Meter Reading Relay Control

[fsolanes]

Im looking for a solution to prevent feeding to grid my excess power from my Enphase Inverters, my utility company is not permitting me to feed any of my excess PV energy.
I found the EKM Meter may be just the product I need.

Id like to set this system up to basically trigger a relay to a dump load or power diversion device when power on the meter reaches a certain value, and obviously reset when the value resets to a certain threshold. It may not sound pretty but at this point I have a 4KW Roof PV setup thats been off for 4 Months
Ive looked at some other AC Coupling alternatives but all come at a really high $$ amount. And really they are not that much nicer considering the investment. This Sub $1K solution may just get me back online
Is this possible? Anyone on this forum have any other ideas that may help? I have done some reading and it looks like the relay control part is a road map part of this product but Im not sure really where that stands?

Thank you anyone for your input and help.

[Jameson]

Hello fsolanes, welcome to the forum!

We would like to offer this functionality. For now all we can offer is triggers via the EKM Dash software.

There is more information here: http://forum.ekmmetering.com/viewtopic. ... gger#p6246

If you setup the EKM Dash Triggers, you can have it email you if your watts is over a certain amount or under a certain amount for x number of reads. The next step would be to change the EKM Dash Triggers to be able to change a v.4 meter relay if a trigger fires.

So you could conceivably setup your EKM Dash to sense when you are sending too much power to the grid and switch a relay to either turn off your power to the grid, or use the excess power to run a pump, heat water, charge an electric car, etc.

To be clear, we do not have exactly what you want right now, but it is on the roadmap.

Thanks,

[Carbazole]

I think adding the functionality of controlling a relay via some kind of meter reading trigger should be a priority and not a nice to have. Currently the description of the EKM Omnimeter Pulse v.4 - Pulse Counting, Relay Controlling, Universal Smart Electric Meter suggests very strongly that this can already be done:

"This universal kWh meter can be used on nearly any electrical system in common use and can also count pulses from up to 3 pulse-output devices, as well as control up to 2 external relays."

It's a very nice meter, but I would not have purchased it if I realized that it couldn't activate it's relays automatically. If this can be rectified quickly (I note the last post was several months ago and the poster was told it's on the roadmap) you will make at least this customer happy

[Jameson]

Thank you Carbazole for your feedback!

Yes, it is still on the roadmap, we have been working on some other improvements to the EKM Dash in the meantime, including some stuff to do with Triggers and how the triggers are implemented and logged. This will be useful when we implement triggers that control relays.

We are looking at where to head next, and I will definitely personally be rooting for this feature because I think you are right that it could add a lot of value to our offerings (and it will be fun to work on!)

Just a heads up that this will be the EKM Dash controlling the meter via triggers, so the Dash will have to be running and the meter will be controlled via USB converter or iSerial (not EKM Push).

[Jameson]

We have just released a new version of the EKM Dash (v2.0) that allows for trigger based relay control using a USB converter, or EKM iSerial, and the Omnimeter Pulse v.4.

This new feature offers some interesting new uses. You could choose to turn of a switch if your watts was over 4000 for 3 meter reads, or turn off a water valve when your measured gallons went above 10,000 gallons, or turn off a fan if the voltage was too low, or run your pool pump when you had solar electricity available, for example.

More info about the Trigger feature is available here:
https://help.ekmmetering.com/support/so ... -4-and-up-

If you haven’t yet downloaded v2.0 (it’s free for existing Dash users) you will be prompted to do so when you open your current Dash version. Let us know what you think!