Domoticz and PvOutput.org
What is PVOutput.org?
PVOutput.org is a free service for sharing, comparing and monitoring live solar photovoltaic (PV) and energy consumption data. You can integrate Domoticz data with PVOutput.org.
Uploading data to PVoutput
You can upload a lot of data if it meets the requirements of PVOutput. The main purpose is using the PV- and netdata but there are several other possibilities (specially when in Donation mode), for example your gas consumption, water consumption, hot water consumption, temperature solar heater, etc.
Below are some of the key features of PVOutput:
- Automatic uploads of live energy generation, consumption and temperature data
- Graph and tabluate data in live, daily, weekly, monthly and yearly intervals
- Search and discover similar solar installations within a geographical area
- Compare live or daily data with another system, past date or postcode
- Team up with others to combine generation data
- Bulk data loading facilities to upload history data
- Open API to automate data uploads and downloads
- Email alerts when your live system becomes idle or uses excessive power
- Photos, favourites and filtering capabilities
- Mobile apps available for Android, iPhone and Windows Mobile
Hardware
There is a lot of hardware you can use to upload to PvOutput. Some inverters have the PVOutput uploads integrated, Some inverters are SMA , Growatt , Enphase, etc.. A List of options
There are also many open source projects using for example the hardware below:
- Arduino
- Netduino
- Raspberry Pi
Software
There are many ways to upload the data to PVOutput, the main groups are:
- Manual, using the bulk uploader
- Automatic, using the auto uploader
- Automatic, using the Service Integration
- Or with PVOutput Third Party Software which are according the API Specification.
One of the third party software is SolarMeter on codeplex (a very nice Dutch product!). It's one of the simplest and probably the best :-) Definitely my favorite. Built on an Arduino with Ethernet Shield, so very cheap. If you built it yourself a complete SolarMeter system probably cost you about €65 (incl S0 meter). A disadvantage is that the SolarMeter has no voltage upload. There is a good support forum on Wijhebbenzon and Harold also provides very good support to codeplex.
Some nice extras:
- Upload the gasmeter positions every night to Mindergas.nl.
- Output visible in Exosite with different gauges and charts.
Using Lua scripts to upload data from Domoticz to PVoutput
If the energy data is already available, you can use this wiki for an example how to get this up and running. In this section of the Domoticz-wiki an alternative lua-script (applying inputdata from an S0PCModule) can be found at http://www.domoticz.com/forum/viewtopic.php?f=23&t=5006#p43815
Using Python script to upload data from Domoticz to PVoutput
If the energy data is already available, you can use this Python-script to upload your data to PVoutput.
It is not necessary to have solarpanels, the script can also be used to only upload your energyconsumption data. Be sure to change the settings in the script and the settings at PVoutput to be confident that you don't upload your consumption as production (it will mess up the stats generated by PVoutput).
Integrated Domoticz PVOutput data importer
There are several options to log data of your energy/water consumption or your power generation to PvOutput (Example of a PVoutput log). Domoticz can import most of this data directly from PvOutput. To do this, follow the instructions below.
- Go to "Hardware"
- Fill in the name field with a desired name (like "PVoutput import")
- Choose for type "PVOutput (Input)"
- Under UserID (translated "Gebruikersnaam" in dutch) fill in your "PVoutput System ID" number and as password your "PVoutput API key". Both can be found in your PVoutput account under "Settings".
- Click on "Add".
Now there are 5 new devices added to your Domoticz device list.
- Power generation (Current and total)
- Efficiency
- Temperature (when it is uploaded to PvOutput)
- Voltage (Only available when it's uploaded to PvOutput)
- Power consumption (Only available when it's uploaded to PvOutput) (total is not correct @ the moment)
- An option in the future might be the other parameters from PvOutput V7 - V12, for other data you can upload to PvOutput in donation mode.
Go to the devices tab and add them to your system by clicking the green arrow and give them a name.
Note: It can take some time before the first data is transferred from PVOutput to Domoticz, after that it should update with the same frequency as the data is uploaded to PVOutput.
Thanks to
And of course not to forget !
Big thanks to Harold65, and Rob.