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PengEF

Hi All,

Now that I have my spiffy new PV system and it's merrily telling me how much it is generating each day I find I want to know what I am using on the consumer side more than ever. I have always wanted to do this since I decided to get PV and have been reading anything I can find on the net about it. However most systems seem to use some form of current clamp and vary from somewhat inaccurate to what could be called best guess if being polite and downright lies if not.

So just thought I would ask some of you experts what you have seen done, have used or know about that can accurately measure the amount of electricity I am actually using.

Thanks.
 
Most of the CT systems for 'energy monitoring' - GEO, CUrrent COst etc, are wildly inaccurate...they will give you an idea, but that's about it.

Others may be able to recomend one, I can't, and I've been looking for ages.

Almost all the manufacturers have sent me theirs to test and I still can't recommend one that is sensibly priced - yet .. I have one that is supposed to be the dogs **** coming in the next week or so, I can give you feedback then.

Until that time, if you are up to it, the most accurate one at a reasonable price that IO know if is this one: Home | OpenEnergyMonitor
 
Hi Mate
I've been using a GEO SOLO PV system for the last 2 months since our install.
I have found the readings to be accurate - no more than 0.5kw out over a 7 day period.
What i do is monitor generation totals using the Geo Solo and get a final balancing read of the gen meter once a week (ish)
Cheers
Dave
 
I'm using a Current Cost Optismart to monitor our generation but it's main purpose is to monitor usage although it can do both if you have 2 transmitters.
The transmitter attaches to the LED on your meter and counts the pulses.
The receiver (Envir) can be connected to a PC to upload your data to pvoutput.org or similar.
Its also pretty accurate, I usually need to adjust our figures on pvoutput by around 1kwh a week.
 
Thanks for input so far all. I have looked at the open energy org site Worcester but they seem to be going down the energy clamp route and I am not convinced it's the right one.

Wasn't sure about the LED things as I didn't know how they worked mainly because my main meter is in a big green bubble that I can't get to. But now I have something similar for the generation meter I see that this maybe has potential and understand what it does better now. So thinking about it if I paid to have anther one of these meters installed between the PV joint and the consumer unit it would measure the power being used and I could stick an LED counter on that and get fairly accurate usage that way couldn't I?
 
Let me put it like this ..... all the three phase meters we install are CT based measuring 1/1000 of kWh, accuracy is down to the design of the system. They are fully certified.

A well designed CT system will always be the best as it allows you to monitor what you want to. Well designed ones don't come cheap though..
 

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