When looking ahead over a decade, one needs to be sure that the battery doesn't depend on monitoring, signals or commands from proprietary external services.

If any management operations rely on a 'server' belonging to the supplier, then they needing checking at the outset.
The loss of communications with a remote server should still allow the battery to continue operating, albeit with some possible loss of features.

Both NESO and DESNZ are pursuing strategies which are reliant on external commands as part of the 'future grid'.

I'm not against having 'smart operation' for home-based energy products, but I think

• the smart features should be integral to the device, not imposed by external commands
• autonomous operation in response to data from the local area grid is a better match for the pattern of distributed generation we are moving to
• smartness should be based on more than just price

The question to those with Powerwalls and Tesla EVs must be "what functionality remains if Tesla's data network fails?"

We generated 410kWh in March from a 4kW system installed in 2012. So paid £315 or so. Sweet

Posted by: @transparent

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When looking ahead over a decade, one needs to be sure that the battery doesn't depend on monitoring, signals or commands from proprietary external services.

If any management operations rely on a 'server' belonging to the supplier, then they needing checking at the outset.
The loss of communications with a remote server should still allow the battery to continue operating, albeit with some possible loss of features.

Both NESO and DESNZ are pursuing strategies which are reliant on external commands as part of the 'future grid'.

I'm not against having 'smart operation' for home-based energy products, but I think

• the smart features should be integral to the device, not imposed by external commands
• autonomous operation in response to data from the local area grid is a better match for the pattern of distributed generation we are moving to
• smartness should be based on more than just price

 

The question to those with Powerwalls and Tesla EVs must be "what functionality remains if Tesla's data network fails?"

To be frank, I don't know of any inverters/batteries that don't have a physical console to offer the ability to change settings, so I suspect pretty much any system bought would be able to continue doing its stuff ad infinitum if, for instance, the householder's Internet line became unavailable.

That said, I'm pretty sure the average householder would find a regime of button-prodding (possibly outside in the cold rain) whilst squinting at a small LCD screen in torchlight rather too much of a faff to put up with. Since I have experienced plenty of hugely underwhelming functionality from under-performing and badly designed apps for controlling some of my kit, I can attest to the sigh of relief when I was able to connect to my inverter by a local connection and use that to manage everything. As a result, whilst I have no problem with people making use of the apps supplied I strongly agree that any kit someone buys should have at very least a port available for providing a local connection (usually RS485 for modbus) so the householder has a modicum of choice and, therefore, control.

Posted by: @majordennisbloodnok

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To be frank, I don't know of any inverters/batteries that don't have a physical console to offer the ability to change settings,

PowerVault.

Wow! Seriously no buttons anywhere?

PowerVault solar/battery units require a constantly 'live' internet link.
If you lose the link, then you're blind.

Their data is in the cloud and visible about 3-mins later via a web-page.

That's where you can monitor what's happening and have a small amount of control over schedules.

But you cannot, for example alter the balance of how much solar generation is stored and how much exported to the grid.
The only option is for it to first fill the battery and then export (but only up to the permitted current of course).

So you can have afternoons where the battery is now full, and all generation above 3.68kW is discarded.

PowerVault are not the only company which offers a 100% Managed Service.

But I don't have first-hand experience of using the others, so I'm loathe to mention them by name.

Looks like our March numbers are echoing what the MET office has had to say:

https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/about-us/news-and-media/media-centre/weather-and-climate-news/2025/a-record-breaking-march-for-sunshine

Posted by: @transparent

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PowerVault solar/battery units require a constantly 'live' internet link.
If you lose the link, then you're blind.

Their data is in the cloud and visible about 3-mins later via a web-page.

That's where you can monitor what's happening and have a small amount of control over schedules.

But you cannot, for example alter the balance of how much solar generation is stored and how much exported to the grid.
The only option is for it to first fill the battery and then export (but only up to the permitted current of course).

So you can have afternoons where the battery is now full, and all generation above 3.68kW is discarded.

 

PowerVault are not the only company which offers a 100% Managed Service.

But I don't have first-hand experience of using the others, so I'm loathe to mention them by name.

I find that sobering and not in a good way.

When we first got our Growatt inverter and battery, I was loath to experiment with telling it to charge the battery from grid since, if my Internet line went down my app wouldn't be able to tell the inverter to revert to its "load first" mode and I didn't understand the physical controls well enough. But at least even then I still had those physical controls so I wouldn't be stuck until kingdom come having to charge the battery at whatever was the going rate. I see that fallback as absolutely essential; indeed I want to have a plan B in most aspects of my life.

@majordennisbloodnok Yeap, worry or not, the battery life may or may not last 8, 10, 12 or more years - who knows? I am just signing up for Octopus Intelligent Flux, so my battery is going to be more heavily exercised than it has in the past - I hope that almost doubling the returns on export in the summer months will make it worthwhile! Toodles.

Posted by: @majordennisbloodnok

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I find that sobering and not in a good way.

Indeed.

Whilst PowerVault's intention might be to simplify the process of having a battery installed at home,
they have ended up with a product which lends itself to miss-selling by unscrupulous agents.

The concept of a 100% Managed Service initially appears to be reassuring for those who have no grasp of technology.
But how could the bill-payer know whether they have been sold a service which truly benefits them?

The reason I could tell what was happening was because I installed additional monitoring.

I also had sufficient grasp of the principles that I could correctly interpret the graph when things went wrong.
Here, for example, is a software failure just before 1pm:

Even if a householder spotted that, by actively viewing the monitoring data,
how could they tell if it was a fault within their own unit, or an error in the commands being sent by PowerVault themselves?

The way in which these Managed Storage products are sold means that it's unlikely that an owner is going to pop up here on the forum.
They probably lack sufficient understanding to adequately frame a question.

Our March generation was 133% of our PVGIS prediction at 400kWh generated versus 300kWh predicted from our south facing 3.645kWp array.

Now winter is over, I can confidently say our solar production for the year (since installation) will exceed our ASHP consumption.

Still waiting on the outcome of our G99 application to double our solar array and add battery storage.