Yes. Mind you I still haven’t made it to my battery/solar solution and a currently researching that part but smart panels 100% I’d do it again.
The only other panels I’d consider right now are the ones from Schneider Electric (Square Ds parent company). At this point I would not do new construction without the smart panel if i can avoid it as long as the smart part of the panel comes at less than about $2-3KUSD premium over a standard panel.(ill give them that because you’re basically paying for a panel frame PLUS a hardened SOC / monitoring platform built in no matter who’s solution you buy. And if they aren’t collecting money from you as a service they need to collect something somewhere to keep thier back end alive…)
I have access to everything I need NOW with available software and panel access. It can only get better. This isn’t like the Mazda thing where yore accessing someone’s service you’re directly connecting to the device. If they at some future point attempt to block access to what I have now. They will have conversations with an attorney. . But based on my conversations with them they know that and I don’t expect THAT to be future issue.
What I’m looking at now is supportability. This thing is a computer wired to your home. (I now have two so odds of ‘whatever random stuff hapoens’ happening to me just doubled)
Tell me how many computers you’ve had last 10 years. Exactly. 20? (were solidly in i386 and retrobrite territory there). Im actually building a list of questions around servicing and future serviceability for my rep. They say it’s designed for the long haul but I also know what Texas heat does to electrolytic capacitors…
The servacing aspect still isn’t anything that would waive me off because at the end of the day the way SPAN is designed is basically a standard breaker box with a computerized load controller bolted on. Which means even of all the electronics fail. I still have power. It just means long term budget planning for repairs.
Would you still go this route given what you know now?
Reluctantly, yes, I would still go with Span, because the functionality (per-circuit load-shedding, monitoring, and control) is highly desirable, and I am not aware of any existing competing solutions. But given Span has not yet documented nor supports the local API, I/we are are on very thin ice should Span be acquired or cease operations.
What is more likely, Schneider Electric (or other BigCo) shipping a smart panel WITH a local API, or Span eventually doing the right thing. I’m still betting on the latter.
Recently I have reviewed the Span installation documents, and I want to qualify/clarify some of my previous comments on this thread:
All my previous comments about how and where to connect an ESS and PV system are based on my experience with the Tesla Powerwall ESS, and an Enphase PV system consisting of microinverters-per-PV-panel connected to an Enphase combiner. So, In my case, the ESS and the PV system are completely distinct, and are AC-coupled. In other words, they do not share an/the inverter. So, based on these components, the ESS sits between the Utility meter and the first/primary Span panel, the output of the Tesla Backup Gateway 2 feeds the input lugs of the first/primary Span. The output of the Enphase Combiner lands on a 2-pole breaker in the bottom two spaces (dedicated for generation) in the main/primary Span panel.
As a detail, there is a CT that measures the output of the Enphase PV Combiner that connects to the Tesla Backup Gateway 2, so the Tesla ESS knows about the PV production.
There are other ways to do it, and there are some existing combined ESS/PV systems, where the PV feeds into the ESS directly, and they share a central inverter.
So, my previous comments do not apply to every other potential system, and you need to work with Span and your installer to design the correct system for you.
For multi-panel Span installations, I have advocated daisy chaining the panels via the feed-thru lugs. I still think that is a great way to do it, but another supported option is to feed another (Span) panel from a 90A (or lower) breaker in the primary Span panel. Of course, if you do so, the total load the connected panel must be less than the breaker.
One important limitation of multi-Span installations: Currently only the panel that is connected to the ESS detects and sheds-loads during a grid outage, the other panels are NOT informed and do not shed loads. This was “news” to me, and I only learned about this very recently. I have it on “good authority” that multi-panel load shedding is a priority enhancement, but who knows when/if this will be fixed.
I am considering writing my own load-shedding daemon, monitor the grid status on the ESS-connected panel, and turn off sheddable loads via the API, but I would much rather Span just fixed this…
3 months in, I would definitely still go with Span. While it has challenges, ultimately there is nothing better IMHO at this time.
I do think Span will “get there” in support for HA sooner or later, as one or two of their Devs frequent the GH repos for the integration I use and seem to be genuinely invested in making sure we get some form or direct support from them, even if unofficial. What little insight they have been able to share does show that span had a an MVP effort at best (“minimum viable product”) for API/external support at launch that was lightly documented and featured, but does have some serious thought put into aspects of it. Over the time since, they have methodically evolved these components, albeit slowly, in a way that exhibits an honest intent to catch up to where this kind of support should be, now that their core product needs are met.
It’s not out-the-gate perfect, but the intent seems to be there and progress is coming along.
My only catch is, while running the Span integration from gdgib (GitHub - gdgib/span: SPAN Integration for HomeAssistant/HACS), I have noticed once a day every 3-4 days something will “blip” that results in all values from the panel being in an “unknown” state until I reload the integration. I have fixed this however by simply creating an HA automation that monitors one of the Span data points (Power consumed by solar I think is the one I picked) and if it flips from anything notunknown over to an unknown state, then the automation will simply reload that integration immediately, and all is well and no data points are lost. So far so good with that minor tweak!
(Also forgive me if I have rehashed anything discussed at length previously in this thread. I only recently discovered it and have not had time to read back through 2+ years of history, but wanted to answer the recent question based on my experiences.)
