Smart meter regrets?

[Umski]

Hello folks,

Sorry lurker from a couple of years ago and fell off the radar for various reasons

My last project was a Solis RAI AC with US5000 pack - all was going swimmingly for the last couple of years, I was even considering a mild increase in capacity by adding a US2000 but was waiting for another price drop...

Then I decided that it was time for a Smart meter from Octopus after being nagged, thinking that with my mini-split and battery, something like the Cosy would be an interesting first option. Install went well and off we go...BUT for the fact that the old meter (digital spinning 200 spins dial type) barely registered any increment over the day whilst the battery charged/discharged, while my hot water diverter was able to make use of the excess and "slack" and everything was good - the smart meter on the other hand (with the Octopus mini) is regularly seeing small Wh increments, which over time add up - to the point where the other day fully working on solar/battery my import was 0.28kWh - now I can tweak the diverter (Open Emon) to minimise this effect when diverting, but the Solis uses a CT and Acrel and there's no way to refine that it seems. I wouldn't mind a marginal export, but it seems to register about 20W import when charging and something in single figures when discharging - it may be Wh but those add up to kWh over the month

So my regret is that I am now paying for import which previously wasn't even registering - I am on deemed export otherwise I could somewhat offset the import with an export tariff...

I guess it's a one way street now - anyone have any similar experience or thoughts?

[AE-NMidlands]

My understanding was that what is reported in-house on a current basis isn't very accurate, especially at negligable flows, but the overall metered amount (read off the meter itself or by summing the octopus account half-hour amounts) is as good as it physically can be - as it is a quality-assured meter being used for billing purposes.

[Umski]

Sure, I get that, the Octopus mini updates every 10 sec or so - but the 5 and 30 minute reporting it also collects on the bar graph the app displays subsequently adds up all those Wh which is where I've been keeping an eye - as I said, Tuesday should have been an "no import" day but it totted up 0.28kWh once the 30m/day readings went off into the Octopus ether...

Clearly the electronic meters are far more accurate so one could argue that I'd been getting "free" leccy for the last 12 years with the PV and battery - but the point is I shouldn't need to but the tolerances have closed up making it harder not to import those few electrons I don't really need

[Moxi]

I got a smart meter recently too and it does capture the imported power more accurately but the small increase there is massively offset by access to much better smart tarrifs so overall I am much better off.

Moxi

[Umski]

Thanks, I remember you being very helfpul with my past endeavours Which tariff are you currently opting for out of curiosity? I joined the two "saving session" but don't have the results yet - I know you can game it a bit but our use is generally low at present so I suspect the savings were in the Wh range

[Moxi]

Hi Umski
I’m on octopus go as I only charge the car on my type two charger, but that does well for us as I charge the car and the house battery and run two oil rads through the cheap slot each morning then work off the batteries till the next scheduled period. The induction hob usually causes us to import maybe a quarter kilowatt for a day and the average unit paid for a month is in the 9.n pence region so I don’t worry about the import fraction. As the solar gain increases I will be able to cut down the house battery charge and use solar generation direct. We use some smart plugs to knock off the sky box and TVs and a few other things after we go to bed and that knocks down the vampire loads too.

All in all I think the move to smart meter was good although I still harbour my big brother worries but that’s just me being paranoid - so the wife tells me anyway.

Moxi