Negative prices > stop or reduce Solar production

[FKey]

The season of negative prices has started again.
Homeycan help maximising the use.

But sometimes, theres just too much production and prices are very negative (like todayin NL)

So I started looking into solutions to reduce the production or even switch off the panels.

Flipping the circuit breaker is a way, but it is not adviced to do that during full production and more important hard to be managed by homey.

I found the Solaredge+Growatt modbus app has the option to reduce the power delivery.
To install it just follow the instructions in the forum thread. (Login to your solaredge to activate modbus and link the solaredge in the app).
Now you can reduce power using this card.(zero will shut the panels down)

For enphase (I do not have the metered inverter, but the standard) it requires a bit of hardware.

The enphase has a “DRM” port that can be used to shut down your panels in a controlled way.

When you remove or shortcut (both works) the resistor (mounted from factory) a signal is sent to the micro inverters to shut down.
I bought a shelly plus 1 mini (that has potential free switch) that can be controlled via homey.

Testing that setup now, works fine. Although I can only shutdown not reduce power

I was inspired by these forums:
Home assistant

Enphase

[Falcovd]

Yesterday i was resarching this solution as well, so the Shelly is on my way now

I was wondering if the solution was working straight ahead, or did you(r installer) need to activate something in the Enphase Envoy meter? I saw in a installation manual that the installer needed to install the DRM interface (maybe they just meant the hardware, dunno)

[FKey]

No installer involvement needed for any firmware.
But to install the sessy you might neeed an installer.
(Only work on electricity if you know what you are doing)

[B4ZZY]

This is great. Got myself the same set-up, but turning it off is working, but turning it back on is the issue…
Just to make sure I got my wires straight.. ()
I port wires it to the 1st port
O port wires to the 3rd port
L to L
N to N
The resistor will remain in place. (Port 1 to 3)

Am I missing anything?
Please let me know.
Thanks in Advance

[FKey]

@B4ZZY

I port wires it to the 1st port
O port wires to the 3rd port

Thats correct,
Its a switch so mixing port 1and 3 does not matter either.

@B4ZZY

L to L
N to N

Yup also good

@B4ZZY

but turning it back on is the issue…

How did you determine that?
Did you check the homey app of the panels?
Or did you check the P1 port?

I also noticed that it takes some time before values show in the homey app of the solar panels.
But on my P1 readout I can see they are delivering again

[B4ZZY]

I’ve installed it last night and switched it on and off multiple times during the day but as you can see on the enphase screenshot it only started to deliver at 6pm when I removed Shelly completely.
During the day the P1 meter also did not get any solar input.

The resistor needs to remain in place right?

I might try it later tonight with some thinner wires as 2.5mm2 wires did not fit with the resistor. I then installed it with 1.5mm2 wires which seems to connect better but the wires may be too stiff.
Perhaps a 1.0mm2 threaded wire might work. I’ll try tonight again.
Thanks for the help so far!

[FKey]

@B4ZZY

The resistor needs to remain in place right?

Yes!

• If you remove the resistor delivery will stop
• If you shortcut the resistor delivery will stop

[B4ZZY]

Tried it with thinner wires, but still can’t get this to work…
I’m
Unable to get the solar delivery to get back on again.
Tried taking in step by step by only creating a loop between port 1 and 3 see picture.
Tested it for an hour and still no solar delivery.
Normally looping it should work right?
Thanks for your help in advance.

[FKey]

Someone reported the same issue as you have here

[FKey]

Maybe try the other way

So put the relais in series instead of in parallel.

Tthat should have the same effect

Reading this thread it looks like the swittching behaviour can be configured in the installer app.

Maybe your settings are different
(i do not have an installer account so cannot check)
If level2 is also set to 0 in your case it woul return to…zero

[Patrick_Speetjens1]

https://enphase.com/en-au/download/setting-pv-power-production-limit-tesla-powerwall-2-tech-brief

I think this can help

The relays need to be connected with [1/5] and [COM]. And also do the settings to program the relay

[FKey]

@Patrick_Speetjens1

I think this can help

This is a completely different setup.
Its for connecting the low voltage (12v) relais of a tesla wall to the IQ gateway.

The setup I was describing is doet not require a low voltage relais, just a relais switch (shortcut)

Dont know what will happen if you shortcut ports [1/5] and [COM] instead of providing 12V

[Patrick_Speetjens1]

As how i read it the tesla battery is just a relay. The low voltage (12v) is on [1/5] or an other relayport if you like. The [Com] is the neutral.
They are talking about a low voltage relay because the tesla relay is not suitable for high voltage. But seems to be a normal relay because they are talking about open and close.

The enphase installer portal has the option for 4 relay ports (16 possibilities).
So the ports must be [1/5],[2/6],[3/7] and [4/8]. So in the future (in the Netherlands 2027<)you can add more relays so you can use different power limitations to come close to your home use.

[Patrick_Speetjens1]

Your solution is working?

I tried to connect [1/5] with [com] but that is not working.

[FKey]

For me its working fine, but same setup is not working for @B4ZZY

[FKey]

There are several DRM (Demand Response Management) options define by Enphase

But according to an answer from enphase in this post only DRM0 is supported.
(Its a year old post, maybe they support more now)