      Comment

                      • Iniadan
                        Junior Member
                        • Dec 2022
                        • 3

                        #12
                        I had a SolarEdge SE6000H inverter with 20 panels, StorEdge interface and an LG RESU10H battery installed by a local installer here in Cardiff, UK at the beginning of Nov 22.

                        I had read about the problems mentioned above re: owners having trouble getting access to configure time of use profiles for the StorEdge / battery. In my case though, they were easy to resolve. SolarEdge support were very helpful and a lot more helpful than I was worried they might be, based on the descriptions above.

                        In the end I decided to take full control of my site myself i.e. transfer it away from my installer to a new "self installer" account I created. SolarEdge did that for me within a couple of hours, so now I have full access to Energy Manager / Time of Use profiles etc.

                        My installer was pretty relaxed about me doing this. SolarEdge sent me a PDF of how I could give my installer access again once I had taken full control using the "associated accounts" feature which works a bit like friends on Facebook - I invite my installer via my new self installer account, they accept, once they've accepted I can give them read or read / write access to my site. I gave them read access, I think my installer wanted it because it helps with prospective new customers if they can show the figures for sites they installed etc.

                        There didn't seem to me be to be much of an issue with warranty. For the costly components - the warranty on the inverter (12 years) is with SolarEdge, the warranty on the battery (10 years) is with LG. In neither case do I need the original installer to make a warranty claim. On the other hand, if my inverter fails, what I'll get from SolarEdge is a new inverter in a box. Then I'll need to find an electrician to swap the dead one out for the new one, but that's a quick job, an hour or two of work, shouldn't be too costly?

                        SolarEdge did tell me they are modifying the MySolarEdge (owner) app to make it so the owner can control time of use profiles directly from the app. They offered to add me to the "beta" for this but in the end being a technical type I preferred to take full control.

                        They were very happy also to answer a couple of questions I had e.g. why does my LG battery only charge at 2kW when there is 5kW available from panels, whereas back in Nov it did sometimes charge from panels at the full 5kW. Answer - weather is cold right now, battery is in my garage, battery's charge controller restricts max charge rate for safety / to prolong life of battery when battery is cold (recommended temp for battery is above 15C but will work right down to -10, I guess with restrictions)

                        Also I asked, why do the blue self-consumption figures sometimes disappear from MySolarEdge. Answer - they are only there if you spend the whole day on max self-consumption. They go away if you switch to time of use profile.

                        All in all I'm very happy with the SolarEdge solution I bought and their support could not have been more helpful.

                        Here in UK there is one supplier (Octopus) offering a time of use tariff. It's not very attractive right now due to war in Ukraine / sky high gas prices etc. but when energy market settles down I'm hoping to be able to make use of battery time of use functions to use a tariff like this and use battery to power through the expensive early evening peak.


                        Comment

                        • soby
                          Solar Fanatic
                          • Mar 2019
                          • 121

                          #13
                          Greetings from across the pond. Congrats on your new system.

                          Originally posted by Iniadan
                          SolarEdge did tell me they are modifying the MySolarEdge (owner) app to make it so the owner can control time of use profiles directly from the app. They offered to add me to the "beta" for this but in the end being a technical type I preferred to take full control.
                          I've wanted this ability for years now. I'm glad they are working on it.

                          Originally posted by Iniadan
                          Also I asked, why do the blue self-consumption figures sometimes disappear from MySolarEdge. Answer - they are only there if you spend the whole day on max self-consumption. They go away if you switch to time of use profile.
                          I asked them about this a few years ago and got the same answer. I call this a bug. There's no reason why it can't still report self-consumption.

                          What does the battery tab of the app look like for you? I recently lost the ability to adjust my "Backup Reserve" amount using a slider. I have a service ticket submitted but haven't heard back regarding why it went away. IMG_1717.PNG

                          Comment

                          • Iniadan
                            Junior Member
                            • Dec 2022
                            • 3

                            #14
                            Originally posted by soby
                            Greetings from across the pond. Congrats on your new system.
                            Many thanks!


                            Originally posted by soby
                            I've wanted this ability for years now. I'm glad they are working on it.
                            One of the support engineers I "spoke" with on Whatsapp called it an "Alpha" (i.e. further away from release than a Beta) so I wonder when they'll be releasing it.

                            When I was experimenting with the storage profiles in the admin web interface (below), it struck me what a complex interface this is. It's very fully featured - you can have different named profiles on different days of the week, different times of year with "special" days which are exceptions. Each profile can switch between 5 or 6 different modes on a timetable, and you probably need to read the application note to understand fully what each mode does. I think it won't be trivial to turn it into something that's easy for end users to do on a phone.

                            storprofile.jpg

                            My battery tab in MySolarEdge doesn't show any backup settings etc. (below) I think that's because my setup (SE6000H inverter, StorEdge and battery) can't be used for backup i.e. it won't work if grid power fails.

                            I think that's a regulatory restriction here in UK (and elsewhere in Europe). To have battery backup here I think an extra component is needed which will isolate the house completely from the grid, the idea is to protect engineers working on failed elements of the local grid nearby which they expect to be powered down, but unbeknown to them it is being energised by my battery / inverter. I think this may be different (less restrictions) in USA, no need for the isolating component?

                            Screenshot_2022-12-07-18-41-29-45_c9cd3d70baa8e2f6f50c767617a09056.jpg

                            Comment

                            • Srrndhound
                              Member
                              • Sep 2022
                              • 46

                              #15
                              Originally posted by Iniadan
                              My battery tab in MySolarEdge doesn't show any backup settings etc. (below) I think that's because my setup (SE6000H inverter, StorEdge and battery) can't be used for backup i.e. it won't work if grid power fails.

                              I think that's a regulatory restriction here in UK (and elsewhere in Europe). To have battery backup here I think an extra component is needed which will isolate the house completely from the grid, the idea is to protect engineers working on failed elements of the local grid nearby which they expect to be powered down, but unbeknown to them it is being energised by my battery / inverter. I think this may be different (less restrictions) in USA, no need for the isolating component? ]
                              Here in the US, we do need an isolating component. Besides the inverter, my SolarEdge system has a backup interface (BI-EUSGN-01) which has a transfer relay inside to disconnect from the grid when it goes down -- redirecting the PV and battery power to my home's power panel. The unit also prevents the PV output from reconnecting to the grid until a certain time after it recovers to let it stabilize. Just taking a quick look at their UK website, I'd guess the BI-EU3P Home Backup Interface would be the unit to look at, but not sure. Your friendly installer can easily confirm. Do you have a system diagram we can see?

                              SolarEdge 12.3kWp grid-tie, 19.4kWh, SW Idaho

                              Comment

                              Working...