Warning!
This app described in this article will be deprecated soon, and will be replaced with the new Microgrid module.
The new module is natively integrated into the platform, available in Analytics and Dashboards, and offers a much quicker bulk setup.
Jump to the Microgrid module support article, and start using this new functionality.
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In this article, you will learn how to use the Microgrid App.
Contents of the article:
Introduction
This application allows you to track your Microgrid, analysing the Energy Balance between the generation (i.e: PV plant), storage and energy consumption of your sites.
Getting started
To start, you must install the app from the Market Apps of your account.
Once the App is installed, a new tab will appear in the locations settings of each location of your account called Microgrid Configuration:
This is where the configuration of the app is done for each of the locations that you are willing to analyse.
As you can see, the configuration of this app is divided into four elements, that are directly related to the same those elements in your installations:
- Generation: It will represent the generation system at your site. The energy is thought to flow uni-directionally, from the generation system to the Microgrid.
- Storage: It will represent the battery at your site. For this element, bidirectional flows of energy are allowed. The battery is not compulsory for using the app.
- Grid: It will represent the interaction of your site with the grid, i.e. the electricity imports and exports. That's why this element accepts bidirectional flows of energy as well. It is not necessary that your installation exports energy to the grid.
- Load: It will represent the total consumption of your building. In case you do not have any meter monitoring this consumption, you could create a virtual device that represents it.
In the following section, you will learn how to configure each of these 4 elements.
Setup
Grid
- Click on the + button of the main screen
- Add a configuration name for the grid device
- Select the device that contains the grid import data and the device that contains the grid export data
[Note] If you do not export to the grid, leave this space blank.
Load
- Click on the + button of the main screen
- Add a configuration name for the load device
- Select the device that contains the building load data and the device that contains the temperature data
Generation
- Click on the + button of the main screen
- Add a configuration name for the generation device
- Select the device that contains the PV Production data, the device that contains the Irradiation (parameter 338 - Solar Radiation Energy) and the device that contains the temperature data (parameter 701 - Device Temperature)
- Define the Installed PV Power by adding the Inverter Nominal Power, the Peak Power and the Performance Ratio Threshold of the PV Plant.
Storage
- Click on the + button of the main screen
- Add a configuration name for the storage device
- Select the device that contains the Charge data and the device that contains the Discharge data
- Define the Properties of the Storage device by adding the device that contains the State of charge information, the device that contains the temperature information, (parameter 701 - Device Temperature), the Nominal Voltage and the Capacity
And that's it, let's Analyse now!
Analysis
There are 3 different main screens in the Analysis section of this app:
Energy Balance
The Energy Balance section is the main screen of the Analysis: the big summary of your Microgrid.
The screen is divided into 2 sections: the graph and the summary table.
Graph
In this graph you can visualise and analyse many different bars of energy in any frequency, from 15min to monthly, and for the customised period that you select of the desired Location:
- The Energy Generation of the site.
- Main Loads of consumed energy of each site.
- Grid imports, the energy imported from the grid.
- Grid exports, energy generated by the prosumer that is exported to the grid.
- and finally the energy remainders. Ideally, the amount of positive energy (produced or from the grid...) should equal the negative energy (consumed by the building or exported to the grid...). When this is not happening, the amount of energy needed to balance the positive and negative energy values is defined as remainder. The ideal reminder is therefore 0.
In case the prosumer's Microgrid has a storage unit, you will also see:
- Battery charges
- and battery discharges
Notice that on the top left of the graph you can change the visualisation from stacked to lines or flow.
You can also select and unselect the different parameters to visualise in the graph.
Metrics
Self-consumption ratio is an indicator that you can visualise on the top right of the graph. It shows the percentage of renewable energy consumption VS your total building's consumption.
The self-consumption ratio represents the percentage of production that is converted into self-consumption (generation - grid export):
where
- generation: energy produced by your solar installation
-
grid export: energy produced by your solar installation that is exported to the grid
Summary table
Under the graph, you can visualise 2 summary tables:
- One shows the Microgrid's energy inputs, i.e. Grid Import, Production and Battery discharge (if applicable).
- And another one summarising the Microgrid's energy outputs, i.e. Grid Export, Loads and Battery charge (if applicable).
You can compare both groups of data with the Previous period or with the Same period last year.
Storage
The Storage tab is only activated when your Microgrid has a storage unit configured in the app's settings. Otherwise, you will get a message indicating that you don't have storage configured.
In the graph of this screen, you can visualise and analyse, from 15min to monthly frequencies, and for the customised period that you select of the desired location, the following variables:
- Battery discharges, identifying when the building has used the energy gathered from the batteries, on top of the energy produced and/or imported from the grid.
- Battery charges, indicating the moments in which the batteries have been charged.
- The State of Charge, the level of charge of the battery relative to its capacity in percentage.
- And the Battery's temperature, to analyse and prevent overloads.
Notice that you can select and unselect the different parameters to visualise in the graph:
Generation
In the Generation screen, you will be able to analyse more deeply the Energy Production of your Microgrid.
The screen is divided into 2 sections: the graph and the summary table.
Graph
In this graph, you can visualise and analyse in any frequency, from 15min to monthly, and for the customised period that you select of the desired location, the following variables:
- Energy Production of the building.
- External temperature gathered from a weather station.
- PV Module temperature to detect deviations in the Production (if applicable).
- Irradiation on the selected location (if applicable).
- and the performance ratio of the PV plant, calculated taking into account the irradiation and the installation's peak power.
Notice that you can select and unselect the different parameters to visualise in the graph:
Metrics
The performance ratio is an indicator that you can visualise in the Generation tab. It shows the relation between the actual and theoretical energy outputs of the PV plant.
This ratio is usually defined as the percentage of the theoretical generation potential that is converted into effective generation:
which can be written equivalently:
Peak sun hours can be calculated as follows,
And these formulas, combined, lead to the formula used in the platform to calculate the performance ratio:
where
- generation: data from the device configured in the field "PV production", in the generation section of the app configuration.
- solar irradiation: calculated from the solar irradiance parameter, which corresponds to the device in the field "irradiation", in the generation section of the app configuration.
- peak power: value from the field peak power [kW], in the generation section of the app configuration.
The peak sun hours in the app's table are calculated with the formula:
where
- generation: data from the device configured in the field "PV production", in the generation section of the app configuration .
- peak power (in STC conditions): value from the field peak power (kW), in the generation section of the app configuration.
Summary table
Under the graph, you can visualise a summary table with some details (total, median, max, min) about each parameter visualised in the selected period.