Power Consumption Monitoring

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#2518045 6-Jul-2020 15:43

Well I can't recommend my Kickstarter project 'ecoisme' https://www.ecoisme.com/ecoisme-ceased-trading

Yet another crowdfunding project that I backed that never delivered, or delivered https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CX8LR74Z3_U a rubbish result.

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sdavisnz

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#2518087 6-Jul-2020 15:48

Damn that sucks, I had a look at sense, the American one that is 300usd. I can't quite stomach that.

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neb

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#2518089 6-Jul-2020 15:52

sdavisnz: Hi all, any updates on home energy monitoring products?

Still happy with my Flukso after five-odd years of use.

jpwise

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#2518095 6-Jul-2020 16:17

I'm similarly still using the Smappee after repairing it back in Jan-2018. Otherwise still going well. Since it hasn't died (again) yet, i haven't looked into openenergymonitor any further so far.

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#2518627 7-Jul-2020 16:47

Im still using my efergy, it integrated into HA when i tried it briefly

Just waiting to put it back in after some electrical work

neb

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#2872045 21-Feb-2022 14:25

Updating this after another 18 months, it seems like nothing has changed. In fact we've more or less gone backwards, the Sense is now OEM'd by Schneider Electric but still doesn't work outside the US' peculiar 110V distribution system and the Smappee is either dying/dead or they've switched to some trying-to-find-alternate-revenue-streams model where you can't get it any more, and that's about it for the disaggregation-based power monitors.

Anyone know of any other disaggregation-based monitors? By which I mean ones that'll tell you what's happening per device, not per circuit.

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jpwise

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#2872063 21-Feb-2022 14:39

Just got the thread reply notification. Have to say I haven't look at it again since last time, but you're not kidding about Smappee getting harder to buy. Consumer Purchase is a contact form (maybe they do still sell?), ZenEnergy in AKL only lists the Infinity system at $2k plus.

Only only place semi-local I spotted was an AU supplier that still lists the standard grid kit for $189+tax, or $145+ for the bare unit - https://vpt.com.au/product-category/manufacturer/smappee/ - don't know if they'd ship to NZ.

I still like Smappee as a product, but their customer support (at least when the wifi module failed out of warranty) was pretty sub par, and I'd agree it does look like they may be trying to move towards higher revenue models, since the energy monitor doesn't generate them any money after sale and ongoing cloud/data costs for them to support it.

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neb

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#2872067 21-Feb-2022 14:44

jpwise:
I still like Smappee as a product, but their customer support (at least when the wifi module failed out of warranty) was pretty sub par, and I'd agree it does look like they may be trying to move towards higher revenue models, since the energy monitor doesn't generate them any money after sale and ongoing cloud/data costs for them to support it.

Someone has a Home on TM for something like $120 but I looked at their overall situation and it looks like the product is dying, the last Amazon review for it was four years ago and I don't want to buy something that's effectively EOL'd.

I'd really love to get a Sense before I put in solar to see what I need to deal with, but they've shown no interest in making it work outside the US market.

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#2875293 26-Feb-2022 14:20

I setup power consumption monitoring in Home Assistant and making this meter which monitors the flashing light on your power board. The actual measuring is pretty much bang on to what Meridian charge me for each month.

I also purchased a couple of the Arlec smart plugs with monitoring capabilities from Bunnings and flashed them with Tasmota to put in front of my high energy devices (dryer and server rack), and I use API access to pull charging details from my Tesla.

The end result is I get something like this:

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neb

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#2875325 26-Feb-2022 15:56

Obraik:
I setup power consumption monitoring in Home Assistant and making this meter which monitors the flashing light on your power board.

That's what the Flukso does, except that it interfaces directly to a pulse-count meter. Problem is though that it only gives consumption on monitored circuits rather than per-device information. There seem to be no device-information monitoring devices left available or workable in NZ.

Obraik

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#2875330 26-Feb-2022 16:06

Are you meaning something different when it comes to per-device monitoring? The Arlec plugs I linked let me do per device monitoring - you can see them broken out in the bottom of the screenshot.

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#2875332 26-Feb-2022 16:09

Obraik:
Are you meaning something different when it comes to per-device monitoring? The Arlec plugs I linked let me do per device monitoring - you can see them broken out in the bottom of the screenshot.

I meant power disaggregation where it identifies individual devices from their power signatures and reports on the power usage patterns and usage for each one. So you put a current clamp around the power feed to the house and get reporting on each individual device in the house as far as the disaggregation algorithms are able to distinguish them.

Obraik

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#2875333 26-Feb-2022 16:13

That sounds like it would be difficult to do reliably. Which is probably why they've disappeared

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neb

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#2875337 26-Feb-2022 16:21

Obraik:
That sounds like it would be difficult to do reliably. Which is probably why they've disappeared

It's actually surprisingly effective. And they haven't disappeared, the market winner is still going strong and now being resold by Schneider Electric, it's just that it's US-only. So the long-term hope is that Schneider buy them out and make a non-US version as well.

PolicyGuy

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#2875422 26-Feb-2022 18:15

neb:
Obraik:

That sounds like it would be difficult to do reliably. Which is probably why they've disappeared

It's actually surprisingly effective. And they haven't disappeared, the market winner is still going strong and now being resold by Schneider Electric, it's just that it's US-only. So the long-term hope is that Schneider buy them out and make a non-US version as well.

I'd say that the North American market (USA & Canada, I don't know about Mexico) is substantially different from Europe & Australasia.
As well as 60 / 50Hz, the fact that NA houses appear to be generally bigger than ours - longer cable runs, and the use of 110VAC means that the NA markets have many fewer - often only one - devices / outlets per circuit, so an average house has two or three times as many circuits as a 230 / 240VAC does.

That must make for substantial differences in device signal recognition for the device power consumption monitoring widget.

A 50Hz / 230-250VAC gizmo may be quite a big step.

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