smartenit 5010T ZBPCM

[MarioLanning]

Thinking of getting one, question though. I have 2 power meters, one is the utility and the other is the 13Kw solar array I have on my roof. Does the ISY allow 2 and let me make one as power generated?

 

Also, I fond no documentation on what power meters are supported.

 

Thanks

[paulbates]

Hi Mario

 

The ISY, if used with the optional Zigbee ZS card and modules, provides the client side zigbee connection to the meter.  I'm not sure how this device fits in with the ISY.

 

And from my experience 

• Make sure your power company will allow you connection to the meter before you buy.. Mine would not
• The ISY can only connect to one at a time. 

Paul

[larryllix]

Energy meters can have communication PCBs added to them or not and it may not be ZigBee at all. The meter type does not usually specify if they have the capability.

 

I worked for a distribution utility that doesn't offer the customer to connect to their system, period. They offer online reporting on a website though.

[Teken]

Thinking of getting one, question though. I have 2 power meters, one is the utility and the other is the 13Kw solar array I have on my roof. Does the ISY allow 2 and let me make one as power generated?

 

Also, I fond no documentation on what power meters are supported.

 

Thanks

 

Hello Mario,

 

There are several things you will need to find out as Paul noted below.

 

1. Is the device supported by the ISY Series Controller - You can see this by looking at the supported hardware via the drop down list.

 

2. Does the utility in your area allow the consumer to connect to the meter. It should be noted most if not all POCO's use the ZigBee Energy Profile and RF communications protocol. You will be hard pressed to find anything else beside a random POCO testing *potential* hardware under trials in v1 deployments.

 

3. The UDI web sales indicates the current hardware for energy monitoring / energy management. Keeping in mind there is a distinction one supports third party energy monitoring hardware. Where as the other assumes a utility meter which uses ZigBee and that POCO allows third party devices to connect and enroll to said device.

 

For third party energy management / energy monitoring there is the UDI version which I have never heard of anyone using or having. Then there is direct support for Brultechs ECM-1240 and Green Eye Monitor (GEM).

 

4. The ISY Series Controller does indeed support multiple third party energy monitors. How many that is I completely forget but its more than one for sure.

 

5. As noted by Paul if you ever decide to get serious about energy monitoring / energy management. You can only have one daughter board connected to support either Z-Wave vs ZigBee. Keeping in mind the ZigBee card only supports the *Energy* profile and nothing more.

 

Meaning it doesn't support anything outside of energy like Home Automation (HA). Due to ZigBee's stupid deployment of the protocol which has pretty much hobbled the industry as a whole.  

[KeviNH]

While ZigBee's Smart Energy Profile (SEP) is the most well-known radio link from meters, Itron ERT-enabled meters broadcast usage data using a simpler radio protocol meant for meter reading.    Unlike ZigBee SEP, this transmitter is (usually) always on and does not require permission from your power company to "connect" to your meter.  I see transmissions from not just power, but also water and gas meters!

 

The most common Automatic Meter Reader (AMR) broadcasts current and historical readings via a simple cleartext RF transmission in the 900Mhz ISM band, can be decoded with a twenty dollar SDR dongle and some free software.
 
I've tried setting up RTL-AMR receiving and decoding on a Raspberry Pi 3.   The computer can handle the radio receiver code, but falls behind when trying to receive and decode the transmissions on a single rPi, realy needs a faster computer.    You'd need to be running ISY v5 and set up a node server if you want to make use of AMR-received power data in your ISY programs.

---

5. As noted by Paul if you ever decide to get serious about energy monitoring / energy management. You can only have one daughter board connected to support either Z-Wave vs ZigBee. Keeping in mind the ZigBee card only supports the *Energy* profile and nothing more.

Agreed. If you decide to get serious about energy monitoring, you'll probably want to go with per-circuit "clamp on" CT metering in the breaker panel rather than whole-house totals at the meter, there's a thread about that: http://forum.universal-devices.com/topic/17817-suggestions-on-energy-metering/

[Teken]

Also keep in mind if someone is truly dedicated in obtaining the energy data from a meter depending on type, style it may still be doable. The older rotating disk style have several third party vendors that watch and read the black stripe passing through.

 

If you have this sort of rotating disk do a search and you will find hardware that supports it. For those with the digital meters again depending on brand, model, style, some offer a LED pulse which can be read by a pulse sensor.

 

As KevinNH clearly noted if you're even remotely serious about getting into energy monitoring / energy management then you must use something that monitors each circuit in the home like I do via the Brultech Dash Box / GEM combination. The reality is none of this is sexy and hence why the market has never really taken off.

 

Regardless of how unsexy it is - managing your energy will save you real money which can allow you to buy sexy things!