I think something happened to my panel? Won’t connect to home assistant and when I push the door close button 3 times the lights flash a few times. The local API still seems to work. Anyone else seen this before?
They’re pushing ab update that is incompatible with the current integrations (they changed what something is called.)
Someone wrote a possible solution to test
The solution Should work for both old and new firmware and I currently have two panels - one on each firmware level but I need access to my panel in daylight to do the proxy detect. I plan on doing it after breakfast (abt 6hrs)
Oh and the flash is confirmation you successfully did the three button press.
Just finished testing. Both panels on both current firmware imported successfully - Just put my stamp on it.
And edit on the flashing
press 1 - nothing
press 2 - flash (I guess it means hey dude you’re about to unlock me)
press 3 - flashing stops. (confirm the action)
I’m a bit stuck with integrating my Span panel using the HACS integration. I had it working for months, but needed to move my HA installation to a new computer. After the move my two Spans failed to connect. I’ve tried removing them from the devices/entities and re-adding them back in, but no luck. I tried deleting the Span HACS installation and reinstalling, but still no luck. The panels aren’t getting auto discovered and adding them manually isn’t working either. When I input the IP address of either panel into the add integration dialogue box, it results in a “failed to connect” message.
And I’ve confirmed that both panels are accessible via their web interface (three door button presses to unlock). Nothing is working. Does anyone have any ideas for troubleshooting steps I should try?
Span is currently pushing firmware that is incompatible with existing integration - they changed something) the branch I’ve tested above (been running on it since late last week) has the fixes you need. I don’t know when it gets merged into the version you’re using though.
Im away from my desk to check. But if you’re feeling adventurous you can follow along in the bug in gdgib’s repo and find out how to get the code if you need it now (it will involve uninstallling and changing the source repo for your code. Then reinstalling)
My Panel updated yesterday shortly after noon. I found the issue on GitHub listed above and I’m hoping the pull request gets merged and pushed publicly shortly. I don’t want to cobble mine together for the interim fix.
I have been hit by the latest update today and I have pulled @sargonas test fix and so far everything is working as intended. If anyone else wants to test this fix add this link to your HACS repo:
Of note, when you hit the blue add repository button and search for Span multiple will now come up as it is now an official HACS Integration (congrats @gdgib !). To check if you have the right Integration go into one and on the upper right 3 vertical dots select “Repository” and it should redirect to sargonas’ repo. Download and go to Devices, for me it identified it immediately after reboot.
The only issue I had was I accidentally hit the auth token (don’t know if that works yet?) and I was locked into selecting that until I rebooted HA again. Be sure to authenticate via proximity and do the 3 button door test and you’re in.
Tested multiple breakers and measured one lead with my clamp meter and amps followed along with the watts it was posting (offhand anyway, still want to track over period to see why reports are not exact).
As others have said, yes… if you are suffering from a broken integration due to the latest firmware, my fork will fix it if you add it manually to your integration.
There is an open PR for it to be merged back in, just waiting for gdgib to acknowledge it. It has only been a week,so I’m giving him a fair share of time for the benefit of the doubt, but if we end up at the end of the year with no response from him then I may look into supplanting the HACS version with my updated one. However that’s a break glass in case of emergency option. (And if I did do that, I would kick my repo out into its own GH Org and share admin with a few other community maintainers so that I am not a bus factor, while at it.)
As someone else said as well, there is a bug if you start the Auth Token flow, you can’t elegantly back out of it. I did not code that flow, it was recently merged into Main pending the next release a few months back by someone else, but I am going to open an issue and tag them on here this week and simultaneously see if I can’t figure out myself how to put in a simple return flow back to the menu if you wind up going down the wrong path.
Detailed instructions are in the README in my repo, but here is an exact CLI example for you (that I just added to the readme as well). Remember to replace the IP with your IP address, and the home-assistant-123435 with a random UID of your choosing, just to be safe.
curl -X POST https://192.168.1.2/api/v1/auth/register -H 'Content-Type: application/json' -d '{"name": "home-assistant-123456", "description": "Home Assistant Local Span Integration"}'
Also bit by the latest firmware update — noticing that the curl against the SSL interface is getting a connection refused. The SPAN panel itself isn’t listening on 443/tcp, so neither version of the integration is working for me. Thinking about reaching out to SPAN support.
PORT STATE SERVICE
22/tcp open ssh
80/tcp open http
111/tcp open rpcbind
8000/tcp open http-alt
8080/tcp open http-proxy
My panel also wasn’t listening on 443. Weirdly, I did set it up about a week ago with the auth token, but it kept asking me to press the button every couple of days or so. I deleted the integration to set it up again hoping it would stop prompting me every few days, but when I tried to make the same call in the same way, I got the same error as @variousplaces.
I was able to make the call over http (no s), and get the access token, but that’s possibly more concerning than if I weren’t. I suppose there’s a reason I set up a vlan only for IoT devices, but this thing punches a hole through to the open web anyway, so listening on port 80 and returning an access token is concerning. @mbbush, it’s been a while since you weighed in here, but this seems worth raising internally.
. But based on my conversations with them they know that and I don’t expect THAT to be future issue.